How a father attempted to help his child make sense of what’s happening in the world right now, from the Front Page Sections, translated…
The terrorist attack in Paris, France had, shocked the world, and it’d gotten the world’s people’s sympathies as well as cares and concerns. The display pictures on Facebook of the personal accounts were changed into the flag of France, to show condolences toward those who died, as well as the blessings toward France.
My twelve-year-old eldest daughter also cared about the events, all of a sudden, she’d asked me, “Dad, what, had happened in the terrorist attack on Paris?”
I was stumped for a bit, not knowing where to begin to explain, I didn’t want to start with the dichotomy of “angel vs. demons”, I’d thought about it awhile, turned on googlemap on my internet explorer, typed in “Syria”, decided to give my daughter a lesson on international relations, and world history, the simplified version.
“This event, we must start, in a country called Syria, this region called the Middle East. Right here, there’s an organization that worshipped Islam called Islam Nation, they’d taken parts of Syria, as well as Iraq. This organization is seen by the U.S. as a terrorist group. But, before we get into talking about IS, we must, talk about the constant religious and regional conflicts in the Middle East first, this, begins with Israel…”, as I’d talked, I’d pointed the cursor to Israel, south of Syria.
I’d started talking about World War II, from how the Germans committed genocides on the Jews, to how after the war, Israel started rebuilding their nation, how the Middle East was, trapped in long term religious and racial conflicts since. Then, I’d talked to her about the multiple sects of the Islam religion, how there had been, civil wars within the nations of the Middle East for a long time, and how the U.S., Russia, along with other major world powers played their parts, supporting the different nations.
With the mentioning of the various nations of my “story”, I’d searched, endlessly, on Googlemap, as I’d introduced these places to my daughter.
There had been constant civil wars in this nation. And, some of the sects had, pointed their fingers to the western world, planned their revenge. And, they’d started a series of terrorist attacks in the boundaries of the western nations, and, the western nations called these attacks “Terrorist Attacks”. The most serious one was September 11th, 2001 in the U.S. Back then, you weren’t even born yet.” I’d shown my daughter a photograph of the fallen twin towers in New York for her to see.
Then, I’d cut straight into the condition in how IS had its influences in Syria and Iraq, because of the way the IS ruled with bad ways, the murders, the decapitations, causing millions of Syrian refugees to escape, over millions had made it to Turkey, as well as nations in Europe too, which had caused the serious problems of refugees in Europe. At the same time, I’d told her the story of the little boy, Arlan, in order to go to Europe, how he was killed in an accident. The photograph of Arlan, lying, lifeless on the beach had caused the Europeans to think seriously about humanity, but it’d also, added on to the differences of the views of how the issues of the refugees were to be handled.
Then, I’d entered into the attack on Paris. Spoke of what sort of military actions that France took, in the Syrian conflicts, in the very end, I’d told my daughter about this latest attack on Paris, France.
This current event history lesson, I’d ranted on, for almost two hours, and because my daughter asked questions here and there, I’d also had to, speak to her on how the time of how Egypt was related in the whole story, before Israel became a nation on its own. My daughter was so into it, but later on, her mom told her, that it was, time for bed, over, over, and over again, and that, was when she’d left my side, unwillingly, because she wanted to hear the end of the story.
After I’d put my daughter down to bed, I’d thought, that although, we all felt awful, for what happened to the victims in the Paris terrorist attacks, but, this is not a matter of who’s right or who’s wrong, it isn’t, that simple. I’m very glad that my daughter asked the question, it’d allowed me, to examine the events through a historical angle too.
Recalling all of these, intertwined, mingled, mixed emotions of these events in history, I couldn’t help, but sigh, that peace, had never been, easy at all.
And so, this, is what the father gained, from teaching the lesson of current events to relating it to history to his child, and, that just shows, how although we don’t live anywhere NEAR the areas of conflict, it’s still, affecting us, in ways we can’t imagine, and this, is a GREAT way, to instill that world view inside a child’s young mind too!
Life, the Obstacle Course 