DEAR YOGESHREE
This is the last in a series of letters that investigate something of the very special form of leadership that we as child and youth care workers display in the work we do with children and young people,... or maybe should be showing... We have a particular responsibility to demonstrate a style of leadership that reflects the world as it should be. I call it a future world. .. not the present world tweaked a bit to bring about little compromises to it as it stands, but a vision of a new world where the most important values of love , democracy and justice are seen and experienced by the children as a workable new world through what we say and do... as individual child and youth care workers and as a caring organisation.
It is for this reason that the mantra of 'Think globally.... act locally' is so powerful in the work we do.
So, for example, the new world is a non-violent world , the use of war to bring about peace has no part in the new world, and weapons of violence and harm are melted down and "turned into plough-shares".
You will remember the movement to make South Africa into a "gun-free society" well, as a believer in a non-violent world, the Children's Home joined the movement and disallowed any manner of gun on the property. The play therapy room was permitted to be an exception for reasons best understood by the play therapist.
I can remember that we took a fairly large group of children on a camp at the camping site at Umtentwini near Port Shepstone on the (then) Natal South Coast.(now Kwa-Zulu Natal) The camp-site was used only once a year by the 'Home" and for the rest of the year it was used and looked after by a group who called themselves ' The Bullslingers'. I was not aware of this, but to make money for the 'Home' and to make use of the bush and heavy undergrowth, the Bullslingers had made the site into a place for the playing of paint-ball shooting games. You know how it works. Two sides are identified by some sort of coloured scarf and are armed with guns that shot pellets of paint. I don't know the rules, but they stalk each other and try to shoot the opponent with the pellets of coloured paint. There is a system of knowing whether if you are injured or dead and which side wins. It is a physically harmless simulation of battle. A war game.
I am sure that you see where this is all leading.
When we arrived at the site the Bullslingers came to welcome us onto the site and to check that everything was alright and to plan their input into the programme. The would join us all for an evening campfire and barbecue Then I learnt of the paintball game and how the site was being used so that funds could be raised to support the camp costs for the children. They invited the children and young people to a game of paint-ball as part of the camp progamme.
The children and young people were ecstatic.
So, here I was between possibly offending a funder and making an exception to the gun-free policy or sticking with the values attached to the values of a non-violent society, refusing the game and hugely disappointing the children.
I must tell you that the staff were part of the discussion around the camp programme and the children were brought into this process.
The outcome was that we were prepared to stick with the principles and possibly offend or lose the funder. It was really hard for all of us .
Leaders, especially in the unique form of leadership that we as child and youth care workers adhere to is a form of personal integrity. We demonstrate congruence between what we expect from the children and what we say and what we do.
Please, Yogeshree, in your child and youth care journey .. in your leadership, please, don't lose your personal integrity and the mantra that we 'think globally ... act locally '
As child and youth care workers and leaders, we are trusted to "be the world we want it to be".
Love peace and blessings
Barrie
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