14 September 2009

What Is The World Coming To?


I have titled this post "What Is The World Coming To?" for the simple reason that this photograph represents, to me, the problems that we face as a community.

That said, I hope that the missus and I can raise young Will with a healthy dose of respect for his elders and an appreciation of the difficulties faced by those less fortunate than he. I would be a little annoyed if I saw a photo like this floating around the twitter-sphere or the internet with young Will front and center giving the bird to some poor old lady. He'd be off down to the nearest shelter or soup kitchen for a cold hard dose of reality to see how some others have to struggle to survive.

My first thought was that this photo was photoshopped or it was staged. Then, I started thinking about some of my experiences in Indonesia. I can see this photo, and I have seen this photo many times, the only difference was that I was not carrying my camera to catch that moment.

This is a sad indictment of where we are as people and what we are teaching our children if this sort of behaviour is acceptable.

I borrowed this photo from the treespotter and his incarnation of treeatwork. I would like to give credit to whoever took the photograph. So, if anyone knows, feel free to drop me a line. I will add a postscript to give credit where credit is due.

But enough of the preaching. I look forward to comments (if anyone wants to make one or two).

4 comments:

Unknown said...

the original link i post below the picture.

anong said...

I think many are doing the same to Obama. Pity really

Brett said...

The school can probably be identified by the uniform. Seriously, I haven't seen this uniform before - short pleated skirt?

Rob Baiton said...

Treespotter...

I thought that was a link to somewhere else. But, I will add it to the post.

Anong...

Not really thinking about Obama on this one. But, yes, the idea of a youngster giving the bird to an elderly lady trying to make ends meet as a beggar is sad.

Brett...

Probably. I thought you got out more than that. So, I was figuring you would have seen plenty of different uniforms about the place.

I have seen short skirts before. Although I am not sure that the picture is Jakarta. But, I will check out the treespotter's link and see what it says.