The latest Paris terror attacks have really taken a toll on the world. The internet has exploded yet again -status updates, pictures of a dark Eiffel Tower, change in profile pictures, more hashtags, more Whatsapp forwards and so on and so forth.
But for how long?
How long do we really intend to ‘#prayforparis’? A couple of days, weeks maybe?
It is no secret that none of this is a permanent solution for terror attacks. Honestly, what sort of terrorist gives two-anything(s) about whether you’re praying or not or whether your face is adorned with red, white and blue on Facebook? Now, I think it’s important that you understand that I’m not going against religion. I’m a pretty religious person too and not for a second will I go all out and say that I refuse to believe in prayers. But if we must pray at all, if faith is what the world runs on, why not all year round? Why not for everyone?
We stress on Paris today, ignoring the constant killings in Baghdad, in Beirut and in all the places across the world. We ignore the apparent smaller things like poverty, abuse and rape, labeling them as random sporadic accounts. We push away incidents based on how important we think they are. When our maids come home to tell us that their drunkard husbands beat them up, we let it be. We think of it as absolutely normal. When we see old men and women hunching and begging at our car windows for a few rupees, we roll up our windows and do our best to ignore them. It doesn’t even have to be a crime, what about all those “affluent” people with broken hearts or a friend who comes to school or college suffering from depression or something along those lines? Are these incidents not worthy of prayers as well or do we need hundreds of people to be killed for mankind to suddenly unite with the excuse of faith?
Honestly, what IS the world coming to?
A lot of issues are out-of-control, honestly. We can’t controls tsunamis and earthquakes and a lot of crimes that take place every day across the globe. Heck, we definitely can’t control the ISIS yet. So what am I exactly suggesting here? I suggest trying to do one good deed a day. No matter how small, if it makes one person genuinely smile, still do it. It’s worth it.
On the radio, there’s this advertisement of a lakeside Children’s Day carnival, with some sort of accented kid blabbering on about Disney kiosks and Chhota Bheem being there and how he’s so glad his parents are taking him there and all that other whiny nonsense. I suppose this seems perfectly normal to you. But it doesn’t to me. Not one bit. Instead of spending the day by a lakeside, pampering an already-pampered child some more with expensive things, why not think of all the kids out there, sitting glassy-eyed and desolate on Children’s Day? Why can’t we all take the focus off ourselves for a while and just strive towards something as simple as equality? It’s as simple as understanding the difference between what we need and what we want.
“Hey, I already have this so I don’t need a new one. But the poor kid doesn’t so let me give it to him or her.” Why can’t it be this simple?
In the apartment complex where I live, every year we have a community lunch, sponsored by some big-hearted resident. All the residents go to this lunch, they eat, they complain about the quality of the food and then they go back to their fancy little apartments and sleep. All the non-residents, namely the security guards, the helpers, the maids and everybody else is usually not encouraged to eat with us. Again, I do not understand the point of feeding about a thousand odd people who are absolutely capable of going back home and eating whatever they want to. Instead, why not bring in the entire helping staff and perhaps their families and feed them? As for the point of the community lunch, to bond with the neighbors and all that, let’s all serve them the food. Let’s literally join our hands, seat all of these less fortunate people and serve them food. We’re still doing it as a community but we’re also doing a good deed.
There is literally no end to these tiny examples. But I hope that I have managed to accurately convey the very point of this post. All I’m saying is that let’s all learn to be a little selfless, to actually treat every human being as our own and to always be united in faith and love.
You want to pray?
Let’s pray.
Let’s pray for the world, let’s pray for every soul out there, everybody hurt, everybody sad and everybody who needs some light in their darkened lives.
Let’s pray for our Family.
It’s Time.
Written by Sumedha Biswas
2 Comments
Reblogged this on kshaemamathew.
Reblogged this on thepurpleirises and commented:
This was super exciting, first ever guest-blogging attempt!