Comment by themgt

Some related topics I find interesting to ponder in relation to the Rwandan genocide and more broadly:

Accusation in a mirror:

Accusation in a mirror is a false claim that accuses the target of something that the perpetrator is doing or intends to do. The name was used by an anonymous Rwandan propagandist in Note Relative à la Propagande d'Expansion et de Recrutement ... he instructed colleagues to "impute to enemies exactly what they and their own party are planning to do". By invoking collective self-defense, propaganda is used to justify genocide, just as self-defense is a defense for individual homicide. Susan Benesch remarked that while dehumanization "makes genocide seem acceptable", accusation in a mirror makes it seem necessary.

Double-genocide or at least mass war crimes against Hutu by the RPF:

Estimates of Hutu deaths from mass violence in the 1990s are much less precise than Tutsi death figures from the Rwandan genocide due to the greater timescale and geographic spread of the killings. Researcher Alison Des Forges estimated that the RPF killed 60,000 people in war crimes in 1994 and 1995. Historian Gérard Prunier estimated that 100,000 Hutu were killed by the RPF in 1994–1995. Historian Roland Tissot argued that there were around 400,000 Hutus killed by the RPF between 1994 and 1998 (excluding disease and excess mortality), while Omar Shahabudin McDoom estimated several hundred thousand Hutu victims during the 1990s. Demographer Marijke Verpoorten guesstimates 542,000 deaths of Rwandan Hutus (about 7.5 percent of the population), with "a very large uncertainty interval", from war-related causes in the 1990s, including battle deaths and excess mortality from poor conditions in refugee camps.

Kagame, the leader of the RPF, has also had an ... interesting tenure as president, in power 25 years and most recently winning 99% of the vote:

The highest-profile opposition figure for the 2017 election was local businesswoman Diane Rwigara. Although she acknowledged that "much has improved under Kagame", Rwigara was also critical of Kagame's government, saying that "people disappear, others get killed in unexplained circumstances and nobody speaks about this because of fear". Like Ingabire in 2010, Rwigara was barred from running in the election.

Throughout Kagame's tenure as vice president and president, he has been linked with murders and disappearances of political opponents, both in Rwanda and abroad. In a 2014 report titled "Repression Across Borders", Human Rights Watch documents at least 10 cases involving attacks or threats against critics outside Rwanda since the late 1990s, citing their criticism of the Rwandan government, the RPF or Kagame

My general impression is that Rwanda has been compressed down to a simplistic morality play when the reality seems a lot more complex and in many ways more unsettling.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accusation_in_a_mirror

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_genocide_theory_(Rwanda...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Praise_of_Blood#Death_toll

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kagame#Assassinations