I found this little girls face to be so very haunting. I found myself wishing I could pluck her out of the photo and into my safe, comfortable world. How arrogant is that to immediately think that I could offer her a better life? That's the "American" way to view the world and I hate it when I fall into that mindset.A young Iraqi girl waits with other female pilgrims at a checkpoint leading to the shrine of Imam Moussa al-Kadhim in the primarily Shiite Kazimiyah neighborhood of north Baghdad. Hundreds of thousands of Shiite pilgrims went for the annual march to commemorate the 8th Century death of Imam Moussa al-Kadhim, a key Shiite saint.
2 comments:
Actually I think (to be fair to yourself) that you were simply responding to an almost universal desire to nurture children who are in need. Particularly ones with big sad eyes. I felt the same way.
But I understand what you mean about the arrogance of the American mindset. You are right when you suggest that Americans tend to want to tell the rest of the world, "if you could just be an American like me your life would be good." And they have just as much propensity of saying, "why would I care about other countries? They're not America." This last is almost verbatim what one of my new co-workers said when I talked about traveling overseas.
I honestly don't understand that mentality at all. And I have yet to figure out a way to give people like that a more generous view of the world.
that's me...always the one hardest on myself....comes from growing up with catholic girl guilt i guess....I fled the church but the guilt lingers on.
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