All the money made, every cent, then goes to a whole variety of important causes, mostly locally but some goes to that global campaign to rid the world of polio.

Because we might sometimes sell our product to children, everyone involved must have a police check that we are not on the register of sex offenders. It seems silly; it does seem a bit extreme.

Sure, children have to be protected from any form of harm, but are we taking this fear too far? Are we over-protecting our children?

The authorities apparently have a record of all people who have been before the court on sex offences.

But are they really more potentially dangerous than the people found guilty of drink driving or drug dealing?

Why don’t we have the same fear about them? Aren’t they equally dangerous to our children?

But the problem goes much further. Children are being warned (by caring parents and teachers) to be fearful of ‘strangers’, and that is very sad indeed.

Meeting new people is a vital part of growing up and the vast majority of the strangers children would meet would be genuinely caring people.

To paint the people outside the family unit as potentially dangerous characters must create some form of negativity in children.

It is a worry that these children might grow into adults with the fear that has been ground into them that everyone out there is a potential abuser – and that is so wrong.

It used to be said that it took a village to raise a child. These days the rest of those ‘villagers’ seem to be regarded as people to be feared, and that is very sad indeed.

We train our children to be careful in crossing the road because of the traffic, but that doesn’t stop us from letting them ride in cars.

We know that people swimming can drown or get taken by sharks, but that doesn’t mean we stop them from having a swim or surf.

It’s all a case of balance and the balance in having everyone being classed as a potential danger seems terribly wrong.

Sure, children must be made aware of their personal safety, but how far do we go? The vast majority of ‘the people out there’ just want to be friends. It’s always been that way.

Fortunately, with a line-up of seven great-grandchildren, your scribe gets a good supply of cuddles, but there must be many oldies out there who are denied that pleasure and there must be lots of littlies who will never understand that there are lots of people out there who would love to talk to them – but that, somehow, they are all put in the category of people to be feared.

Sad, isn’t it? Let’s tell children to be wary, but not be fearful of strangers.

Is it asking too much to expect our government to make a few clear statements of why we are involved in that never-ending religious/cultural mess in the Middle East?

Who, really, made that decision? What is our exit strategy?

There was once a special defence committee in our Federal Parliament involving both members of Government and the Opposition. Is it still in force? How often do they meet?

We are to have a plebiscite costing lots of money just to save some politicians who would rather not have to vote on the subject of same-sex marriages.

Surely, deciding our country would become involved in a foreign war is of far greater importance, so who made that decision to become part of the Middle East muddle?

Ray Williams has been a Post columnist since retiring from the newsroom in 1993.