For the Children

FOR THE CHILDREN

The London games took place last year, we cheered and watched with awe, it’s a given that people all around the world who watched was blown over by the sheer magnificence of the occasion and the pyrotechnics that were on display that day.
I open by saying this because recently I watched a video on YouTube which was titled first world problems said by third world people. The ad showed third world people talking about problems as mundane as the phone charger not being long enough to reach the bed, the house being so large that the residents needed a booster so that the wireless internet would be received all over the house.

Before I go any further let me explain that I have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING against people who have worked hard who do well in life and enjoy the somewhat finer aspects of life itself.

My problem is mainly with the way the world views itself, its ability to gawk at the stunning pyrotechnics at the London Olympics (or indeed any other opening ceremony of a major world event) and casually turn a blind eye to the children dying in Africa and many other parts of the world.

Yes, many of us protest the killings of children and civilians during wars but are there enough of us that do? Do those protesting do it in an effective enough way?

I was listening to a speech by Howard Zinn today and he says how we must not give up, that the only great big changes that have happened is not because of government or anybody else but because of the people that march, the people that protest, the people that are willing to speak up to be heard. In a time where the big companies have a stranglehold of television news stations, radio news stations and the printed media the one aspect that they don’t have charge of the internet. You see they can shut down a website or two. Or five or ten. But what they cannot stop is us networking with the rest of the world, so in that spirit I propose an idea, an idea to write to the international Olympic committee and the Brazilian government with as many signatures as we can get this year through a snowball effect online, and ask them instead of having an extravagant opening ceremony and presumably spending close to the 27 billion pounds spent by the UK , to instead take the budget for the opening ceremony and give it to the poorest regions of the world, to give people a chance at life, if not the world then at least to the poorest people in Brazil, to those who are suffering without clean water, clean sanitation and in general a sustainable development agenda.

I beg you all to stand up, be counted and have courage. If not for you, then for the children!

Some stood up once, and sat down.
Some walked a mile, and walked away.
Some stood up twice, then sat down.
“It’s too much,” they cried.
Some walked two miles, then walked away.
“I’ve had it,” they cried,
Some stood and stood and stood.
They were taken for fools,
they were taken for being taken in.
Some walked and walked and walked –
they walked the earth,
they walked the waters,
they walked the air.
“Why do you stand?” they were asked, and
“Why do you walk?”
“Because of the children,” they said, and
“Because of the heart, and
“Because of the bread,”
“Because the cause is
the heart’s beat, and
the children born, and
the risen bread.”