Bob CollinsWe’re fairly sure news organizations are viewing this as an uplifting example of the kindness of strangers and, perhaps, it is.
But particularly in the wake of last week’s Golden Valley snub of children with mental health issues, it strikes as another example of the shunning of people who aren’t just like us.
A Michigan mother wanted her son to have a happy birthday. But he didn’t have any friends to invite to a party. So she turned to Facebook.
It worked. She got over a million birthday cards for her son.
It’s a sweet outpouring, but do the 1 million Facebook friends make up for just one face-to-face friend to come to a real party?
“The main thing was finding out that a lot of parents were trying to get their kids out of Colin’s class — and the teacher told him,” Jennifer told GoodMorningAmerica.com. “His peers don’t understand him but every adult who meets him loves him so I thought I would go to a place where adults and my friends are, Facebook, and have them write nice messages to Colin so I could share them on his birthday.”
The teacher told him? People!
How bad can we be at shunning? This is the second mother in a week who’s had to turn to strangers for what people in the community should be providing.
In Andover, Mass., Catherine Pearson showed a TV reporter all of the pictures of the life of her severely autistic 11-year old son. There were, WBZ reports, no balloons, no parties, and no friends.
“People have just felt like well ‘Logan can’t understand so we aren’t going to do anything for him like other kids,'” his dad James said.
The mailbox — as you might expect — overflowed with hugs around the world for the young man’s birthday later this month.
Nice, yes. But we’d like to hear that just one kid in their school has said, “I’d love to come to your party.”
