Starlight in the Dark Night of History: Why was Children's Day born?

A Global Awakening from Bloody Ruins to Beacon of Hope

On June 10, 1942, the morning in the Czech village of Lidice was torn apart by gunfire. Under the pretext of “retaliation for the assassination of an officer,” the Nazi army shot 173 adult males on the spot, transported the women to concentration camps, and shoved 88 children into gas chambers - only 17 “Aryan-approved” babies were taken. Only 17 “Aryan-identified” babies were taken from them; the rest were reduced to ashes. This dehumanizing massacre accidentally ignited a spark: the birth of International Children's Day, the most decisive rebellion of human civilization against tyranny, and the most solemn promise of childhood.

Bloody Morning: The Crying of Lidice and the Awakening of Humanity

The Lidice tragedy was not an isolated case, but the last straw that broke the bottom line of civilization:

A village erased: the Nazis bulldozed houses, blew up churches, and even altered maps in an attempt to erase the existence of Lidice.

Disappearing Childhood: Marie Doležalová, 8, secretly slips a rag doll into her brother's swaddling clothes before being sent to a concentration camp, the last gift she will ever give her family.

A wave of global outrage: British director Humphrey Jennings makes the documentary “The Silence of Lidice”, the US state of Illinois renames the town “Lidice”, and a Brazilian poet writes that “the world owes every child a star”. --This tragedy has forced humanity to face the most poignant question of all: should children's right to life take precedence over all wars and hatred?

From Ruins to Convention: The Global Birth of Children's Day

The blood of Lidice gave birth to the modern child protection system:

1.The Promise of Moscow in 1949

The Women's International Democratic Federation (WIDF) gathered representatives from 72 countries and wrote the same sentence in Russian, French, and Chinese on the draft of the International Declaration of the Rights of the Child: “To guarantee the right of all children to survival, health, and education.” June 1 was designated as International Children's Day, and China's representative, Deng Yingchao, tearfully signed the agreement.

2.China's “cocoon” moment

In 1950, the first Children's Day in Beijing, Zhongshan Park hosted the “New China Children's Exhibition”, which included a straw shoe abacus made by children in the border areas, and a record of the temperature of a prematurely born baby in a field hospital - a silent proclamation that China's right to health and education was being realized. -These exhibits proclaimed that children were no longer accessories to their families, but future citizens of the country.

3.The UN Torch Relay

In 1954, UNESCO established World Children's Day (November 20), but the countries of the socialist camp still hold on to the tradition of June 1st. This phenomenon of “double birthdays” is a rare consensus under the Cold War: regardless of ideological rivalries, children deserve to be protected by all mankind.

Starlight in the Dark: The Lives Changed by Children's Day

Children's Day is not only a day of remembrance, but also a program of action to rewrite our destiny:

1952 Korean War: Through the Children's Day initiative, the Red Cross Society of China sent 26,000 cans of powdered milk across the Yalu River, saving 300 babies in an orphanage in Pyongyang.

1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child: The principle of the best interests of the child in a treaty signed by 196 countries around the world stems directly from reflections on the Lidice tragedy.

Syria 2013: A war correspondent's photograph of a young girl's hands raised in horror as she mistook a camera for a weapon forced the UN Security Council to reopen its aid program for child refugees.

The Rose of Lidice: when remembrance becomes rebirth

Today, 30,000 roses bloom year after year at the Lidice site, a “carpet of peace” grown from seeds sent by children from around the world. In the birthplace of Children's Day, the same phrase is repeated in three languages:

Czech: “Děti jsou naděje světa.” (Children are the hope of the world.)

Chinese: “We must turn our dark history into a bright future.star_border”

Arabic: “لا تدع أي طفل ينام جائعًا” (Let no child go to sleep hungry)

Every June 1, children from 60 countries present puppets and crayons to the Lidice Children's Statue, a bronze sculpture engraved with 88 pairs of empty eyes - forever stuck on the day they were robbed of their childhood.

Conclusion.

While Chinese parents are shopping for dinosaur dolls for their children, Ukrainian teachers are teaching their students to wrap their cell phones in tinfoil to avoid missile targeting, and South Sudanese teenage girls are sewing schoolbags out of U.N.-issued sanitary napkin fabric. ...... Children's Day has never been a sweet fairy tale, but rather mankind's salvation from its own sins.

Liditzer's starlight tells us that Children's Day was not established to coat childhood with a pink filter, but to enable every pair of tender hands to hold the right to be free from fear. Just like the sculpture of the dove of peace on the ruins of that village - its wings are mutilated, but always facing the direction of the rising sun!