Furneshesq, I’m clearly not expressing myself properly, because my point is not getting across. So I’m going to quote something I said in another thread that directly relates to what I’m trying to argue here. Hopefully, it will serve to illistrate my point.
In this thread, I talked about changing the Muslim world’s mindset at the “Great Satan.”
If Muslims see American children sending one measly dollar to the Afghanistan children, then perhaps we will be able to change this mindset a little. Because I believe that this is the crux of the problem - the origin of the problem. Not the “Attack on America” - that was a reflection of how the Muslim world, for the most part, feels toward Americans. I think we need to change their minds. Make them see that we are not all evil. Perhaps some Muslim children who hear about this will grow up to not hate Americans so strongly.
The Muslim world holds America in great contempt. I am not saying we deserved this attack - both the United States AND the Middle East have made mistakes with each other and within their own countries that led to this disaster. But when the Middle East so blindly hates America as an entity, their hatred allows men like Osama bin Laden to push his ideology of mass hatred. People are willing to die for him, willing to sacrifice their own families and lives for what they percieve as a giant, faceless enemy. And when you have that sort of mania, something like this happens. It has happened before and it will happen again unless we act in a way that changes their mindset.
Bush seems to understand this, and he asks American children to sacrifice $1. It’s not much. It’s not going to eradicate hunger in Afghanistan, or even in America. But hopefully it will serve to remind people everywhere that they have the capacity to care for and help someone they don’t know and don’t understand who is very different from them. I do not see how anything but good can come from that.
I took President Bush’s speech as a chance to open a dialogue with my 8 year old son. He is at the age where when he asks “Why?”, he doesn’t stop asking “Why?” until he’s satisfied. He needs to understand. Well its hard to explain to him why someone would want to kill thousands especially when I don’t understand it myself. When I picked him up from school on 9-11 he asked me if I had been watching T.V. His teacher had the news coverage on in the classroom. I told him yes, and he said “Dad the Germans are bombing us! They’re trying to burn New York down!”. He thought this because we had visited the D-Day Museum and had been watching a lot of WWII stuff on the History Channel. It was easy enough to convince him that the Germans are now our friends, but he just can’t comprehend that terrorists flew planes into buildings killing themselves along with thousands if innocents. He still believes that the terrorists parachuted out before the crashes. “Dad nobody is that crazy” he says. What President Bush has proposed he can understand. He can participate. It makes him feel good. At first he wondered why we would send food to the enemy. That gave me a chance to explain that the children are not the enemy. They need our help to live. We spoke about why we are bombing and who we are bombing. I don’t know if he picked everything up but I do believe the conversation made him feel better. I know it made me feel better. When I drove him to the post office he asked me “Dad have you ever got goose bumps when you did something good?”. I kid you not, I am not making any of this up. He said that he hopes the money gets there in time.
Giving makes my son feel better. It gives our children a chance to participate in a way thats healthy. My son can’t stop talking about what he did. He tells everyone. In his little world something makes sense. And lastly it may not be a long term solution but it will feed children that are in a desperate situation. Its a win win idea. And to be honest with you I think my son learned a lesson that will stay with him for a lifetime. THAT makes me feel just a little better. I just can’t decide who will benifit more, my son or the Afgahni children.
I think SpoilerVirgin quote of the AP story was great. I like that cheesy rhyme.
I also seem to recall there was a similar effort during WWII buying war bonds was one, but I remember saving tinfoil from gum, and my dad saved tinfoil from his cigarette packs. I have no links on this, just seem to remember it.
I can remember in parochial school also, kicking in pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters and even half-dollars (we had them then) for the pagan babies whoever they were.
