Character counts safety among the benefits it offers us, but it’s often hard to convince people of that fact. If you mention it, you’re likely to get a raised eyebrow or two as they ask you, “How can character building keep you safer?”
I just ran across a story that illustrates perfectly how the building of moral excellence can make us safer, and I’d like to share that story with you. I don’t have the name of the author, so I can’t give credit, but the story came from a reliable source.
It happened this past Monday in the town of Modesto, California – a city with a population of 200,000 or so, located southeast of San Francisco. It began in an elementary school named James Marshall School. In involved a tiny eight-year-old boy – a boy who stood barely four feet tall, and held the distinction of being the tiniest child in the third grade class.
Imagine it. Picture him. He’s only eight years old, scarcely four feet tall, and the tiniest child in the entire third grade class! What kind of threat could he possibly present to his city? Someone must be pulling your leg, right?
No, he really did threaten the safety of his community. This third grader got an idea last Monday while his teacher was busy. He got an idea of how much fun it would be to drive a car like an adult. Specifically, he thought it would be fun to drive the teacher’s car for a while. He waited until she turned her back to the class, and then plunged his little hand into her purse to take her car keys.
Before long, the tiniest child in the third grade was out the door and into the teacher’s Dodge Caravan minivan. He turned off the radio. He raised the driver’s seat. He adjusted the mirror. He even lowered the steering wheel. How he knew what to do is beyond me, but he managed it all. Then he turned on the ignition and started his joyride.
How many people he endangered, we’ll never know. He did no damage, and no one was actually hurt as he cruised through the neighborhood. He drove himself home, which is less than a mile from school, and parked the van in front of his house. He went into the city’s records as their youngest auto thief, and although he was not charged with a crime, he was lectured by the police and suspended from school.
Think of how much safer he and his neighborhood would have been if this child had been taught several pertinent character traits. If his teacher had used even a few of the books from character-in-action.com, he would have learned to be honest and not steal a car. He would have exercised respect for his teacher’s personal possessions. He would have known that responsibility includes not driving before you have a license. He would have known that, aside from specific character traits, character itself, as explained in Christopher Cat’s Character Club, means that you always do what is right even if no one is watching. In this case, even if the teacher is not watching!
Character counts safety among its benefits, and the more we instill character into our young people, the safer we and they will be.
That’s the view from my chair. What’s your view?