Why The Hunger Games Scares Me

Spoiler Alert: If you haven't seen the movie, don't read this blog yet. Mucho spoilers throughout!

So about a week ago I finally saw Hunger Games. I waited a long time to see it because I knew instinctively it was going to be a lot, though I wasn't quite sure of what. I remember watching the first preview and thinking, "This looks like a modern day Holocaust movie."

I thoroughly enjoyed this film. It's beautiful; quiet in the right places, loud in the right places, harsh, and tender. A truly wonderful movie, but it scared me a lot. Here's the thing, it wasn't just the violent scenes or even that these violent acts were being committed by and on children. The reason this movie scares me is I see so much of who we already are as a society in this film. The arrogance, the viciousness, the selfishness; and it does seem, in one way or another, to be pointed at our children. That scares me. Sure we may not be literally sending our children out to be slaughtered by each other, but consider all the ways we are harming them. Stealing money from education, continuing to employ teachers who care nothing about children, ignoring, harming, and belittling them, only to send them out into a world they are ill prepared for. What else can denying our children hope and preparation be called except killing them?

There is a line in a Switchfoot song called Blinding Light:

Hey boy, don't believe them, we're the nation that eats our youth. Hey boy don't believe them none of us are bullet proof.

Are we teaching our children the things that matter? Are we giving them the things that last? Do we even remember how? I honestly have no stats for this but I feel pretty confident that 20 minutes of undivided attention with your child or student or mentee will mean more and last longer than hours spent on any Playstation, Xbox, iPad, iPod or Wii. How can we make sure that our children learn not just survival skills but life skills? I don't know about you, but I don't just want to survive here. I want to flourish, and I want the same for my children.

So, I'm not one of those people who believe in shining light on heavy problems and then walking away, I want to know what you think we can do to kill the Hunger Games mentality in our own society. It doesn't have to be big like building a school. My mentor always says "Success comes in pieces, work the pieces." Let's start a little bit at a time. Love you guys!

To our future,

Ina