{"id":13806,"date":"2015-07-03T19:58:50","date_gmt":"2015-07-03T18:58:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.glass-cage.com\/dianas_blog\/?p=13806"},"modified":"2021-01-13T10:42:24","modified_gmt":"2021-01-13T10:42:24","slug":"camila-batmanghelidjh-surprised-troubled-kids-with-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glass-cage.com\/dianas_blog\/2015\/07\/03\/camila-batmanghelidjh-surprised-troubled-kids-with-love\/","title":{"rendered":"Camila Batmanghelidjh surprised troubled kids with love"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"PoweredThis article titled “Camila Batmanghelidjh surprised troubled kids with love” was written by Libby Brooks, for The Guardian on Friday 3rd July 2015 18.04 UTC<\/a><\/p>\n

Camila Batmanghelidjh doesn\u2019t text. Chronically dyslexic, the plethora of electronic means of communication, second nature to the young people she works with, is anathema to the children\u2019s campaigner and founder of Kids Company<\/a>. I found this frustrating when I was getting to know her, over a decade ago, first as a journalist researching a book on childhood and later as a volunteer for the charity. Wasn\u2019t it rather queenly to expect a personal audience in this frantic and impersonal age? But I came to recognise that this was her gift: there were no fob-offs or polite ambiguities with Batmanghelidjh, no compromise with \u2013 often entirely pragmatic \u2013 convention, no fools suffered gladly either. And when she was with you, she really was with you.<\/p>\n

I can only imagine what it must have felt like to sit in a room with her as a furious, dislocated, damaged child of the kind she found on the streets of south London, whom she fed, clothed and educated when no other social service would or could. \u201cA child who has been terrorised and neglected isn\u2019t going to feel threatened by punishment,\u201d the Iranian-born psychotherapist explained to me. \u201cLoving care surprised them more.\u201d She recognised that love is an action.<\/p>\n