
HBO’s three-part docuseries ‘Savior Complex’, put together with precision, is captivating and aggravating as it narrates the actions of Renee Bach. It is an intriguing amalgamation of charity, class, race, outrage, privilege, and colonialism, and is elevated by the refusal to provide straightforward answers However, people who start with a shared belief that she is a sociopath on par with Hitler will also find many justifications for this stance. People who believe that Renee has been used as a tool of activist oppression claiming to serve justice will also find ample reason to stick with that narrative. ‘Savior Complex’ is a horrifying case of detailed investigation that illustrates the dissociation within different aspects of our society. it never sets her free, attacking her claims with poignant testimonies, revealing that no one knows the entire story.
At the age of 19, Renee Bach discovered her mission when she volunteered in an orphanage in Africa. She founded an NGO called Serving His Children, and opened a facility for malnourished children in Jinja, Uganda. After establishing the NGO, she hired staff and it is evident that Bach saved the lives of many children in the area. Some mothers can support that claim while others argue that all the medical procedures that Bach performed that she was not qualified for led to the death of hundreds of children. Even Bach herself confesses to frequently relying on her intestines for guidance instead of using logic. The number of children that died is extremely high.
An ex-American nurse Jackie Kramlich shared her shocking experiences attending SHC. The nurses described the astounding insufficient education and dirty conditions available in these facilities. On the show “Savior Complex,” evidence has been provided where actors describe how Bach injected his patients with zero regard for technique, and how he hung IV liquids in a gruesome manner. Other workers accuse Bach of disregarding well qualified and experienced Ugandan nurses. What makes the situation even worse, is the fact that a nurse may have positioned himself where he believes he needed to be, causing the death of one or many children, which is deeply disturbing. Kramlich was forced to leave SHC when she saw the conditions, but after receiving an employee report describing how these conditions worsened, she reached to No White Saviors.
No White Saviors interprets missions such as Bach’s in a similar fashion as colonialism, where other people who regard themselves as more powerful than the individuals they intend to assist live in and trade control of the region. Jackie Jesko, the Director of ‘None of Us is a Savior’, seems unbothered by the argument that she is trying to make where Bach was an actor in the intermediate wrong doing, using the ‘white American woman’ approach to Ugandan people regardless of the damages it would inflict. However, to the more disgraceful comparison, Jesko does not pound it as some other filmmakers tend to do. She quite cleverly permits Bach to unveil her own blind spots on occasions like letting appear a segment in which where she is unwire of the fact that neocolonialism exists, something that for certain is unbelievably good to grasp within this context. She can be truly brilliant. Jesko reveals that she depicts an unconventional but thought provoking perspective of how young white women assert authority in missionary contexts globally because it is significantly easier compared to portions of feminine America which are dominated by males. In conversing with Jesko, Bach appears baffled that they could possibly encapsulate any central matters like this within the context of her life and thus engage in self argumentation on basic rational life covering the issues of those in the society.
The no white saviors complex gets even deeper due to the assumptions that stem from these topics. Take the case of Kelsey Nielsen for instance, while she single headedly runs the White Savior Complex No Saviors, she happens to also be an outspoken American woman and that is incredibly ironic. To joke about it is one thing, but to assume there are also American saviors that are saving Uganda from Kelsey Nielsen, is incredulous. The irony gets taken to a whole different level when the people fighting for Kelsey’s prosecution for ‘white savior’ complex, don’t even get her name right. An interview with a former missionary mother was conducted aimed at dismantling kelsey’s white antics. She rather glorified the BACH savior and claimed he had done miraculous exploits like saving her child from dying. Rather than depicting helpless mothers who have had unwanted pregnancies and kidnaped children, instead of the godson from their missionaries, NWS should simply plaster the images all over social media and go into deep social exploitation. Some of these social media stunts move towards the area of abuse to her child ostracized by BACH.
Unearthing the Bach case numbers could prove to be a daunting task as well. According to Bach and Shazia’s mother, it is argued that 105 children had SHC with a reported 11 percent mortality rate. The nearby children’s hospital posted a gloomier 14 percent mortality rate. Still, the numbers fall way short of the entire scope of the situation. If after all the action Bach had taken, more listening had been done, could her number have been under 10? If So, those lives are valuable right? But if Bach was not part of the equation, who knows if that number could have been doubled?
What I have portrayed is this grey area that a majority of what has been said has tried to avoid. In no way am I making a claim that there are no winners in interpretation and perception. Bach would strongly oppose. No white savior is actively helping and so these kids who are unfed and cannot get to a hospital have no help to rely on, so who is to blame in this situation?
Bach’s type of self-righteousness certainly has the potential to be extremely dangerous.
The first episode of Jesko’s series, starts with a quote that is often repeated: “God doesn’t call the qualified, he qualifies the called.” While this belief allows for plenty of room to maneuver, as “Savior Complex” points out, it is who most needs to heed this warning. It is a combination of all the great ideas that are in contention that creates the reality of the docuseries, and it should be viewed especially by any organization which is even thinking of engaging with another society.
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