In Response To Paris

Hi -di-hi y'all. Bet you didn't expect to hear from me again so quickly.

Like everyone else with access to the free media, I heard about the terrible attacks in Paris, among other places, last week. The media have covered it pretty much non-stop since it happened (at least in Paris, I've not seen a lot about anywhere else). I've been pondering my personal response to these actions for the last few days. I know I'm only one person, but with this blog I know I can reach at least, like, three whole other people. So maybe I can make a small difference.
When I heard about Paris, I was shocked. I wanted to cry, and scream. I wanted to get over to France and do anything and everything I could to help. Sadly, France was in total shutdown, and it wouldn't have been practical to go even if it hadn't been. So I decided to do everything I could from my family home in Hertfordshire.

I checked that my friends in Paris were safe, and then I did nothing.
That's it.

I didn't cancel my plans to travel (using public transport) into central London with my family on Saturday. I didn't stop myself from enjoying a night out in one of the most "at-risk" cities in Europe. (Xanadu at the Southwark Playhouse, if anyone's interested. Amazing. I'd recommend going, but they've sold out until the end of the season!) And I did nothing to lessen my experience of getting on the tube (I hate the tube) any further. I also didn't cancel my flight from London to Berlin (arguably another "high risk" city) on Sunday. I didn't change my travel plans to get to the airport either. And I didn't complain when they wanted to check my bag at security (my bacon showed up as a liquid on the scanner.) When in Berlin, I didn't do anything to alter my arranged journey back to Braunschweig. I didn't worry about anything apart from making sure I got on the right train.

Because that's the best way to fight these morons.

Terrorists are like naughty children. If you react to every little thing they do, they will never learn that that's not the right way to behave. If a child throws a hissy-fit in the middle of the supermarket because you refuse to buy them sweets, you shouldn't give in and buy them sweets. Then the child learns that making a fuss leads to getting what you want. If a terrorist organisation kills innocent people in one of the biggest cities in Europe, you don't creep around in fear for the next few months. And you certainly don't get into a screaming match in the middle of the metaphorical supermarket. You just get on with your day as you would have before. You don't let them learn that they win by making a fuss.

If we live in fear of everything, we provoke the response "Look how weak the West is! They cower at our feet!" If we retaliate and bomb them into oblivion, we provoke the response "Look how dangerous the West is! We must fight back to protect ourselves!" If we band together, recover from the atrocities they've committed and leave them alone, they'll realise that their plan isn't working. They might try again (I really hope not, surely nobody is that heartless), but they'll learn that it isn't going to help.

They'll grow up a bit if we just leave them alone.

America and Europe have sent fighters and bombers and soldiers into more countries than there are scenes starring Daniel Radcliffe in a Harry Potter film. IT DOESN'T WORK. We've never had the result we want, and we never will. What on earth makes people think "This time. This time we're going to come out on top." It just kills more innocent people, a result nobody wants.

Actually, that's a lie. You know who wants that result? Terrorists.

My point is: stop. Stop trying to fight back. Stop giving them reasons to come and do this again. People died. Over one hundred and thirty people died. One hundred and thirty. That's about the same as the number of people in a reasonably large Scout group (Beavers through to Leaders). That's not OK. In no universe is that OK. So don't send troops and planes and bombs. Don't cancel your holiday plans. Mourn the dead, of course, but don't make things worse for the living.

Carry on as before.
Offer support the the refugees trying to escape from these people.
Look after your friends, family, and neighbours. (Especially those who peacefully practice Islam, they need the support right now too.)
Help out if you can.
But apart from that, do nothing.


All my love goes out to those affected by the attacks France, Lebanon, Chad, Cameroon, and Nigeria, to name some of the most recent ones. I hope life can resume for normal for you all as soon as possible.

The First Baloo

Hi again guys, you must feel truly blessed to be inundated with so many updates... My pondering this week looks at how great it is to be compared to a beloved childhood character.

One of the perks of being a Cub Leader has been choosing my own name, although it's not been made as public as it eventually will be. For those of you who don't know, the tradition for Cub leaders is for them to take the name of a character from the Jungle Book. There is a long history behind this, but basically it stems from the friendship between Rudyard Kipling (the author of the Jungle Book) and Lord Baden Powell (founder of Scouts.) The idea behind leaders having names is, I think, to create the distance between the leaders and the children which would be suitable in such a situation. This is a similar way of doing things to how teachers are only known by "Mr" or "Mrs" at school, except less formal.

As I think I said on this blog about two years ago, I decided upon Baloo. This is almost entirely because he's good at singing, and is loveable in the Disney film of The Jungle Book. However, when I started my Assistant Leader training about this time last year, I decided that I should read the Jungle Book (as in, the actual book), in order to properly educate myself as to what it was really all about. I'm assuming that most of you haven't actually read the Jungle Book; it's really weird. It's split into shorter stories - some are about Mowgli and his adventures in the jungle, there's one about a mongoose called Rikki Tikki Tavi, and one about a seal called Sea Catch (I think - there's lots of seals.) For a children's book, I wouldn't really recommend it for children, to be honest.

I'm just glad they don't call me Rikki Tikki Tavi.

Having read the book now, I do agree that I made the right choice with Baloo. He's not as fun-loving and easygoing as he is in the Disney film, and I like that. I like that there's two sides of the character which work together or separately. It makes it seem more real, more... Like me. Maybe.

The first time one of my Cubs called me Baloo was at camp the other weekend. It was one of the best feelings I've ever had. Like, for once, I was more than just another person; I had a specific role in this child's life and it made me feel important. It made me feel grown up.

I guess that must be what being a parent feels like.