Dear Editor:

What is the difference between the poison used in Syria and lethal results in weakening the clean air act, pesticide drifts over farmlands, or even allowing poison lead in the water of American families? We shoot missiles because watching children in pain is difficult, but not seeing the brain damage pain, or the difficulty of breathing the air as a slow painful death, is not acknowledge as being caused by our government. Are we in denial of massive loss of children’s lives, believing we are less guilty than what we see in Syria?

We hear statements like - “out of the mouths of babes, comes wisdom.”

As adults we think we are wiser than the children, but in all honesty their wisdom for resolving problems far exceeds our own. We forgot those beautiful big visions and solutions we had in our youth.  Eleven-year-old Naomi Wadler wants the media to pay attention, but feels many are not equipped to catch an important point when people of color, especially women, were victims. The suffering of children is real and preventable, yet we often ignore what is happening in our own country and in righteousness we fire missiles as if that will work even though it did not work in Syria before.

While we celebrate missile success, our government’s food SNAP program is ... proposed to be eviscerated at the expense of the lives of one out of every six children.

We attempt to deny what we are doing brings harm to the children. We switch the water source, but the pipes that carry the water still have lead. Listen to the children, they know more than we do on what is happening that is preventable. 

Please stop killing children and focus on saving their lives. You may cry when a child dies from abuse. You think a phone call reporting the abuse is the answer, but what is the phone number that mandates investigation? None were provided.

Technology has increased child abuse in the home. The children are known to be drugged so they have no memory or pain. America, we have a problem! Start saving children’s lives in America.

Jarryl Larson

Edgecomb