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I've posted this in another thread, but I feel like it's a good topic for discussion here. I feel like a lot of the topics discussed here are rather silly; we have a tendency to make big issues out of nothing. In the process, we often ignore the real big issues facing our planet and our species. Today I'd say the greatest moral and political problem we face as humans is global poverty. While everyone is so up in arms over the latest partisan squabbling here in the US, people across the globe are suffering terribly. I really think that its shameful that no one in these forums talks about any of this; we ignore it completely.
So many people here have become so nationalistic that they compartmentalize humanity, thinking that it is some how morally acceptable to brush off the suffering of the world's poor simply because they 'aren't American' - as if an American life is somehow worth more, as if we don't share some of the responsibility for the state of things at the global level.
A few interesting statistics to ponder:
Approximately 1 billion people live on less than 1 US dollar a day.
Approximately 1 billion more people live on less than 2 dollars a day.
Approximately 900 million people, predominantly women and children, suffer from chronic malnutrition--they don't have enough food to eat, let alone a roof over their head. More than 1 billion people are undernourished. At least 3,500 people die from hunger each day.
Approximately 1.5 billion people lack regular access to clean drinking water.
Approximately 5 million people die from water related diseases each year.
More than 33 million people suffer from HIV/AIDS.
The most violent, deadliest war since WWII is currently raging in the Democratic Republic of the Congo yet no one pays attention.
More people than you can imagine across the continent of Africa have suffered from mutilation and rape as a result of violent conflicts largely stemming from poverty.
Millions of children die every year from preventable illnesses. Hundreds of thousands of children's lives could be saved by something as simple as a mosquito net.
These are the real moral issues of our time; this is real suffering beyond the imagination of most people living in the US. The developed countries of the world have the capacity to dramatically reduce this suffering. However, the political will is nonexistent. I'm guessing a lot of people here will brush this all aside, too, saying that its not 'our problem' and that those suffering can continue to do so because they are simply too inconvenient for us to make sacrifices for...
Money is only a measure of poverty; absolute poverty, which is what is being captured by the statistics I cited, is a situation in which a persons basic needs aren't being met. Living on less than a dollar or two a day means acquiring every meal is a great struggle, it means that you rarely have a roof over your head, it means that you certainly don't have any access to healthcare of any sort; it means a lack of opportunity to receive an education and a lack of ability to do anything to remove ones' self from poverty. It means children who are without parents (either because they died or because the parents simply can't afford to take care of the child) and who are chronically malnourished and dying of easily prevented diseases. An enormous number of people (billions, not millions) are suffering terribly as a result of circumstances that are far beyond their control. As long as the status quo remains and there isn't a more concerted effort to address the systemic problems which result in this widespread poverty then people will continue to suffer.
I really believe it a moral failure of the developed world that more isn't being done to address this.
I can not pay more for this crap. We are paying as AMericans the ones who work hard enough. Let someone else pick up the tab. Taxing us more to help corrupt governments is not the answer. I am so tired of this guilt trip.
I can not pay more for this crap. We are paying as AMericans the ones who work hard enough. Let someone else pick up the tab. Taxing us more to help corrupt governments is not the answer. I am so tired of this guilt trip.
Two comments. One, over the past 20 years, there has been an incredible reduction in poverty, defined as % of population under each country's respective poverty line. This is due primary by economic growth in Asia and the economic improvements in Latin America. Before the 1980s, the % poor in the world was far more than today. Two, if you want to truly help reduce poverty, help them gain meaningful jobs that pay well. For Americans this means building companies to hire them off of the ranks of the unemployed, teaching, and combating against terror and oppression. All else is secondary or tangential.
In both cases, this means gaining wealth (flexibly defined) first and then being willing to spread that wealth.
Otherwise, you would be getting in the way. Were China to go green today, you would see a reversal of progress on poverty. This is a reality that few would readily admit.
Today I'd say the greatest moral and political problem we face as humans is global poverty.
A few interesting statistics to ponder:
Approximately 1 billion people live on less than 1 US dollar a day.
Approximately 1 billion more people live on less than 2 dollars a day.
Approximately 900 million people, predominantly women and children, suffer from chronic malnutrition--they don't have enough food to eat, let alone a roof over their head. More than 1 billion people are undernourished. At least 3,500 people die from hunger each day.
Approximately 1.5 billion people lack regular access to clean drinking water.
Approximately 5 million people die from water related diseases each year.
More than 33 million people suffer from HIV/AIDS.
The most violent, deadliest war since WWII is currently raging in the Democratic Republic of the Congo yet no one pays attention.
More people than you can imagine across the continent of Africa have suffered from mutilation and rape as a result of violent conflicts largely stemming from poverty.
Millions of children die every year from preventable illnesses. Hundreds of thousands of children's lives could be saved by something as simple as a mosquito net.
These are the real moral issues of our time; this is real suffering beyond the imagination of most people living in the US. The developed countries of the world have the capacity to dramatically reduce this suffering. However, the political will is nonexistent. I'm guessing a lot of people here will brush this all aside, too, saying that its not 'our problem' and that those suffering can continue to do so because they are simply too inconvenient for us to make sacrifices for...
Thoughts?
For the most part the people you describe do not have the mental capacity or ability to produce even what they need to survive. Looking at it from a micro level, it's easy to feel sorry for these folks as you seem to. Looking at it from a macro level, everyone is going to die. In fact, the human race will not be around for ever.
Looking at the big picture, Darwin/Mother Nature says that these folks should perish. Mother Nature says that the fittest should survive and procreate ensuring the continue evolution and improvement of the human race.
The social pathologies that you describe are those we see disproportionately in the segments of society with the lowest levels of intelligence. They include violence, crime, poverty, illegitimacy, high rate of AIDS and other STDs, low educational achievement and low productivity to name a few.
The problem is that you cannot teach these people to fish. You will forever have to keep giving them fish. We could go in and provide an infrastructure for running water, factories to build mosquito nets and farming equipment, schools, medicine, hospitals, etc but these things would soon disappear if we left.
You seem to think the resources of the developed world are unlimited but they are not. If we ensured the survival of these folks they would soon out number our ability to help them. Soon there would not be enough productive members of society to carry all of the folks who cannot even produce what they need to survive.
These people will perish anyway in the end. You want us to deplete our resources and significantly lower our standard of living to attempt to help folks who are going to perish in the end anyway. This is what I call pi$$ing into the wind.
It's not nice to fool with Mother Nature and, in fact, you cannot. Mother Nature will always have her way.
my tax rate is showing anger. This is bullcrap, I am so tired of the US helping other countries. Please we give enough. We give more than any other nation in the world. How much more do we need to give and no less to goverments that just steal and rob from there own people. No accountability for their actions or where they spent the money. IM FED UP! Call it greed but I would rather help YOU or someone in this country than poor countries.
How many of the global poor live in countries where the leadership siphons off vast sums of foreign aid for their own uses? Kleptocracy is the bigger problem IMO.
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