SC - Toys for Tots and other comments

[Lee-Gwen Booth]

- ----- Original Message -----
From: Ras
I suppose it depends on your perspective but I would rather immunize a
> child than give it a plastic truck and watch it die of disease 6 months
down
> the road.

Yes, but if one can do both one can keep the child healthy in body and give
it pleasure with the toy at the same time. I don't think (and please
remember that I don't know what "Toys for Tots" has as its core) that the
two charities are inconsistent.  Certainly, the inoculations are more
important than the toys but that doesn't mean that they aren't both good
causes.

In fact, there have been times when the toys are actively good things.  When
Australian soldiers went to East Timor they found that children were
(unsurprisingly) very wary of uniforms and so helping them was difficult.
One way to help get over this was to have the soldiers carry small toys in
their pockets for the children (and, yes, I do know that there are some
problems with the morality of this and that children should not be
encouraged to trust people just because they give them toys - but it worked
and under the circumstances it was a Good Thing.)  It has also been seen
that giving a child in a war torn place a toy - even a pre-loved one - can
really help brighten an otherwise revolting situation.  (No, I don't have
documentation!  This is just something I have gathered from news reports.  I
don't know if any studies have been done, but I wouldn't be surprised if
there have been.)

Gwynydd