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ESL forum >
Message board > Being sorry is not enough
Being sorry is not enough
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donapeter
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Being sorry is not enough
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Dear all, I �ve just read the sad news about the young people who died in Spain. Everybody have been sending condolences and express their sorrow about what had happened. This is a great gesture and I really appreciate this. But.....beside the sorrow, is there anything that we do? Do we learn a lesson from this terrible accident? Or we just feel sorry and say nothing, letting our kids crossing the railways/streets chaotically? I just ask you: have you seen mothers and kids running across the streets where there are no zebra crossing? Did you say anything to them? Did you talk about it with your students? Have you ever seen children pushing each other in front of the car , thinking that this is cool? Have you heard about children playing chicken in front of the trains or trucks? If yes (and I do not believe you haven �t seen such things) , did you do anything about it? And ...given the news now.....did you explain to your kids/students what was wrong about it? Or we just feel sorry?
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24 Jun 2010
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magneto
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You �ve got a point there, Donapeter...This is something we should all think about: We remember our bad habits when something bad happens. It takes a tragedy for us to realise that our indifference may, in the long run, affect our lives as well...Being sorry is not enough - remaining silent makes us accomplices. Time for us to change our attitudes and get more involved - in general.
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24 Jun 2010
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Greek Professor
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Hello everyone...
Donapeter: I get your point and you are right...Of course kids play dangerous games and mothers run across the road with their children at a no zebra crossing...
YES...I for one have done something...and still do... when i see the absurd/irrational/crazy things happening i go for it...I give these people a piece of my mind...Just the other day i had gone walking and a kid kicked the garbage bin down and i shouted to him and he just ran off..Of course I chased him and {for my age i did pretty well} and caught him and gave him a good scolding when his mother came out and basically scolded me...
Quote: "He �s just a kid..."
When I heard this I just went off at her....and of course she lowered her eyes and grab her son by the ear and took him inside nagging.....BUT THIS WAS DONE B/C I TOLS HER OFF AS WELL....so what do parents do?
However there are parents and children who do listen. who do follow the rules...
So basically it us up to us adults to continue telling young people what is right or wrong...the time will come when they will actually listen...
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24 Jun 2010
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donapeter
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I mean something else: when such a tragedy happens ...we as a family , as parents....do we feel free of guilt? Is our consciousness ok, do we set our hearts at ease? Did those families educate their children as to avoid such things to happen? Do they feel ant guilt for it? Or, of course, it �s the conductor �s guilt?Or......and this is one of my favorites : it �s FATE! A short exercise of mine: imagine you are the conductor, doing your regular job. Do nothing wrong, but your job. This accident happens and .....you are to be blamed for it. Is it fair? And...something more than that: do you have where you live old people who cross the street wherever they want? It happens to me almost everyday to see old people crossing the streets, running (OMG....so to say running, after a certain age running seems just a slow walking) through cars to get on the other side?
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24 Jun 2010
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Greek Professor
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Im sure those families did educate their children..But unfortunately...FATE? STUPIDITY? PEER PRESSURE? something sent them there...!Is it the conductor �s fault?
Whose fault it is i think it doesn �t matter {metaphorically}...These teens are dead and the loss of life is what really counts...Unfortunately blame will not bring them back...
Maybe what I �m saying doesn �t make any sense...I don �t know...When I read the paper I was at a loss for words... |
24 Jun 2010
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Mariethe House
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I agree with you Donapeter and zora but When you are a mother of a youngster , no matter what you say, no matter how much you do to make them
aware of dangers they just love taking risks at this age and as a
mother my attitude was whenever he went out with his "gang": "I hope
everything will be alright" and I just prayed he loved life enough not
to go beyond the barrier! Now he has become a very responsible person
and is the father of a precious 31/2 year old little girl and I know he
has learnt the lesson and knows the price of life ! Thank God!
Lots
of love to all the parents and children on this site!!
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24 Jun 2010
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Zora
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The sad thing about this accident was very simply this - "it was preventable". It was not due to a mechanical error, it was not a freak accident of a train going off it �s tracks or a bridge plummeting to the ground.
It was human negligence - and because it was a group of young people who decided to cross in an area that was not meant for crossing. - we feel especially bad. But quite truthfully, these were not "kids" (i.e. 9 or 10 year olds), they were young adults that should have known better. ALSO this train was full of innocent passengers, that quite thankfully, were spared as the train could have derailed and this could have been a lot worse than it was.
Now, I agree it was a tragedy; but what about the poor conductor, policeman, ambulance drivers, EMTs and innocent bystanders that saw the accident? What about them? Or how about the friends that survived? I can �t even imagine how they are going to feel after the shock wears off... In fact, we often forget that our negligence and total disregard for things like safety, affects others in ways we can �t even
start to comprehend and I agree that "being sorry" is not enough...
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24 Jun 2010
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rainyp
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Dear donapeter
i do agree with you, being sorry is not enough all the time. but you know what i think...sometimes we get lesson after doing and committing deed, then we get back our conscious and feel sorry for what we have committed, but then we have nothing to do...like this after losing the young people........
sometimes i think like why people dont understand from example, why they need experience to learn....and it also happens sometimes that after incidents like this we forget after some days and do the same things again...you know some people never learn.
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24 Jun 2010
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donapeter
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Things like this (the accident in Spain) happen everyday. But not for a group of people. If you watch the news there are people who want to cross the railway or the street and get killed. NOW, we feel so sorry because it was a group! We look it as it is smth exceptional. But it is not. Every day this kind of accidents happen. And noone writes it on the board for us to present condolence. |
24 Jun 2010
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MJ_Misa
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Yes, Dona - you are right.
Things like this happen every day and even thought it is a terrible tragedy, the people caused it themselves (which doesn �t mean I am not sorry for them). But who I feel much more sorry for is the train driver, who hasn �t caused anything and will see it every single day till the end of his life. And only thing he did was doing his job well. That is a real tragedy - innocent people paying for irresponsibility of others.
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24 Jun 2010
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