Trying to Understand Honduras

Honduras. A country we’ve been hearing a lot about in the news recently. Sure, I’ve known that it’s tough to be a migrant or a refugee. To go from one miserable country to one that hates you and locks you up in cages is horrible. But reading Refugee really helped me put it into perspective. Hearing about exactly what these people had to go through, and especially reading it all through the eyes of a young boy (something that I once was), furthered my empathy. Then, I thought about Honduras. I’m sure you’ve heard about Honduras on the news recently. Thousands of people walking from Honduras to the United States. That’s a 1,125 mile walk, in case you were wondering. More than I’m sure any of us have had to walk at once. They’re not traveling in luxury, either. Most of them are carrying with them only what they can fit in a backpack or a bag. As with most of the topics we have been studying in this class, I did not know very much about Honduras before hearing about this “caravan” in the news. I knew it was a country in Central America, but that was about it. I was surprised to hear about all these poor migrants and wanted to learn more about it. For starters, Honduras is considered one of the most dangerous cities in the world because it has one of the highest rates of murder in the world. As I looked around online I learned why. A journalist from the Associated Press explained that while he was living in Honduras, he was constantly in survival mode. Everyone he had met knew someone who had been killed by a gang or a corrupt police officer. The United States had a hand in making Honduras this way. We helped convert Honduras into the first “banana republic,” or a country whose economy runs off their export of bananas. In the 80’s, we even backed multiple military coups to protect our economic interests. But then, we stopped buying the fruit from them, devastating their economy. Imagine being a child growing up in a world where if you said the wrong thing, you could be killed. My heart breaks for these people attempting to escape this crime-ridden country. This is perhaps the worst time to try to come to the United States. President Trump uses the hatred of immigrants to empower his campaign, and the United States (as you know) is separating children from their parents at the border and keeping them in caged communities. A lot of people in the United States believe these people are somehow a threat to our country. I find that hard to wrap my head around, but I guess it is a symptom of the general lack of empathy felt by a lot of my fellow Americans. It's important to note that just because Honduras is a dangerous place, it doesn't mean that the people coming here are. The people coming here are people who wish to escape their country

The Government is corrupt and has been for a while. Police receive training and funding from the United States in an attempt to stop cocaine trafficking, but a lot of the police officers are corrupt. Gangs are rampant, and it most Hondurans have seen people get murdered. A lot of Honduran citizens live in shacks and don’t even have running water in their house.
and get away from extreme violence and poverty. The ones who contribute to the crime remain there. I wonder what will happen to this caravan when they reach the border. Will we help them? Imprison them? Turn them away? Only time will tell.

I also want to take this opportunity to encourage you to vote. It is very, very, VERY important that we go out and vote for the election coming up next week. If we keep our Government the way it is, we might just be on the path to a Fascist government. Here’s a website that explains the proposal on the ballots.