Learn from human misery for our children

Learn from human misery for our children

Simon Marcus Gower, Executive Principal High/Scope Indonesia,
Jakarta

The images of war have been many and terrible. Middle East
terror and the continuing conflict in Aceh have closely followed
the war in Iraq. With the world's media now so abundant, there
seems to be a flood of awful images. We have been inundated by
the images of war and the suffering it brings and it is hard not
to be overwhelmed by them. The prevalence of war, conflict and
strife means that the supply of these images is almost without
end.

From the sorrowful images of schools being destroyed in Aceh
to images that seem surreal as they portray war as it happens,
live; television screens, newspapers and computer monitors
streaming internet news updates have been awash with the pain and
anguish of war and conflict.

There can though be no more painful and appalling images than
those of children caught up in the horrors of war. The heart
wrenching images of children crying out in mental and physical
pain should be a lesson to us all. But do we really learn this
awful and horrible lesson? Do we see what has been done and what
we have allowed to happen? Do we teach so that we might limit the
chances of it continuing to happen?

We must surely learn and pass on that learning. It may not be
a comfortable or easy task to deal with these difficult images
and seek out answers from them or for them but we must take up
the difficult challenge that they present us.

Teachers in schools can engender debate and serious thought
about the consequences of war. Parents can show their sympathy
and encourage empathy by spending time with their children
genuinely facing and talking about the harsh realities of war. By
putting young people now through the challenge of seriously and
maturely exploring the often-grim reality of our world we may
engender within them a desire not to permit similar things to
happen.

Too often it is too easy for young people to avoid the hard
realities of our world. Too often young people are left to be
caught up in a shallow existence of pop songs, pop culture and
materialism that leaves them inadequate and powerless to respond
to real difficulties that may be faced in life.

Adults and adolescents need to be actively engaging their
minds in the real world problems that we face. It is not enough
or appropriate to be passive consumers of the imagery of our
world. We have to engage with our world and similarly be
encouraging of engagement from others and in particular young
people. Schools can obviously play a central role in engaging
young people with the world.

Schools present anopportunity for such active and peremptory
engagement. The mere fact that a classroom full of people is a
perfect arena for human engagement clearly creates an ideal forum
for discussion, exploration and hopefully learning. If we are
complacent, if we see no need to focus our minds and those of
young people on the troubles of our world, then surely we are
doomed to repeat and exacerbate the troubles and pains of recent
experience.

It is said that through adversity we come to know ourselves
and through suffering we may achieve some modicum of wisdom. How
then are we to know ourselves and gain wisdom if we are not
prepared to face adversity or respond to suffering?

The cynic might say that there are troubles all around us,
that is the nature of our world, but we can only deal with our
own troubles and feel our own pain. But this would seem to reduce
us to a lowly and base survivalistic existence. We are human
beings and we must surely aspire to higher humane values. We are
surely above and beyond the mere survival instinct.

Our ability to deeply educate our children not just
academically but also morally is undoubtedly one of our greatest
human aspects and assets. But we have to teach not only of
survival and the gathering of the essentials of food and shelter
and even increasing personal wealth. We must also teach of love,
of caring for each other and being able to help our fellow human
beings.

Our social capacity is what can make us strong. It is the
development of that social capacity and the stimulation of social
conscience that schools must be critical players in. Evidently
the images of war present a stern challenge to us all. But we
cannot, in good conscience, shy away from them or try to ignore
them. For some it may be that they can respond directly to the
pain and the needs of those caught up in war.

Hospitals and rehabilitation centers will do much to help the
poor children who have suffered loss of limbs, loss of loved ones
or mental damage from war. But indirectly we must all do
something to help. Even though we may be far from the war and
have no direct link or contact with the area of conflict, we must
all try to learn from it.

The poor boy that has had his arms blown off by a bombing or a
missile launched from miles away. The poor girl that is battered
and bruised by the falling debris from his destroyed home. The
poor children that have been made orphans and homeless by the
brutality of war; they are all suffering terribly.

We cannot know the depth of their suffering but we cannot
ignore it and we must feel for them. And we must learn and try to
pass on our learning to our children so that they may have
compassion and care. And we may hope that they will not suffer
similar horrors too nor be complicit in the creation of similar
horrors in the future.