RE: [wg-review] Outreach [was: Multilingualism]

["Joanna Lane" <jo-uk@rcn.com>]

Eric et al,
The length of the following response must be worth 5 posts, but I think it's
worth it, so I beg your indulgence and with this, I recuse my opinionated
self for the next 24 hours...:-)
Joanna

>Eric Dierker wrote:-
<snip/>
So yes pictures and such campaigns are important.  But if I brought someone
to
these lists with a compassionate poster of a child, and then they witnessed
the
atrocious verbal battery that occurs here we would never see them again.
[...]

I agree, but I did not explain myself clearly. Education and Outreach goes
both ways. My suggestion was that we have a lot to learn from your Shoeshine
Boy, if he would agree to share his experiences with us and explain how his
life has been and could be affected. There are many who can only dream of
becoming a Shoeshine boy. I have met families in Kenya whose children
receive no schooling at all because they will not allow them into the
building without a ballpoint pen, costing 10cents, which is out of reach. As
you can imagine, we left with empty suitcases, but I doubt very much that
any of these children have yet received the benefit of a single connection
in their schools.  While I'm sure DNSO does not want to place children at
risk in this way, how can we confirm whether or not they will be affected
adversely by policy recommendations if they are not even represented or
consulted?

The boy I am featuring here in the following link, Meo, is one of the lucky
ones who achieved his ambition through use of the Internet and the DNS. What
was his ambition? Take a look. http://www.phil-am-war.org/shiner/   A boy
who takes pride in being on his knees is worth more than a passing thought.

<snip/>
And so we must combine Outreach with educational gathering points where
through
a multilingual environment we can train the new recruits so that their first
taste of battle does not shell shock them.

I hope I have not painted to grim a picture with my words, because I see a
great
and brilliant horizon where the internet can be used as the key to unlock
the
chains that bind.
[....]

As do I see a brilliant horizon, but neither are we immune from shocks as
the enormity of the task unfolds.
Personally, I try not to forgot this one, which as you may know, was passed
around the DNS fairly recently:-

Read, wonder, realize, and count your blessings!

If we could shrink the earth's population to a village of precisely 100
people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same, it would look
something like the following:

There would be: 57 Asians, 21 Europeans, 14 from the Western Hemisphere,
both north and south, 8 Africans. 52 would be female, 48 would be male, 70
would be non-white, 30 would be white, 70 would be non-Christian, 30 would
be Christian, 89 would be heterosexual, 11 would be homosexual. 6 people
would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 would be from the
United States. 80 would live in substandard housing, 70 would be unable to
read, 50 would suffer from malnutrition, 1 would be near death; 1 would be
near birth. 1 (yes, only 1) would have a college education, 1 would own a
computer.

When one considers our world from such a compressed perspective, the need
for acceptance, understanding and education
becomes glaringly apparent.

The following is also something to ponder...If you woke up this morning with
more health than illness...you are more blessed than the million who will
not survive this week. If you have never experienced the danger of battle,
the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of
starvation...you are ahead of 500 million people in the world. If you can
attend a church meeting without fear of harassment, arrest, torture, or
death...you are more blessed than three billion people in the world. If you
have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a
place to sleep...you are richer than 75% of this world. If you have money in
the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish someplace ... you are
among the top 8% of the world's wealthy. If your parents are still alive and
still married ... you are very rare, even in the United States and Canada.
If you can read this message, you just received a double blessing in that
someone was thinking of you, and furthermore, you are more blessed than over
two billion people in the world that cannot read at all.

Someone once said: What goes around comes around. Work like you don't need
the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching.
Sing like nobody's listening. Live like it's Heaven on Earth. It's National
Friendship Week. Send this to everyone you consider a FRIEND. Pass this on,
and brighten someone's day. Nothing will happen if you do not decide to pass
it along. The only thing that will happen, if you DO pass it on, is that
someone might smile because of you.

Regards,
Joanna





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