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bfpnola · 1 year

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Hey. It's @reaux07. If you remember my last angry history rant on Paul Robeson, I'm back for Part 2. This time? King Leopold II and his relationship to the Congo. I just finished writing a 5-page, single-spaced essay on this for class, so I'll do my best to summarize in bullet points this time rather than chunky paragraphs. This will still be long though, as a warning, but it's a necessary read. Please let me get through this, because y'all know this hurts to write.

Trigger warnings for... just about everything typically associated with mass colonization (e.g. rape, murder, torture, etc.). Tiktok below as a brief introduction first:

King Leopold II of Belgium, due to his personal unpopularity and lack of love from his parents, had low self-esteem. As his father had already made 50 attempts to colonize foreign lands to no avail, Leopold felt the only way to uplift both himself and his country was to take take control of his own colony.

He checked Sarawak, the New Hebrides, the Fiji Islands, and the Philippines. Nothing. But what was left? The Congo.

How did he learn of the Congo? Leopold hired Henry Morton Stanley, a famous Welsh explorer of the time, to cross Africa from east to west, walking and canoeing 7,000 miles.

Upon the Congo's discovery, Leopold turned his palace into a luxury hotel for the delegates of a new conference to discuss Africa's colonization, supervising every detail. He successfully lied to the major powers of Europe, making claims of charitable and philanthropic aims, and that there would be free trade amongst the African colonies. (And yes, he did give every single attendee a painting of his face... Because he could.)

Meanwhile, back in the Congo, Stanley (the explorer I just mentioned) used bribes and trickery to provide official treaties with the various chiefs of the land in case Leopold ever needed legal proof of land ownership. (Ex of said trickery: One report noted that a village assumed "the white man controlled the sun.")

In 1891 and 1892, Leopold released decrees stating that both vacant land and produce of the forests exclusively belonged to Belgium and that natives could only harvest for the state.

Enforcing Leopold’s rule were 16,000 Africans equipped with modern Belgian-made automatic rifles.

Outing Attempt #1: One African American man, George Washington Williams, during his trip compiled a report to be sent to the American secretary of state. In this letter, Williams remembers bets being taken on who could shoot the native people in the head first, among other instances of vile treatment. While the document never made it back to Williams’ home country, it was eventually found in Europe where he later died.

By this point, the Congo was actually ruining Leopold’s finances and he was growing desperate. But to his surprise, he happened to pick the one spot where rubber grew in abundance, just as the demand for cars and bicycles rose internationally, John Dunlop, a Scottish veteran, having just invented the first pneumatic tire.

Because of this, rubber-prominent areas were the targets of mass exploitation and punishment if daily and weekly rubber quotas were not met.

Missionaries began to write not just to one another, but back home in disgust of these aforementioned “punishments,” one man’s writings put in missionary magazines and national newspapers in Europe. These punishments included rape, tying people up to trees, cutting off men's heads and genitals to be displayed along the fences of Congolese villages, cutting women’s breasts off, and most notably...

Attempt #2: The world, if only momentarily, saw BASKETS after BASKETS of right hands that had been cut off as proof that each of the cartridges given to the Africans had been fired and killed one of their own people. These hands were then smoked for preservation and brought back to their officers.

What did Leopold do once this information came out alongside photos of child mutilation? Acknowledge the abuses and moved on almost immediately.

In Europe, the rubber was processed in a city called Antwerp, ironically named after a mythological giant who also cut off hands. To this day, the connection between such a name and Belgian history has not been made by the general public as countless documents by the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs are kept secret to maintain an image of untouched royalty.

One commissioner in charge of a district in Congo, Leon Fievez, produced one ton of rubber a day, boasting of 1,000 people killed, 162 villages destroyed, burning gardens and plantations so people would starve, and having “only” used 3,000 cartridges. He was nicknamed the “Devil of the Equator” and rightly so.

Attempt #3: One day, a man named Charles Stokes, a British trader working for the Germans, entered the picture. Stokes was arrested for trading in state territory, despite those former claims of free trade, and sentenced to death. Leopold was forced to pay compensation to both Britain and Germany for his death, both countries now increasingly aware of the Congo’s dark reality.

To cover it up, Leopold made claims of the Congo opening up to new companies. Let's be real: His men were on the boards of all these new companies and he took 50% of the profits.

In particular were these "concession companies" where the "hostage system" was set up. Agencies, with official hostage licenses authorizing such, would take the wives of rubber collectors for up to 15 days until the quota was met.

