Two news stories

There were two stories in the news today—both about young people.

The first involves a student who brought a lawsuit against a school district because he had a problem with the district’s hair policy.

The second is about a new acronym WCNSF which stands for ‘wounded child, no surviving family.’

That’s the world we live in these days.

On one side of the divide, a kid sues his school to demand his right to wear his hair any way he likes.

On the other side, a new acronym for kids.

The first story brings to mind the hair policy in my old high school.

Our principal, this no-nonsense Irishman, would routinely go around and snip off the hair of any student who hadn’t visited the barber lately.

The impromptu haircut would usually be a bit ragged, requiring the students to go to a real professional to have it fixed.

(Actually this is just hearsay, I personally never saw him do this to anyone.)

We, the timid ones, would comply without question, definitely no lawsuit from us. But I remember the minute we were out of school; we started growing our hair out (at least some of us did—the rebellious ones).

But I bear no grudges against this mini despot (and neither do most of my peers). In fact, I’m planning to visit his home village in County Kerry to pay him (belated) homage soon.

I can make a prediction about the hair lawsuit student—he’s not bound for greatness.

When you obsess over trivial things like how you wear your hair, where would you find time to worry about your future, about laying the foundations for a good career?

It’s a case of externals vs. internals again, appearances vs. how you feel inside.

In any case, I am all for boundaries, especially for young people.

The teenage years is a great time—it’s a time for dreams, for exploring your possibilities, and also a time for rebellion, for asserting your independence.

How can you rebel if there’re no boundaries?

The second story tells the story of more human misery, on a scale that few of us can even imagine and comprehend.

The scenes of destruction in Gaza are heartbreaking, as tragic as the scenes unfolding a thousand or so miles away in Ardviika and Mariupol.

Despite the differences in the contexts (and there is a difference—one was totally unprovoked) the results are the same—human misery and WCNSF.

Which brings us back to the contrasts between the two stories.

On one side, children who are encouraged by their adults to look inward and obsess about themselves, and fight the perceived ‘injustices’ they are subject to, such as how they could wear their hair.

On the other side, wounded children with no surviving family.