July 2016 Articles

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Where is the Love?

Where is the Love?
As I struggled to come up with a topic to write about for this month’s Ag Trader, an old pop song came into my head. The main chorus line of the song asks, “Where is the love?” With all of the recent devastating events that have taken place, I feel like that question is valid at this point of time in our world. First, we have a child who somehow gets into a gorilla’s cage at the zoo, resulting in the gorilla having to be shot. It was a very unfortunate event and I am saddened by the loss of the gorilla, however, it seems that all anyone can talk about is how horrible the parents are and how horrible the people are who shot the gorilla to save the child’s life. I ask you, where is the love? Where is the love for those parents, who perhaps made a mistake, but who must have been stricken with fear that they were about to lose their child? Some may say, where is the love for the gorilla? However, I say, where is the love for the child? All social media shows is people devastated over the death of the gorilla, not over the fact that a child could have lost his life. In fact, I would actually bet that if the child had lost it’s life, people would still be bashing the parents and would not be nearly as concerned about the death of the child as they have been over the death of the gorilla. Where is the love? I love animals honestly MORE than the average person, but a human’s life, especially a child’s, outweighs an animal’s every time. Period. And how about the most recent accident, where a 2 year old boy was killed by an alligator. How horrible and heart-wrenching that must be for his parents and family, especially since some of them had to witness it. Yet, the most common response is, yet again, people bashing the parents. I do not have a child of my own, however, I am a teacher. I know first hand that you can turn your back for literally ONE SECOND, and when you turn back around a child can be into something. Plus, no one is perfect. Everyone makes mistakes. Things happen. Things that are beyond our control sometimes. How cruel is it for people to sit here and point fingers and place blame and criticize these parents during a time when they are drowning in heartache and guilt? Where is the love? We all want compassion and forgiveness during our trials, yet we can’t seem to offer it to others. Lastly, the shootings of singer, Christina Grimmie and the young adults at the Pulse nightclub. 51 deaths through terrorism and/or someone very sick or cruel. So much pain, so much hurt. Yet, we turn the heartache into a huge political argument between democrats and republicans. We use it to support our favored presidential candidate. We point fingers at opposing parties. Some of us even say incredibly hateful things about the victims. Let me say right now. I do not support the homosexual lifestyle, HOWEVER, I love each and every homosexual person in this world. What happened in Orlando was a heartbreaking tragedy. I could not care less what the sexual orientation of those young adults were—my heart breaks for them and their families. They are people, just like you and me. We need to stop getting so caught up in a political agenda and show some true compassion.. Where is the love? So I just want to leave you all with this. When a situation arises, whether on the global, national, state, or local scale, or even just in your own home, before you react or judge, take a minute to calm down and strive to listen, put yourself in another person’s shoes, and show compassion. Don’t let there be a question of where is the love? Be that example of love to others in every situation. Be that example of Jesus in every situation. Where is the love? It was crucified on the cross and we must now be that love for Him., like He constantly is for us. Dana Bennett