I can understand that students like to band together on the way to and from school, but I fail to understand why some groups, in doing so, besiege the space reserved for the circulation of vehicles. On account of their indiscipline, drivers are sometimes doomed to use their horns to scatter the crowds or wait until they understand that they are an obstacle to the traffic, which they rarely do.

I even come to think that, unaware of the risks they take for their own safety, some think they are asserting themselves by behaving in this way. Is walking in line on the respective side of the road so old-fashioned? I sometimes get quite irritated with this attitude when I drop or pick you up from school.

Then, when some shocking news on the radio invades the waiting time in the traffic, it only just worsens the situation. Last Thursday, while I was wrestling my way back home after dropping you at school, I was disgusted by the news of a blind lady who had been sexually assaulted by two men while she was waiting for her husband after work.

Her courageous account of how the unscrupulous culprits had taken advantage of her weakness to satisfy their horrible drive was most poignant. I was on the brink of comparing them to ?dogs? but revised my judgement as it would have been an insult to the canine race. In fact, dogs are of great help to those who have the misfortune of being denied the sense of sight!

Though we are living at the forefront of progress, some of us still have to learn from animals. The ruthlessness of the blind lady?s attackers neither tallies with man?s genius expressed, for instance, by the engineering society of Utrecht, which devised a sound system aimed at guiding the blind both on the beach and in the sea; nor does it even compare to prehistoric creatures like dinosaurs, which according to recent discoveries were found to have had maternal instincts, therefore some form of consideration for others.

When an inconsiderate attitude is allowed to express itself in criminal ways, man touches the abyss of horror. Therefore, even if crimes are often treated as common news items, you should always consider them as severe injuries to humanity. Overlooking them is as bad as committing them.

In the field of discipline, ants can teach us a most compelling lesson. They all adopt the same pattern of behaviour. There is no place for uncalled-for, selfish fantasy like obstructing the road in search of assertiveness. We may be born free and blessed with a sense of creativity, which is absent from the animal world, but we sometimes misinterpret this freedom. Freedom is far from being a licence to do whatever you want but is rather the inalienable right to do what you must do.

What you must do is cooperate with others to the best of your capacity to ensure the survival of the species as well as its quality of life. This will be impossible if you are inconsiderate in your deeds or by failing to fight evils, which are obstacles to love and consideration. That?s the challenge of humanity we so often fail to see.

Alain JEANNOT