DO NOT STOP COMMUNICATING!

THIS IS A MESSAGE FROM OUR AMBASSADOR LUCKY MUSHROOM ABOUT RECENT EVENTS

DEAR PARENTS AND CHILDREN,

A lot is being said in the press and online right now about violence and politics in the wake of political activist Charlie Kirk's death.While we pass blame , and there's enough to around, we often forget the little witnesses to our blame games in our homes and schools.

Not only are there two small children that are fatherless today because of our failures as a society to curtail violent senseless political rhetoric, the children of an entire country if not the world are left to grapple with the lethality of provocation in a well armed society that prides itself on freedom of speech .

I would like to see a return to sticks and stones for their sake. Once upon a time children understood that words can not penetrate like bullets can. Bullets should not be a reaction to words no matter the provocation. Children are aware that words can not hurt physically but have been conditioned to act otherwise. Nowadays they have been conditioned to "cancel" and if that doesn't work, violence is an appropriate response. I know this is an unpopular opinion but it must be said. We shelter them from words. We validate their pain and cancel opinions that are not held by the group. Ironically this is being done right now in Charlie Kirk's name.

I don't share his opinion on many matters but I am sure he would not approve of people being fired and ostracized because of the views that they held. I am sure he would have handed them a mic and asked them to articulate why they feel the way they feel. Personally I don't think that he was a very good debater but nobody can deny that he would have debated but I digress.

He would have smiled that smile that some of us loved and some of us loathed and he would have opened up a dialogue. Even our children know this! We are failing them! We are doing the polar opposite of what he said and we claim to stand for. We are not going into the "lion's den" armed with nothing but the desire to debate and a trust in our system that says we have the right to be heard no matter what we believe. We are not communicating with each ohter at all. We are allowing yet another violent act to further divide us as a nation. The entire country has become one giant college campus full of intolerance. Again I ask, "What about the children!?"

All of these children have lived through words that suggested they could kill their grandparents by just showing up at their homes or coming within an arm's length of them. They have even been exposed to mindless rhetoric about a pending civil war They hear the words we speak about peace and reconciliation while images of bombs exploding in different parts of the world plaster the screens of the adults around them. We are teaching them how we really communicate and it's not with words; it's with rockets and rifles. It's with violence and threats of more violence. Simultaneously we prepare them for therapy.

They get a glimpse of reality on a smart phone only to be told to ignore it; forget it you are Ok and if you are not, there is a treatment for it. The older ones are told to aspire to attend one of our fine institutitons of highter learrning and not to mingle with people whose views and values are not the same as the ones that they might have grown up with/around. They are told that this exposure will not broaden their horizons. It feels to me like we are producing incubators of hate even in places where we used to celebrate our diversity. Our diversity is really our strength. Those are not just empty words!

I am Lucky Mushroom and I apporove this message.