On the 15th day, the men of the Congo either got their wives back or faced further punishment, often death. For the agents, the 15th day meant it was time to calculate commissions, and for the king? It was proof that this new hostage system worked.

These abusive concession companies lasted over 10 years until formal competition arose in South America and Asia.

Attempt #4: Then came Edmund Dene Morel, a half-French, self-taught shipping clerk turned investigative journalist who wrote in The Speaker of the abuses faced by the Congolese, backed up by evidence, not just speculations.

Due to Morel’s growing specialization in West African affairs, he was able to not only send out 15,000 brochures and 3,700 letters in six months after his move to Wales, but start his own newspaper, West African Mail.

By 1903, Roger Casement, an ally to Morel’s cause, spent two months traveling the upper Congo, recording African testimonies. He, too, realized that missionaries were key witnesses and went to visit Joseph Clark (a missionary of 20 years) for 17 days.

Through these reports, which grew to 50 pages in length, Casement and Morel were able to solidify Belgium as perpetuating the worst colonial system Africa had ever known. Punishments included Africans performing public incest for the colonists' entertainment, decapitation, women being stabbed with wooden spikes up their vaginas, and one woman tied up to a tree and slashed straight in half from her left shoulder through her abdomen and out the other side.

The West African Mail even reported on a part of Congo no one knew existed, private property within private property called the “Crown Domain” on the other side of Lake Tumba, which gained 231 million euros alone, all sent directly to King Leopold II. Crown Domain was 10x 5)3 size of Belgium.

Founded by Morel, Liverpool became the headquarters of a coalition called the Congo Reform Association. He also published a book called Red Rubber (1906). I think you’ll find the cover particularly striking! Check out the hand in the bottom right corner being weighed against King Leopold II on the left.

Leopold obviously not having this, commissioned a number of books and monthly magazines to clear up the mess. This didn't work. Obviously.

He even tried to send his own international commission to control what the Congolese said in 1904, to no avail. This was due to a missionary named John Harris who had taken the accounts of various people in the area and sent them back to Morel.

In one particularly heartbreaking moment, a chief brought to Leopold’s judges 110 twigs for each of the entire villages, not just people, killed by the Belgian state, naming every last one.

By the time they returned to Europe, the governor-general committed suicide and, upon being asked, Harris suggested Leopold should be sent to the gallows by the relatively new International Court of Justice.

The commission's report vindicated Casement and Morel. Leopold had tricked no one. EVERYONE in Belgium was calling him out.

Leopold ordered all of the Congo State Records to be burned.

In 1908, the Congo became a Belgian colony, not longer Leopold’s personal property. The state still made claims of "civilizing" the Africans after Leopold's death though, utilizing the leftover mineral exploitation industry with no guilt.

At least during his funeral, which he was denied of having privately, the entire city booed his body <3 well deserved. By this point, he had become Europe’s most hated man of the time.

And in case you were wondering, Casement and Morel were both accused to pro-German sympathies during WWI and executed.

I would like to add more detail but I think I’ve hit a character limit. Just know that Congo’s population was cut in HALF, in some places as much as 60-90%. Villages after villages were burned, as shown through so many soldiers’ and missionaries’ journals. This was a genocide of over 10 MILLION PEOPLE y’all. Hearing this story was truly SICKENING, but here’s the BBC 4 documentary we watched for class for more: Congo: White King, Red Rubber, and Black Death.

What truly gets me is just how OTHER colonizers were calling this man out after finding out the full truth… For me, that feels like extra proof of how truly messed up this was if THEY were disturbed too.

And what feels truly insidious was how Leopold made sure to institutionalize all of his wrongdoings and was so… obviously knowing about every wrongdoing, I mean writing in letters to make sure no one else found out. Please…

Linking my angry history rant on Paul Robeson from last semester here.

Happy Black History Month.

#belgium #king leopold ii #democratic republic of congo #history #black history month #colonialism #tw genocide #tw rape #tw torture #tw massacre #the congo #tw incest #resources #bipoc #undescribed #reaux speaks #black lives matter

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spaceshipsandpurpledrank · 2 years

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#talkin #tik tok #king leopold #belgium #king leopold ii #racism #colonialism #colonization #congo #democratic republic of the congo

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beneluxroyalty · 7 months

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#princess elisabeth #king philippe #king albert ii #king leopold iii #king albert i #belgium

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euryalex · 3 months

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people on that post (that I 100% agree with) being like 'If Belgians can't be racist then what about King Leopold II?' and like I get it - King Leopold II colonized Congo from 1885 to 1908. And sure that's a valid thing to bring up but it doesn't change the fact that Belgium is still a white European country today - a country that is racist now.

