filler :)

my filler day blog, so we have a pretty interesting subject in goegraphy lately and i'm really interested. its about Child soldiers. Seriously it has to be one of the saddest things ive heard of. my class are all writing letter to try to stop it. heres my letter :)

Dear Senator Ron Wyden,

Imagine having your children, sisters, brothers or anyone that meant something to you, being taken away. Imagine never seeing them again. Imagine having to live a life without them knowing that they have a high risk of dying. When it comes to these kinds of issues it put me to tears. During an Africa conference that I went to in my IHS classes, I got to go to a booth that changed my life. I’m glad that I got to learn about the Invisible Children and know that they are helping out these poor innocent children. I discovered that any child that were able to hold a gun could be kidnapped and taken to be children of the war. Girls that were kidnapped were used for older men and were forced to marry. They were basically used as sax slaves. I also learned that all these kids weren’t treated right, they were drugged, fed less, and were crowded. They sleep in one room with no space.

I would feel so much better knowing that all kids could have a regular life. I know I don’t speak for myself when I say they don’t deserve this. When I say this I mean nobody deserves to have there childhood years taken from them, even if they weren’t good kids. People learn from there mistakes. Kid’s deserve the right to live there life and become what they want to become! When I know kids that are smarter, more intelligent, and or more talented than me, are having to spend there life killing, used as sex slaves, and killed for nothing they did wrong, it hurts me so much inside. They have it so hard.

I did some research on children soldiers and I found that:

‘Today, we are sending over 3200 former child soldiers back to school. But unfortunately we have to refuse thousands of them, because our resources are limited. This really hurts. My heart goes out to all of them”, says founder Els De Temmerman,’

I have to say that is a huge step in the process of ending child recruitment forever. But if you support the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2007, it will help even more.

I urge you to support the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2007, bipartisan legislation introduced by Senators Durbin and Brownback. This important bill would restrict US military assistance to foreign governments involved in the recruitment or use of child soldiers. Governments would be eligible only for military assistance to address the issue of child soldiers and otherwise professionalize their armed forces until the problem is remedied.

In at least twenty countries, children are involved in warfare. Many are front-line combatants, while others serve as guards, porters, cooks, or messengers. Girls may be expected not only to fight, but also subject to sexual exploitation. While most child soldiers are in their teens, some are as young as eight years old.

I was deeply troubled to learn that in at least eight countries, the United States is providing military assistance to foreign governments that either recruit and use children in their armed forces, or support militia groups that use child soldiers. Such assistance implicates our own government in this terrible crime.

This important bill will help ensure that US taxpayer dollars are not used to finance the exploitation of children in armed conflict, and that US weapons do not end up in the hands of children.

I know you took time out of you day to read this letter, but you really don’t know how much this means to me. For you to help these kids, you’d be helping me. I would be able to wake up every morning knowing that others and I made a difference to hundreds of kid’s lives. So I thank you again for reading this letter. I thank you for all of your consideration.

Sincerely,

Angela Ngo