The virtual reality goggles that were included with this edition of the New York Times are still sitting on the end table, untested. After reading the stories of Oleg, Chuol and Hana—refugee children in the Ukraine, South Sudan and Lebanon respectively—I didn’t feel like I needed another layer of visceral experience to lament deeply what our ways of war have done to the lives of children all over the world. Our aggressive actions to protect our way of life in our places have very real consequences for other places, people and ways of life around the world. Even if these children weren’t propelled into limbo by my personal actions, or even my country’s actions, reading their stories burdens me appropriately with a sense of responsibility we all have—especially those of us who are privileged adults—to work toward a less violent world.
From “The Displaced: Introduction” in The New York Times Magazine:
That children, even under the worst of circumstances, are able to remain children supplies the world around them with the sense of a future, which is the equivalent of hope.
Photo: Kurdish refugees in 1974, after an Iraqi bombing. Credit: Bruno Barbey/Magnum Photos