Over half of black people in Belgium have experienced racism when looking for housing or employment in the last 5 years - and this is only for black people of African decent (as stated in the article)

At the very least, Larian Studios is unknowingly negligent when it comes to creating characters of color (which I doubt) but at most they are willfully ignorant of 1. how they handle characters of color and 2. the harmful stereotypes they added to their game.

#💖.em #i'm not an expert of course because i'm white but i am belgian #and there are more present day examples you can use instead of King Leopold II #also correct me if i'm wrong with any of this ofc

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fuckyeahhistorycrushes · 2 years

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King Albert I of the Belgians (1875-1934)

I am very surprised that this man wasn’t brought up much in historical crush pages online—may I introduce you to King Albert I of the Belgians, the Soldier King (Le Roi-Cavalier). He was the king of Belgium during WWI, known for being one of the last few monarchs who fought in battle. Throughout the war he frequently visited the trenches and he was one of the allied commanders during the Hundred Days. After the war, up to his sudden death in 1934, he dedicated his life into rebuilding Belgium and the country became one of the most progressive and cosmopolitan countries in Europe in early 20th century. (Fun fact: he met Albert Einstein who was friends with his wife.) Besides being perhaps the best Belgian monarch ever, he was a very down to earth person and he loved rock climbing. In fact, despite all the rumours on him being murdered, he really died doing his favourite sport (see this news article).

My words can never do justice to his entire eventful life, but I would like to invite you all to appreciate this handsome man whose beauty has always been compared to Ryan Gosling. He always got that boyish look that I like in a man that makes him still very good-looking in his 50s—also he looks great in glasses. Despite being very tall (approximately 6’4/1.93m; my own estimate), also awkward, he looks very approachable and gosh, his personality just makes him even more charming.

Here’s one more picture of this beautiful man, hopefully to inspire you to learn about this underrated handsome boi.

This man really helped me start a lot of conversations just because he looks like Ryan Gosling and he is just too precious

#history #submission #history crushes #king albert i of belgium #albert i #by the way Leopold II is not his dad #he is Leopold II’s nephew #he also has an elder brother named Baudouin like his grandson Albert II🫢#but Albert I is a very loyal husband and a family man #even all his imperfections I still can’t stop loving him

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monstermoviedean · 5 months

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i will not get pedantic in the notes i will not get pedantic in the notes i will not get pedantic in the notes i will not

#belgium and more specifically king leopold ii are primarily responsible for the millions of deaths in the congo #i don't want to let france off the hook but their worst colonial atrocities were in north africa southeast asia and the south pacific #they absolutely committed atrocities in the congo but relative to belgium it was a drop in the bucket #overall the points are good and accurate but i get so stressed by videos like this where it's mostly accurate with a few mistakes #because those mistakes sound legitimate and accurate based on the rest of the video #so people don't fact check and take the whole thing to be true #anyway i'm very nervous around any history that does not explicitly and readily cite its sources #and that's a me issue #tbc i'm not like upset with or judging anyone for rbing i'm just talking to myself #instead of going 'well actually' in some rando's notes when all they did was share the vid

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themexicanthrone · 10 months

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The first Belgian Royal Family, at the center we can see the King Leopold I, his wife, Queen Louise Marie and their three surviving children, the Crown Prince Leopold (later Leopold II), Prince Philippe and Princess Charlotte (future Empress of Mexico), 1840's.

#king leopold ii of belgium #King leopold i of Belgium #queen louise marie of belgium #Prince Philippe of Belgium #princess charlotte of belgium #empress charlotte of mexico #empress charlotte #carlota amalia #empress carlota #belgian royal family #belgian royalty #royalty #1840s

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postcard-from-the-past · 4 months

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King Leopold II of Belgium

Belgian vintage postcard

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archduchessofnowhere · 2 years

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1898. 17 September. Castle chapel again. Mass. I was drawn to her with power... I wished that she might now have found what she so bitterly doubted - the loving mercy filled me cold again under the torrent of her eloquent pain.

Funeral at 4 o'clock. Papa [Emperor Franz Josef] had been in the castle since the morning and had not spared himself the task of receiving the foreign rulers. He came with Emperor Wilhelm to the Capuchins. Protected by the thick veils, we were spared most of the banal condolences. Enough were those who wept from the heart. Many - Uncle Louis! [Duke Ludwig in Bavaria, Empress Elisabeth's older brother] "I can't forbid the poor devil to come," Papa had said, and it moved the poor uncle. Deeply it awakened memories of old times in me too, when he came to me with the plea: "Only let me stand with you, only stay there beside you." (...) Papa with Leopold [Prince of Bavaria, Archduchess Gisela's husband] and Franz [Valerie's husband], Georg [Gisela and Leopold's son] and Mama's two brothers escorted the coffin down.

