One more glimpse of the horror of a civil war we pay for

CPTnet
3 December 2007
COLOMBIA REFLECTION: Endangered Light

by Sarah MacDonald

I'll call her "Luz" ("Light") because that is what I wish for her
-- 14 years old and small for her age, she looks about eleven.
Yet, as one CPTer says, "She's lived too much for fourteen."
Prostituted as a child, sexually abused by a neighbor, Luz lives
in the Colombian countryside with her elderly grandparents.
Her age and family situation make Luz a target for abuse.
In a community suffering displacements, death threats and poverty
-- a community clinging to the edge of survival--Luz is one of the
most vulnerable members.

At her family's home, I noticed how withdrawn and quiet Luz is,
her gaze often averted, her spirit folded tightly inside her.
Life, it seems, has already taught Luz to make herself small.
When my teammate and I played games with the other children,
we invited Luz several times before she would join us.
But when she finally came to play, I saw an occasional smile
flash across her face, as if a candle had been lit inside her.
How I longed to fan that tiny flame of joy--hope for a young girl
who already knows too well the roughness of life.

A couple weeks later, I traveled with another teammate to the
region of Tiquisio, where we accompany the Citizens' Process
of Tiquisio, a movement of community organization, self-
determination and development. Like other communities CPT
accompanies, Tiquisio has been the site of struggle between
armed groups; residents here suffer forced displacements and the
disintegration of community services and human rights. The
Citizens' Process aims to mend this torn, unraveling social fabric.

One day, members of the Citizens' Process presented a workshop
on sexual health as a human right. Most of the topics were grim:
unchosen pregnancies, domestic violence, AIDS and other STDs.
When a woman listed a few statistics of sexual ill health in
Tiquisio, I saw why this workshop was needed.
At least 50% of children throughout Tiquisio get abused by
adults, she said. The number still jars me. Fifty percent. At least. More children are
abused than not in this region--and I can't believe Tiquisio is
unique in war-racked Colombia.

I think of Luz, and I imagine thousands of children like her.
Thousands of flickering, fragile points of light, in danger of
being irrecoverably snuffed out. Though perhaps less visible
than the guns and landmines of the armed conflict, such violence
is no less vicious. It is also directly connected, since domestic
violence and sexual abuse happen more frequently in communities
battered by the violence of war. Here in Colombia, there is
the further tragedy of legal and illegal armed actors seducing
children from their homes. The likelihood of children suffering
sexual abuse is frighteningly high.

How do we get in the way of this violence?