Raising Awareness is Like Raising a Child
Although I don’t yet know the full involvement and requirements of properly raising a child, I can only imagine it is an epic journey. I hope to stand on the other side of my son or daughter’s college graduation and sigh with relief that they didn’t get arrested or stalked on MySpace or join Al Qaeda. The rally Sunday felt to me like a victory and a tie all at once. The attendance and the press coverage was a success, but there is still so much left to do. Perhaps at my child’s graduation I’ll breathe a sign of relief, but also feel the second or third ulcer form as they embark upon the next leg of their journey out into a scary, big world.
In raising awareness, you count your small victories, much like you count your child’s small victories. The A+ on the pop quiz is stupendous, but the final exam is in a few weeks. When they learn to tie their shoes, everyone needs to get excited, but soon you know that they will have to find a way to buy their shoes as well. If my students this year learned anything, it is that raising awareness is a valuable first step in trying to fix any of society’s problems. Raising awareness is not as glamorous as raising money – with the latter you get to have a 5k or dress up for a benefit dinner. With the former you get to prepare PowerPoint presentations or handouts or try to drag people to a movie showing.
However, the necessity of this step cannot be missed. With an uneducated public, your issue will persist. Just as a child cannot walk before they crawl, or track mud into the living room before they learn to walk, neither can real solutions be brought about before we know which problem needs addressing and why. This is why I rallied on Sunday.
I was impressed as I looked at the headlines on the newspapers in the BWI Airport gift shops yesterday. All of the national papers had a front page story about the Darfur rally, sharing space with the planned immigration protests. Although I wanted to rest easy thinking that America would wake up and read their papers and immediately want to somehow get involved to end the genocide in Darfur, I knew that these newspapers would be in tomorrow’s recycling bins and the chance of Darfur again disappearing from the public consciousness was very real.
The rally was like a college seminar in a class on “Genocide in the 21st Century.” Speaker after speaker stood behind the podium to motivate the thousands gathered on the mall to chant, clap and demand action. Facts and photographs flashed on the screen to remind us why we were there and to give a face to static numbers that appear in black and white. Senators, celebrities, refuges, ministers, and students shared why they wanted to see the genocide end, and every attendee left with more motivation and maybe a new T-shirt.
But the awareness-raising is not done. While we would love to treat the rally like a child’s birthday and take lots of pictures and look at all their friends, and sit back and relax for a month, the plight of the Sudanese is too great and our potential to act too overwhelming. On Sunday, there were other vigils and rallies across the country to remember and persuade. And in Nigeria, peace talks were extended and representatives from the US, the UK and the UN were in attendance. Now, looming in the background after the dust from the rally settles is whether or not a workable peace agreement can be signed. If you search any legitimate news website for Darfur, you will see a handful of articles about the peace talks, some of which were written and published because it now seems that a bit more of the American public cares about their dying brothers and sisters in Sudan.
So we’ve had the rally, made the news, and educated some who were previously unaware. But our baby is still growing and needs more nourishment and attention than before. There are still postcards to be signed, elected officials to be contacted, and newspaper editorials to be written. The combination of thousands on the mall and international eyes on negotiations force the world to wait and see what is next. With a signed agreement, accountability follows and even more will need to be ready to remind every side to uphold its promises. With an unsigned agreement, the fighting and dying continues, and we must again make the noise necessary for those who are able to bring the rebels back to the table.
In raising anything, milestones are like rest stops. Celebrate, take a deep breath, eat some fried chicken, but continue ahead, more motivated and eager than before.
In raising awareness, you count your small victories, much like you count your child’s small victories. The A+ on the pop quiz is stupendous, but the final exam is in a few weeks. When they learn to tie their shoes, everyone needs to get excited, but soon you know that they will have to find a way to buy their shoes as well. If my students this year learned anything, it is that raising awareness is a valuable first step in trying to fix any of society’s problems. Raising awareness is not as glamorous as raising money – with the latter you get to have a 5k or dress up for a benefit dinner. With the former you get to prepare PowerPoint presentations or handouts or try to drag people to a movie showing.
However, the necessity of this step cannot be missed. With an uneducated public, your issue will persist. Just as a child cannot walk before they crawl, or track mud into the living room before they learn to walk, neither can real solutions be brought about before we know which problem needs addressing and why. This is why I rallied on Sunday.
I was impressed as I looked at the headlines on the newspapers in the BWI Airport gift shops yesterday. All of the national papers had a front page story about the Darfur rally, sharing space with the planned immigration protests. Although I wanted to rest easy thinking that America would wake up and read their papers and immediately want to somehow get involved to end the genocide in Darfur, I knew that these newspapers would be in tomorrow’s recycling bins and the chance of Darfur again disappearing from the public consciousness was very real.
The rally was like a college seminar in a class on “Genocide in the 21st Century.” Speaker after speaker stood behind the podium to motivate the thousands gathered on the mall to chant, clap and demand action. Facts and photographs flashed on the screen to remind us why we were there and to give a face to static numbers that appear in black and white. Senators, celebrities, refuges, ministers, and students shared why they wanted to see the genocide end, and every attendee left with more motivation and maybe a new T-shirt.
But the awareness-raising is not done. While we would love to treat the rally like a child’s birthday and take lots of pictures and look at all their friends, and sit back and relax for a month, the plight of the Sudanese is too great and our potential to act too overwhelming. On Sunday, there were other vigils and rallies across the country to remember and persuade. And in Nigeria, peace talks were extended and representatives from the US, the UK and the UN were in attendance. Now, looming in the background after the dust from the rally settles is whether or not a workable peace agreement can be signed. If you search any legitimate news website for Darfur, you will see a handful of articles about the peace talks, some of which were written and published because it now seems that a bit more of the American public cares about their dying brothers and sisters in Sudan.
So we’ve had the rally, made the news, and educated some who were previously unaware. But our baby is still growing and needs more nourishment and attention than before. There are still postcards to be signed, elected officials to be contacted, and newspaper editorials to be written. The combination of thousands on the mall and international eyes on negotiations force the world to wait and see what is next. With a signed agreement, accountability follows and even more will need to be ready to remind every side to uphold its promises. With an unsigned agreement, the fighting and dying continues, and we must again make the noise necessary for those who are able to bring the rebels back to the table.
In raising anything, milestones are like rest stops. Celebrate, take a deep breath, eat some fried chicken, but continue ahead, more motivated and eager than before.
|
Comments (0)
Post a Comment