Then that was over too and we returned to Schönbrunn for a sad dinner, which was also attended by the King [Albert I] of Saxony.

Archduchess Marie Valerie of Austria (1998). Das Tagebuch der Lieblingstochter von Kaiserin Elisabeth (1878-1899) (Translation done by DeepL. Please keep in mind that in a machine translation a lot of nuances may/will be lost)

Curiously, the edition of Valerie's diary that I have notes that "Only Carl Theodor and Max Emanuel, but not Ludwig, escorted their sister's coffin to the crypt". Which is not possible because Duke Max Emanuel had been dead for over five years at that point. The "two brothers" Valerie mentions therefore were Ludwig and Karl Theodor.

#for context: duke ludwig had grown distant with his sister's family since mayerling #him being marie larisch's father and all that #empress elisabeth of austria #archduchess marie valerie of austria #franz josef i of austria #duke ludwig wilhelm in bavaria #karl theodor duke in bavaria #wilhelm ii of germany #prince leopold of bavaria #archduke franz salvator of austria #prince georg of bavaria #king albert i of saxony #das tagebuch der lieblingstochter von kaiserin elisabeth

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drosera-nepenthes · 2 years

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The throne of Holland is not alone in lacking a direct heir. Until recently those of Russia and Italy were at a similar disadvantage. So was that of Servia, or the tragedy of Alexander and Draga had never happened. The mysterious and appalling end of the Prince Rudolf robbed Austria of her heir, and the throne is now destined to be occupied by the Emperor's nephew, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand whose morganatic marriage to the Countess Sophia Choteknow, now Princess of Hohenberg, has cut off the rights of his children to succeed him. King Leopold has for heir his younger brother, a man bordering on seventy. The King of Roumania must leave his crown of iron, the iron of the Turkish guns at Plevna, to Prince Ferdinand, while Abdul Hamid, who took his ensanguined sceptre from the hands of one brother, will all things being normal, pass it on to another brother. Failing an heir to the Netherlandish throne, its next occupant, if he survived the Queen Wilhelmina, would be the wealthy young widowed Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar, himself childless.

The Sketch Aug 1, 1906

#Grand Duke Wilhelm Ernst of Saxe-Weimar #Sultan Abdul Hamid #King Carol I of Romania #King Leopold II of Belgium #Queen Wilhelmina #1900s #magazine article

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elisabeth515 · 2 years

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It's amusing (...in a good way I promise! 🙈) to see you simp for King Albert I, king of the Belgians now because I used to simp his elder grandson 🙈🙈🙈

Ah, Baudouin.

I call him funky glasses guy because he wears a pair of funky glasses

The halo effect has hit us all very, very, very, very hard but seriously he’s just #cursed

#funky glasses guy #questions…?#Albert I is probably the least problematic Belgian monarch before the current King of the Belgians #Leopold I has 2 illegitimate children #Leopold II is a trainwreck #Leopold III is trainwreck no. 2 who almost costs the monarchy #Baudouin had chad moves but what he did to Congo 🇨🇩 was very sloppy #Albert II had a scandal—remember Delphine #and the current one Philippe is just chilling there #and yes Albert I did had problematic™️ moves but wellllll except he low-key endorses his uncle I would let it slide-#also in my opinion Albert I more attractive than Baudouin

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ulysses-posts · 2 months

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The lesser known side of Queen Victoria as "Grandmother of Europe"

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#Crown Princess Margareta #King Carl XVI Gustaf #King Edward VII #King Gustaf VI Adolf #Leonie Lady Leslie #Louise Duchess of Connaught #Prince Alfred #Prince Arthur #Prince Leopold #Queen Margrethe II of Denmark #Queen Victoria

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beneluxroyalty · 10 months

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The relationship between the Dutch and Belgian royal families over the years (c. 1938 - 2023).

