Three Threes …

Ok. There are three rooms. Each is filled with three year olds. There is a load of toys in each room - more by far than children. Let's look in. In one room, some kids take a bunch of toys and say, "Mine, not yours!" Others see the toys that were snatched up first and want those specific toys, even though there are plenty of others. Actually, this happens in all three rooms. The first reactions are to get toys and hold onto them. As time goes on, the rooms start to differ. In one room, two big kids band together. The smarter one employs the other in guarding the stock while he went out to conquer new acquisitions. In another room, some children found that they could use their toys as weapons. Yes, many children were playing calmly and quietly. But the ones who started hitting other kids with their toys did have fun exploring the feeling of power they got from out and out attacks. In the last room, one very clever girl started paying other kids to aquire new toys. She would issue scraps of paper (a kind of virtual 'mine not yours certificates') that could be used at a later time for the use of said toys.

In short, all three rooms had an inital, exploratory time where naturally, the children grabbed at as many toys as possible. At no time did they look malicious or bad. They were just being kids. Human kids. They just used their cleverness and strength to invent ways of having more and more fun. Sharing did not come up as a first recourse. So, what's next? These kids need some help. Maybe somebody a little more mature. They need someone or some consequences to tell them to share. Their first impulse is to feel entitled to toys - actually to all of the toys. But if the sharing can be tried, it actually works out better for everone concerned. The constant fighting and protecting of toy commodities does get old. Sharing can be more fun than aggression. Is it possible that the obvious analogy - that humankind is not much past the three year old stage - also suggests a way out? Is it possible that humankind can get past it's rather self-centered stage? Could we start acting like we are not entitled to all of the toys on the planet? But where was the mature adult or set of consequences that came into our purview?

Watch out humans. Your mother may step in to show you some consequences of your recent actions. Will you perceive these consequences as connected to your actions? Will you use them to revise your actions? Will you grow up?