There is an apocryphal story of a father walking along a shoreline hand-in-hand with his 4 year-old daughter. He is walking briskly to get back to where the rest of the family are waiting for them. His daughter however is tugging him back pointing at hundreds and hundreds of baby starfish washed-up on the beach by an earlier storm.
She picks one up and pulls her father to the water’s edge and drops the tiny starfish into the water.
“Daddy” she implores him “we must put all the baby starfish back in the water.”
Her father however is impatient to move on and tries to reason with her “Sweetheart, the starfish will take too long to save, we have to rush by, we simply do not have time to save all the starfish.”
His daughter shook her hand free from his hand and with tears streaming down her face shouted back “…but we can save some of the starfish.”
Everyone seeing the images of desperate people fleeing war zones and pleading for help will be sympathetic to their plight. Everyone seeing the body of the little Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi washed up on a Turkish beach will imagine the grief of his parents and find it incomprehensible.
So, like the father in the apocryphal story, do we hurry by albeit sad and uncomprehending? Or do we take the logic of his daughter and help some even though we cannot help all?
I think we are in danger of walking by. Can we please count our blessings. Can we please recognise how fortunate we are and offer the hand of friendship to those poor souls so broken by their misfortune?
Of course politicians must be concerned with security and budgets and law & order. Of course politicians must also search for long-term answers that offer hope for normality in the places where these people used to live. In the meantime I want our politicians to act generously, speedily and with humility.
Our national interest is enhanced not undermined when we reach out to people in need. Let them feel why our values are held so dear. What is the point of our values if we do not show how important they are? What is the point of having the power to act and then walking by?
