I'm quite depressed today.
Not just because in a few hours time some innocent people are going to be dying. That has been looking incredibly likely for so long, ever since it became clear that Osama bin Laden had slipped through the net.
No, I'm annoyed because while innocent people are about to die, hardly anyone around me cares. Not my family - for once I'm in agreement with my parents. But my schoolmates.
OK, so I can't expect a bunch of 15/16 year olds that I go to school with to be totally clued up on the upcoming war. I mean I'm probably one of a very small group in my school who has even read Stupid White Men, or even cares who is President of the most powerful Nation in the world. It's across the pond. Who gives a shit. But I do care. I'm scared at the amount of people who are going to die because George W. Bush wants to have a war.
The scary thing is, for many people I go to school with, War isn't real. There was an "anti war demo" (read: excuse to go out and smoke for a bit instead of having a lesson) at school today. I didn't go, because I felt that a bunch of kids bunking off school (they weren't even going anywhere, just to the tennis courts round the back of school) while not knowing anything about the issues involved in the upcoming war is not the kind of group there is any point me associating myself with.
Far more disturbingly, there was a pro war protest at school. As I looked at them in the hall (about 30 people when I saw them) I recognised people that I had known for years, only one year above me in school, supporting something that horrifies me. It truly did scare me.
Not that I don't respect their right to an opinion. That they are having an opinion that isn't just a tool to miss lessons I respect. The reason I say it disturbs me is that there were people there who I used to believe thought like me.
What's worse than the "anti war" bunkers off and the pro war people is the people who think it's a huge laugh. Among other opinions heard today:
"I hope war starts, and Pakistan joins in too."
"Bomb Iraq.. and America too!"
"Miss, I want to go to the anti war protest. Because I want to Bomb the Pakis."
I am geniunely ashamed that no one at my school seems to think innocent people dying is anything other than a joke. Finding someone with an real opinion about the war (ie. someone who isn't just using it to bunk off lessons, and someone who doesn't hope Pakistan joins in) is damn hard.
I really hope the people I go to school with grow up, real soon. I'm one of the youngest in my year, but it feels like I'm attending lessons with 10 year olds.
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