The eastern world, it is exploding

Violence flarin’, bullets loadin’

You’re old enough to kill, but not for votin’

You don’t believe in war, but what’s that gun you’re totin’

And even the Jordan River has bodies floatin’

But you tell me

Over and over and over again, my friend

Ah, you don’t believe

We’re on the eve

of destruction.

Don’t you understand what I’m tryin’ to say

Can’t you feel the fears I’m feelin’ today?

If the button is pushed, there’s no runnin’ away

There’ll be no one to save, with the world in a grave

[Take a look around ya boy, it's bound to scare ya boy]

And you tell me

Over and over and over again, my friend

Ah, you don’t believe

We’re on the eve

of destruction.

Yeah, my blood’s so mad feels like coagulatin’

I’m sitting here just contemplatin’

I can’t twist  the truth, it knows no regulation.

Handful of senators don’t pass legislation

And marches alone can’t bring integration

When human respect is disintegratin’

This whole crazy world is just too frustratin’

And you tell me

Over and over and over again, my friend

Ah, you don’t believe

We’re on the eve

of destruction.

Think of all the hate there is in Red China

Then take a look around to Selma, Alabama

You may leave here for 4 days in space

But when you return, it’s the same old place

The poundin’ of the drums, the pride and disgrace

You can bury your dead, but don’t leave a trace

Hate your next-door neighbor, but don’t forget to say grace

And… tell me over and over and over and over again, my friend

You don’t believe

We’re on the eve

Of destruction

Mm, no no, you don’t believe

We’re on the eve

of destruction.

Growing up, I was one of the annoying kids who asked their parents a lot of questions. My parents became very innovative and creative in finding ways to get me off their case. Naturally, I was always the first kid to be registered in every single children activity!

As a father, who has lived through life changing political, financial and social events, I believe that I, as with every parent, have an obligation towards our children to answer any questions they may have, and to portray the occurring events as they actually happened. To do so, we need to understand what is going on around us and how this will be affecting the generations to come.

Being part of a global society (and greatly TV influenced), we should be answering questions that our middle east fixated parents could not, along with the events taking place in our side of the world. We should have answers to questions similar to those that we asked:
What did you do when Palestine was being occupied?
What started the civil war in Lebanon?
Who shot JFK?
Why didn’t you buy Microsoft shares?
How could you stand watching black and white television broadcast?
Did you ever see the Doors or Led Zeppelin live?

We should expect our kids to ask these same questions, adjusted to our life time of events. Palestinians still live under occupation, some still in refugee camps.
Wars are still being fought in Lebanon, but Iraq and Sudan are now added to the list (my apologies to the smaller insignificant wars that are only written on news bar and never make it to the headlines – you should fight harder to make news).
Presidents and political leaders are still being assassinated, executed and overthrown, sometimes we fail to understand the reasons for it (and are happy that we no longer have any history tests to take).
I still haven’t bought Microsoft shares (and thank God for that after plunging to a 5+ year low).
We have plasma screen TVs with 1000s of satellite channels providing us with all the information we could possibly need (about 24, Lost and Grey’s Anatomy, that is – and yes, we only had three versions of CSI!)
Music legends still don’t come to perform in Jordan!

Have things really changed for us in the region? or in the world?
We definitely witnessed a lot of events, but were they drastic enough to make a positive difference?
We witnessed turmoil, but did we learn anything?
We witnessed suffering and the deaths of many many innocent people all around the world, but did it change anything?
We witnessed the loss of trillions of US Dollars in the world economic crisis, but we still ignore the fact that there are fellow global citizens living in famine, others live in poverty, and others are merely surviving.

The only plan I have at the moment is that when my son is old enough to embarrass me with these questions, God willing, I can stand up for the fact that the Matrix trilogy was a remarkable piece of work given our current technology… for any other question I’m sure I’ll be able to find many children activities that would get him off my case!