Another "what age would you teach this to kids" - **trigger warning** about subject matter as some will find it very upsetting

[afocusonfootie]

Congo colonisation under Leopald II of Belgium. On the net there are a lot of videos about horrific abuses involving severed limbs if the colonised people didn't work fast enough. At what age would you teach/show this to children, together with graphic photographs?

This version of events, mostly found on the net on quora etc, is apparently contested - a historian from the Congo has written a book about what was true and what was not true - so what version should teachers teach?

Thanks all

Could it be generally taught under colonisers and abuse rather than focusing on those particular atrocities. I think it would be interesting to learn that history is contested and politically shaped depending on who is writing it and why.

I wouldn't have been able to handle seeing dismembered limbs as a sensitive kid. I don't think any age I'd be ready, but also don't want to do a sanitise history. Tricky.

I learned about the torture of Guy Fawkes, the Great Plague and the slave trade in primary school, so I don’t see why kids shouldn’t learn about colonial abuses. It’s important and relevant.

It also isn’t really disputed. Colonisers very much did do awful things to the people in the countries they invaded.

Apparently there is a lot of stuff on quora about congo which is disputed by congo historians. It isn't so much saying that colonial abuses did not happen, more saying that a lot of the stuff you find on quora - which was what the teacher showed the kids - is not historically accurate.

What the holocaust means in outline terms might be taught in year 7, but the horrifying details are not recommended to be taught to children under 14 so that would be year 10 or above.

I have looked into it, and it seems that according to a book by a Congolese historian, the atrocities such as millions dead and severed hands by Belgiums are debunked, that the narrative had come from the west and it was linked to trade wars. The dominance of the west in relation to trade, minerals, are key issues, as was the lack of planning around granting independence by Belgium and the fact that the country fell immediately into civil war afterwards, and about rival factions within the Congo, and that there was tension between west leaning and socialist/Soviet Union leading African leaders in Congo and elsewhere, about the west's continued attempted dominance and trade wars between countries, the west's continued benefitting from minerals there, and the continued fighting, and the difficulties all of this posed for Congo leaders to govern - the patronising narratives from the west, and the day to day problems in post colonial congo arising from destruction of infrastructure etc. Also learning about leaders such as Lumumbo and Mobutu etc

I think to pass to children the message that colonialisation involved the control of people and resources by the west, and the complexities and secrecy around trade and ideological wars, and in outline (but not graphic detail) about specific abuses is good. A focus on sensationalising graphic details without sufficient historical scrutiny, not so much.

In terms of whitewashing, if we taught children every single event of inhumanity through history in gory detail, their history lessons throughout childhood would basically be horror and not much else!

tl:dr i agree in relation to contested and politically shaped history being history, and that that and the other key issues are fundamental as background - and abuses do not need to be taught in a sensationalised way and definitely shouldn't be made the central part of the lesson.

Are you a teacher ? Or is this just a general query ?

I would complain if my y3 child was shown a picture of a severed limb, im an adult and I don't want to see severed limbs. I think this desensitises people when they see too many graphic things, in fact I would go nuts if it was the school.

Is your child specifically interested in the Congo? It seems a strange thing to be covered in so much detail if it's school, I would/do just explain it as "very bad things", my children are empathetic so that would be sufficient to cover it for now.

It depends on what you actually mean by teach. If you mean teaching them yourself, researching it properly not just relying on hearsay and doing it in a factual but truthful manner I’d say 10-11 + as a Home Educator. If you mean someone has shown your child a wildly sensationalised account then no age is appropriate

As I said in a post above, this is about something shown to DC. What would your advice be if I were the teacher, out of interest?

It depends on the child really. Some are interested in the macabre and will find images of historical toture interesting, others will be disgusted and disturbed. I had a book about natural and man-made disasters and atrocities when I was about 10, some of the graphic images of holocaust victims and particularly an engraving of a witchcraft trial by ordeal are still vivid in my mind, though they were supported by text which explained the atrocities in an age-appropriate way.

I think the crucial thing is, is the child mature enough to disassociate themselves from the facts and images? By that I mean, I wasn't scarred by what I saw because these were things that happened a long time ago in the days of black and white. Bad things happened a long time ago to people a long way away. (When you're 10, something that happened 40 years ago is as recent as something that happened 4000 years ago.)

I am not sure what you are saying about your experience at 10 - the images lingered with you, so would you have preferred less traumatic images and just basic facts if with hindsight you could have been given the choice, even if you weren't scarred?

I honestly don't think I've come across a child who gets excited over macabre or torture and nowadays I think people would see it as a red flag along the lines of a child hurting animals?!

Humans aren't generally wired up to be interested in macabre or to find torture interesting I don't think. Children are not given any choice about what they are shown, and don't have the confidence or maturity to make decisions about what is or is not good for their mental health....how well they cope will depend on how well the adults around them help them cope maybe?