Challenging Questions of Global Significance from the Young

Can satisfactory answers be found for savvy kids?

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Possible questions to be anticipated?

1. Questions evoked by disorder and violence?
   1. If it is OK to assassinate the bad guys in foreign countries, why can the bad guys in our country not be "taken out"?
   2. If our country manufactures and sells weapons to other countries -- and uses bombs on some of them -- why are people surprised that so many refugees are coming from those countries creating problems for us?
   3. What should I do if someone is rude to you or threatens to hit you?
2. Questions evoked by shortages?
   1. If there is such a shortage of food in many countries, why do people there have so many children?
   2. Why does the Pope always encourage people to have more children -- if their families face so many shortages?
   3. Why are you and mummy making more children, when it is already a big effort for you to feed our family?
   4. Why are there so many starving people on TV when there are so many fat people around?
   5. If there is such a shortage of affordable housing in cities, why is no one offered the possibility of living underground -- so as to avoid lengthy travel and wrecking the parkland where we can play?
   6. Although it is fun to see, why is so much money spent on going into space -- to Mars and beyond -- despite severe shortages on Earth?
   7. Why are there so many things advertised on TV which nobody wants and nobody can afford to buy?
   8. The scarcity of jobs is a concern to many. Incoming migrants, and their children, are considered to be a theat because they take jobs away from others. Now that it is known that mechanisation and robts render more and more people jobless, should the creation of more and more robots be seen as a similar threat -- as "home grown migrants"?
3. Questions evoked by failures of governance?
   1. Why is the world in such a mess -- as shown on TV every night?
   2. Why do religions claiming to aspire for peace engage so frequently in supporting bloody violence against each other?
   3. Why do so many vote for the same party -- when everyone complains that the government does not keep its promises?
   4. If every guarantee is now given that banking can be safely done via the internet, then why can voting not be done in the same way?
   5. If the police know so much about corruption, prostitution and sex slaves, why is so little done about it?
   6. If the government is so clever at detecting threats from terrorist networks, even in our country, why can they not detect crime networks with similar confidence?
   7. If things get bad enough, is it certain that God will send someone to make them better again -- soon enough? Or will the US act on his behalf?
4. Questions evoked by injustice
   1. Why are the people frequently convicted for traffic and other offences not fined according to their income and the number of times they have been caught?
   2. Why do people who have done little get imprisoned, when people who have done really bad things go free?
   3. Why are there so many miserable people on the streets -- so many beggars?
   4. If we need to act urgently against terrorists, how are they different from those bullying me and my friends in school or in the street? They really scare me and no one wants to know
   5. Why do some people manage to avoid paying taxes -- especially by using tax havens? Can I learn how to do that? Our family could get lots of things we need, if we did not have to pay them?
   6. Why do the rich people make so many decisions about how poorer people live -- people like us?
   7. If some old people really want to die, why should they not be helped to do so -- now that we help so many others to die who do not want to? My auntie has been in great pain for years.
5. Questions evoked by lack of opportunity?
   1. If violence is so widely condemned, why is there nothing more exciting on TV and in video games?
   2. If drinking is bad, why are drugs considered worse -- if some want them?
   3. Why do we have to queue for so many things -- when lots of people would like jobs serving them more quickly?
   4. Why is it difficult for so many to get a job -- even when they have been to school and university?
   5. What should I do when I grow up -- if I cannot get a job?
   6. When computers can do my dad's job better than he can, will there be another job he can do better?
   7. Does crime pay?
6. Questions evoked by contradictions?
   1. Why do those advertising products on TV each claim their's is the best? Who stops them if they are not telling the truth? What about the claims of religions and political parties?
   2. Why do girls earn less money than boys when they grow up?
   3. Why do men consider it OK for fathers to beat mothers -- but not OK for mothers to beat fathers?
   4. My mom says her boss terrifies her. Does that means he is a terrorist?
   5. In our local church the priest says we should be afraid of God -- even though he loves us. Does that mean he is also a terrorist?
   6. Are policemen terrorists in disguise -- if people I know are terrified of all of them?
7. Questions evoked by the environment?
   1. Why is there so much rubbish in the sea -- and at the sea side?
   2. Why is there so much junk on th streets in some places, but not in others? What should I do with my junk?
   3. If other kids can scream freely in the train and on the plane, why should I not do the same?
   4. What should I do if I see a dog doing its business on our pavement -- if the owner is doing nothing about it?
   5. Why does nobody help us when the neighbours make a noise all night?
   6. What will happen when everyone has a car -- or a personal drone?
   7. A little boy was caught by an alligator in Florida -- just after 50 people were killed in a mass shooting attributed to a man of Muslim faith. Donald Trump then declared he would ban all Muslims from entering the USA, when he becomes president. Should he also ban aligators? If Americans have a right to own guns -- and to use them for their survival -- do alligators also have a right to have teeth, and to use them?

What questions might be fruitfully added?

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