Innocents

The sky,

Thinking of the innocents that have gone to their deaths through war and genocide. But not just that, also plague and starvation. Cutting funding to medical programs is not helping, and using misinformation is particularly cruel.

What is there that we can do? How do we not weep constantly because of those losses? It’s overwhelming. From the past and into the future, there is no enlightenment. Very little truth and reconciliation. A few places have succeeded, Northern Ireland and South Africa spring to mind.

Maybe we should look at what worked or went well in those situations

Now Gaza and Ukraine, Yemen and Sudan are experiencing the horrors of man’s inhumanity to man. And it really does seem to be a male thing. But maybe I’m wrong.

There should maybe be a class in schools. Respect for humanity. I remember an experiment I heard about. A class of children were split in two. Half were given scarves and told they were better than their counterparts. For the day or the week they were allowed to lord it over the other half. But during the next week the other children got the scarves. Suddenly they had the upper hand. Both groups got to experience the indignities and descrimination of the underdogs. It apparently was a great success in improving how children behaved. Insight is so important.

Truth

What are you passionate about?

I like truth, I always have, I heard a story when I was little, about a boy that chopped down a tree but owned up to it when asked as he couldn’t tell a lie… I think that was a boy who became an American president.

How ironic that a recent president posts on a website called Truth, but that isn’t necessarily being honest (is this where I say allegedly?).

Why am I passionate about it? It actually makes me feel ill not to be honest. I was bought up as a Christian and although I’m now agnostic, I still feel deeply that truth is  important. I feel that people should know the truth about things. The problem with that though is that different people have different truths! I was recently listening to 1984 by George Orwell and it did strike a chord about how the masses can be controlled. Life is difficult and truth is important to me.

He’s resigning

Cartoon I drew of Boris Johnson last year as a naughty schoolboy, hearing, seeing and speaking no art. It was about the cuts in art teaching and the creative industries. But I think it sort of works for what has been happening recently. Has he ignored or forgotten reports of one of his senior government members caught in a serious case of misconduct. In fact he has apparently also been caught out in several untruths, and today, finally resigned (sort of) as leader of the Conservative party but he hasn’t stood down as Prime minister. He seems to be staying on as a caretaker for the next three months while his party decide who will replace him.

Whether you love him or hate him he certainly is a character. When he was a child he said he was going to be king of the world. At Eton he apparently was displeased by his tutors displeasure with him. He was a leader of a club of students at University who were antagonistic towards poorer students. If you look up his biography you can find all sorts of things that he was involved in that caused problems but there are too many to list. These seem to have carried on into his prime ministership. Anyway things are changing, but no one knows if it’s for better or worse?