Images of Alan's body being recovered from a beach near Bodrum caused an outpouring of sympathy for the plight of those fleeing Syria's civil war and criticism of foreign governments for not doing enough to answer the crisis.
Aylan Kurdi has become the image of the impact of Syria’s war. His photo will linger as a reminder of how cruel of a race we are. If it does not concern our everyday life, it is not of interest or importance. If it is not in our own backyard, it is irrelevant. We, as a human race, are cruel. And we are all guilty.
We are all responsible for his life and for the lives of others just like him whose images we may never see. Is this really progress? Is this really what we sell ourselves as change?
Maybe if we cared about the human race we would have less war, less poverty, less racism, less classism, less sexism … more compassion.
We’ve made intellectual and technological progress. We haven’t made compassionate progress. There is still so much work to be done.