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alwaysbewoke · 5 months

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Ota Benga was born around 1883, in what is now the Republic of Congo. Theirs was a hunter-gatherer society. When he became a man, his teeth were chipped into sharp points, part of his tribal customs. His world came crashing down when King Leopold II of Belgium (The butcher of Congo) established a colony in the Congo to exploit its valuable resources. The demand for rubber was increasing around the world and Leopold wanted to corner the market. He subdued the native population to force them into laboring on the rubber plantations. In Belgium Congo, women were held hostage until their men returned with enough rubber for the colonizer King Leopold. Some had their hands chopped off for not meeting rubber quotas. Ota was out on a hunting expedition when his village was attacked by the slavers. Whether they were Force Publique or an African group working to collect people to sell to them varies from story to story. He was taken captive. On the other side of the globe, a man named Samuel Verner was preparing exhibits for the 1904 World's Fair. The fair's organizers wanted to do an exhibit showing the progress of mankind “from the dark prime to the highest enlightenment, from savagery to civic organisation" He was given a hefty budget to collect living "specimens" of people from Africa to represent the "savage depths" from which mankind had sprung. The experience of young African men at the 'fair' aka Human Zoo, was not a pleasant one. Billed as cannibals, they shook spears at the crowd and grimaced with their filed teeth, modeling their "war dances" Verner sent Ota to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. In 1906, Verner found a new home for Ota: The Bronx Zoo. Ota was put as an "exhibit" A plaque was erected, describing him in the same way an animal would be described and put into a cage in the monkey house. The Minneapolis Journal declared Ota to be the "missing link" between chimps and humans. On March 19, 1916, he stole a revolver gun and shot himself through the heart.

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intersectionalpraxis · 5 months

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Winter has started in DR Congo. With increasing cold and rain the suffering of displaced people with increase only. there is no electricity and less food and no clean water. The situation is catastrophic. Spread the world and speak up. Congolese are dying. [source: @ nyeusi_wassi on X, formerly known as Twitter. 11/27/2023.] [Video Description: In the pouring rain and cold, there is a small, pitched tent with a few children inside under the age of ten. There are a few adults standing outside the tent area, and one woman speaking is pointing towards the children and then the camera -there is no translation available at the moment, but it appears she is highlighting the horrific conditions they are in, and how the children are especially suffering.]

For those who are unaware, there are over 6 million displaced Congolese people in the DR Congo -this is a result of the violent genocide, resource exploitation in this country for hundreds of years by western/European imperial forces, and a military coup -and the one's most impacted are young children and women. This is what we all mean by none of us are free until we all are free. That the global north governments MUST be held accountable for their complicity and contributions to the horrors and hyper-exploitation going on in the global south.

The following information, for those who are able to take some time to read some of the excerpts from this article, please do, because I do believe, researching and staying informed about what is going on this this world, especially for those of us who consume and buy products that are often created through a process of immense sufferings and enslavement of human beings in the global south, SHOULD bear witness to this, because it is the bare minimum -Free Congo:

"The bleeding of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), its people, and its natural resources didn’t just start in recent months or years, but we can go as far as during the colonization days when Congo was privately owned by King Leopold II of Belgium from 1885 to 1908. Imagine having a whole country as your personal property for that many years. Congo has never recovered or healed from the bleeding that was overseen by Leopold. After taking hold of Congo, “It quickly became a brutal, exploitative regime that relied on forced labor to cultivate and trade rubber, ivory, and minerals.” (BBC News, 2020). The history of Congo, killings, and injustice are very long and still ongoing as I write this. Congolese people everywhere continue to hope, pray, and cry for peace one day and it is time that the world finally listens." "The continuous killings and abuses of Congolese people, most of them women, and children, have been worsened by the ongoing exploitation of Congo’s natural resources." "Children work under harsh conditions often with no pay or little pay just so big companies can profit. Women continue to be raped and used as weapons so that others can profit from the natural resources. There are also cases where children are forced to take up arms for the benefit of others all because of “The lucrative nature of cobalt mining means that all efforts to ensure production can match the eternally elastic global demand are put in." "The east of the DRC, where the mines are located, is therefore home to nearly 40,000 child laborers digging for the minerals that would eventually be utilized by Apple, Google and other giant corporations.” (Ntreh, 2020). Some of the mining are even in the control areas of the rebel groups and yet the companies and foreign governments continue to operate as business as usual. How is this possible you might ask? Are Congolese lives worthless even after over 6 million deaths?"

"It is time that Congo’s natural resources start benefiting the prosperity of the Congolese people and the nation." "It is time that foreign governments and companies stop interfering in Congo’s affairs and afreedding gas to the fire." "It is time to unite and stop Congo’s bleeding once and for all. It is time to build a peaceful and prosperous Congo for the benefit of its people. Time to stop Congo’s bleeding."

[article source: "Congo is Bleeding: The Genocide & Forgotten Unrests in the Heart of Africa"]

#feminist #feminism #social justice #free congo #israel is committing genocide #congo genocide #congoisbleeding #colonial violence #colonialism #western imperialism

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