A touching and interesting video has gone viral, that of a French dad explaining recent events to his small frightened boy. It has him explaining that the bad guys may have guns, but the thousands of flowers everyone else is laying are to counter the guns, to protect us.
Syria, whence come so many refugees these days, is composed primarily of cold arid steppes which have been little studied compared to the rainforests and temperate climes. It is dominated by grasses and grass-like species, and forbs. With its poor soil, it does not have the variety of flowers other countries have.
The young father may be onto something.
Of course I am not advocating violence, but some of that may shed light on why -- besides the threat of harm to themselves and that of their loved ones -- these people would flee the lands of their ancestors.
Heat waves have disrupted agriculture and forced fishers and farmers alike to flee, into urban centers, in Syria especially, contributing to social unrest there and fueling the perceived need to just get away. Maybe, in the throes of the climate heating us (unlike frogs in a pot on the stove which don't notice until it's too late), these peoples trying desperately to escape hope for a place not only to lay their heads but also cool them.
The blame for much of this crisis and those like it can be laid squarely at the feet of those US Republicans who, over the past decades and now, would and did deny any assistance to women who want to control the size of their families, which women have done down through time by desperate measures if needed, will always need, and deserve. American groups which even dared to speak of abortion as an option found themselves defunded by the anti-choice crowd here. These predominantly old white men had no business telling women not even members of their families that they cannot have simple contraception. They still have no such "business", not that they would ever admit it.
Yet these Republicans do not take in refugees or offer them diapers or education or shelter, not much more than prayers and platitudes, which in their case are cut from the same shredded and useless cloth.
We should also be aware that, though we lay the flowers as a sign of our grief and respect, the other side like daesh may not see it that way - they may see more indulgences, more displays of how much money we have, that there's money to burn on flowers for the dead rather than flowers (or anything) which a body could eat.
The Pentagon realizes what is happening. John Kerry was not the first to use the term "climate refugees," and, sadly, he will not be the last.
We lay flowers and let go helium balloons because we feel powerless and don't know what else to do, when there are better things we, even while grieving, could be doing -- planting the right kind of tree in the right place chief among them.
