You have just come home from an exasperating day. You can not wait to climb into bed. You tuck yourself in, turn out the light, and go to asleep. You are awakened by a rattle at your door. An eight year old child holding a gun barges in and forces you into the night.
This may sound like a twisted excerpt from some fictional book; unfortunately, it is the cruel reality for millions of children in Uganda. Uganda, Africa is in the middle of a civil war that is spilling into the homes of the innocent. The Lords Resistance Army (LRA) has resorted to abducting children to help them in their ploy to overthrow the government. The LRA’s main victims are children between the ages of five and twelve because they are young enough to be brain washed, but old enough to learn how to use a gun. When the children are abducted, the LRA usually shoots one child immediately to intimidate the others and desensitize them. The children are threatened that if they try to escape their entire family will be tortured and slaughtered. The LRA demonstrates their torture methods on their captives on a daily basis. The boys are taught to hate their family, friends, and anyone who defies the LRA. The girls are turned into sex slaves for the men.
The only way children can avoid this fate is by commuting for many miles to city hospitals. They are safer there because it is a busy place compared to their remote homes in the bush. It is their only chance since Uganda does not keep birth records, so when a child is abducted they are gone forever.
For more information and ways you can help please watch the video at invisibleshildren.org
As the richest country in the world, we can not let these children become invisible.
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