They went to school, just like you. They had homes, just like you. They had moms and dads to return to, just like you.

Syrians had lives, not so different from ours, until in 2011 president Bashar al-Assad was brought into office. Rebellions rose and grew violent. Assad resorted to violence.

Soon after, president Obama chose to largely sit out the conflict militarily, sending no troops into battle and belatedly sending weapons to rebels. In the meantime, the average American lost focus on Syria.

Six years later, the world has the problem of tens of thousands of refugees to resettle and Assad and his Russian forces are growing more powerful by the day. Americans must take action against the horrors being committed across Syria.

According to International Business Times, over half of the country’s 22 million people have been displaced. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights declared 13, 617 civilians killed in 2016.

A thousand people is a little under the population of Saratoga High, and Syria’s death rate means that the equivalent of one high school our size or more is obliterated every month. Yet, as a nation, as a model state, as a privileged community and even as individuals, most of us have remained blissfully ignorant while others die in masses.

Hearing bombs has become a norm for Syrians, and the government has been ruthless in its targets, unleashing weapons on hospitals and even funerals.

Meanwhile, most  of America has chosen to ignore the carnage away from American soil. The Syrian economy has collapsed and unemployment has skyrocketed.

The governments of Syria and Russia have mainly been bombing eastern Aleppo, a city that was under the rebel group’s hold. Caught in the middle of the opposition, civilians are losing homes, families and their normal lives.

These targets are killed routinely, just part of some more numbers, all with the goal to keep one man in power.

With so many already lost or displaced, it is easy to simplify human deaths into mere statistics. Yet each individual killed is one more family who must struggle with grief.

These remorseless massacres and terrible conditions have not moved the world into effective action, and with its vast resources, the U.S. is more to blame than anyone.

Civilized nations must uphold the rights of people  everywhere to be happy and safe. We must help heal the wounds these atrocities have inflicted on innocent men, women and children. We must stand against what we know is wrong.

The American government may have chosen to deny help to these people, but we as individuals still can help. We can send clothes and other supplies. The people are the government, and once the people care, effective change can happen in a place as far away as war-torn Aleppo.