On children and the future

Sir: Children are very direct and uninhibited in the way they react to and speak about each other, having not yet learnt to cover plain unvarnished truth with a veneer of politeness, falsehood and deceit.

In the following poem, Our Jane, by a boy of six, we can sympathise with the lad who sees his young sister being allowed to do just as she pleases while he the elder member of the family has to knuckle under and do what he is told.

All his child’s resentment is included in that last line – “They let her…”

“Our Jane is two
She has white hair and
She has blue eyes and
She has a runny nose and
She can’t talk and
She eats biscuits and
She’s fat and
She plays about
She plays up and down
They let her.”

Not only are children more direct in speech and action, they also accept each other more readily at their face value. It is only as they grow older that they learn from adults the wicked discriminations and prejudice based on race, colour or religion that keep human beings divided from each other.

“Don’t play with him, he is white, or Protestant, or Ibo, or Catholic, or Muslim, or an unbeliever, or black, or Yoruba or Hausa.” Eugene O’Neill in his play, ‘All God’s Chillun Got Wings,’ develops this theme.

The play, set in New York, opens with a mixed group of children, innocently unconscious of the barriers of colour – each accepts the other purely on personal merit.

The colour of your skin is nothing to be particular about.

These children are not unaware of the actual difference in colour, but they are still happy in each other’s company all the same, not giving any damn about the social implications, either black or white, rich or poor.

But when they grow up, and gets older in life, the wicked discriminations, evil racial prejudice creeps in and they start imagining societal class and bad blood brought about by religion, parochial practice and wrong ideas which the Almighty God detests and frowns at.

We are all one in this whole wide world, white or black, red or yellow.
This vast earth is an umbrella that encloses and brings us all together.
We should all live together like one big, happy family and let God’s divine love, truth and integrity surround us without relegating anyone to the background.
We should all be careful and conscious of the fact that no particular condition is permanent as everything evolves in time and seasons.

There’s this witty aphorism by the Yorubas, “Ola a dara!” meaning, “Tomorrow will be better.”

At the end of the day, a beggarly and poor individual today may control humongous and stupendous wealth in the future. The Almighty God is love and so shall it be from the beginning to the end.
Think about it.

Segun Durowaiye can be reached via 08055356855.