The most overlooked historical event in the world is, without a doubt, the Genocide of the Congolese, or native people of the Congo Free State, lead by Leopold II of Belgium. When Leopold gained control of Congo, his job was to improve the lives of the native people. However what he did was create a systematic oppression of the Congolese. Due to Leopold’s hatred towards the Congolese, it is apparent that life for the native people of Congo became much worse. When Leopold gained control of Congo in 1885, he thought of himself and other Europeans as superior to the so called barbaric and uncivilized Congolese. Because of this notion of preeminence, Leopold did nothing to protect the native people; in fact, he encouraged the exploitation of …show more content…
The Congolese were forced into slavery by the Europeans; consequently, they began to perform unwarranted duties included mining, building railroads, rubber tapping, and woodcutting. (Peterson) In addition to working in bleak conditions, the Congolese were persecuted and tortured in other ways. Williams shows this in his letter when he claims, “Ox-chains eat into the necks of the prisoners and produce sores about which the flies circle.” (Williams, 1890) It was also very common for the Congolese to be kidnapped, mutilated, robbed, raped, and murdered by the Europeans. (Peterson) One specific example of this inequality was the infamous rubber quota. Leopold set a quota for each tribe in congo in terms of their rubber production. (African holocaust, 2015) If this quota was not met there would be such gruesome consequences that death would seem desirable. One form of torture was when Congolese were “beaten with a dried piece of hippopotamus skin, called a chicote.” (Williams, 1890) A way of avoiding the consequence for not meeting a quota was to provide cut-off human hands to the Europeans as proof that there was a diminished workforce. To escape the torment of their punishment, it was common for a tribe to cut off live peoples hands, including women and children, to give to the