White bands pt. 2
Picture 1: Gap advertisement or anti-poverty campaign?
Here is the link to the comment http://louisrosenthal.blogspot.com/2005/12/righteous-bastards.html#comments
Here is my response
Perhaps my objection isn't with the fact that people are campaigning against poverty, but with the way it's presented and advertised. The posters up at our school showed silhouettes of "cool" people wearing the bands, and text that said "wear a white band, make poverty history". If I couldn't read, I would have mistaken it for a Gap advertisement or something similar. I have checked out their website and it rubbed me the wrong way as well. Many good intentions, but not many solutions. I think it is also obvious that people have known about world poverty long before the stretchy white bands were invented and distributed.
Many people will think that buying a band is the extent of their responsibility to the rest of the world. On top of this, many people probably buy the band in hopes of gaining some sort of social status. Stopping poverty is about giving without getting anything back. To me the whole idea of paying 1$ and hoping that the world will unite and fight for a cause is delusional. The distribution of resources on the planet is way too uneven, and there is no way to organize 6 billion people. Or even 1 million. However, as I am not yet able to come up with the master plan that will solve this mess, I guess I’m being a bit of an asshole about the whole thing.
posted by Louis at 3:01 PM
15 Comments:
who knows.
personally, nothing that affects me in an extremely direct matter concerns me.
call it being selfish, i sort of call it not having time to deal with someone else's problems since i have so many of my own.
haha i feel like such a mean person
As for the wannabe-Gap advertisment...blame Canada! I dont know what it's like over there, but in Europe the advertisements are more about who benefits from white bands, not who is wearing them.
Also what website where you looking at...the Canadian one or makepovertyhistory.com?
Before I read the last sentence in your post I was thinking 'What do YOU suggest they do then???' As you said...you have no plan.
Getting rid of world poverty isn't easy, and yeah you can think of all the sacrifices that people could make and it COULD be so easy, but MAKING them do it, inspiring them to want to change the world, to change a world they know NOTHING about is bound to be hard...
You are right, there is NO way of organizing 6 billion people but what is the alternative...stand by and watch the majority of them die because of famine, disease, drought, while a small minority enjoy their comfortable lifestyles? That's not fair, and if wearing a white band somehow inspires even a FEW people to make a difference (not just by buying a band but by donating money or working for the cause, etc...) if at least a few people make a difference, then maybe it's all worthwhile....
Besides, if you think about it, would you rather people coming together because they want to change the world in some good way (even if it is some fickle teenager just wearing a band because the Gap kids wear them) or would you rather they unite to try to fight a war or start a hate campaign against another race....
Seriously...what EVIL is the white band causing? NONE! And if you want to end world poverty but hate the whole white band thing then GO OUT and do something to change things instead of just complaining that white bands dont change anything!
Well I got that picture from the makepovertyhistory.org site, which I believe is the European incarnation of the institution. Just because I don’t have the master plan doesn’t mean I don’t think about it and have some ideas regarding the subject. Which small sacrifices are you referring to when you say it COULD be easy. I just have trouble with the thought that money can solve any of these problems. If people can’t feed themselves, than they have no business having kids. Poverty stricken places like Africa have way too many people living in them. If their homeland can’t provide them with food and shelter then maybe it’s time they move. I am no longer certain that it’s my responsibility to help these people. Most poor people I have met are lazy, and enjoy wallowing in self pity (for more info read my blog on self-pity). Why do I enjoy a better standard of living? First of all, my ancestors have worked hard so that their descendants could enjoy a better standard of living. Secondly I work my ass off in the summer planting thousands of trees a day. I invite any of the poverty stricken people to get a job in a planting camp. They will hire anyone. Most would quit in a week because they are too lazy and would rather work a comfortable easy 7$ an hour job or just rely on other people as a source of food. In conclusion, I would love to see standards of living for all humans improve, but people must try to climb out of their own hole. As a side note, just because the white bands don’t do any evil doesn’t justify their existence.
I am really curious to know what people in africa do all day. I think i would have better insight into the whole issue if I knew what these people do instead of growing food.
I agree with what you said about some people being to lazy to work but do you actually think that the WHOLE CONTINTENT of Africa, of Central/South America, decided they'd sit on their asses all day and see if someone will help them? That's ridiculous! There are two different types of poor people, those who allow themselves to be (possibly because they are too lazy to work, or they decide it's easier to depend on social welfare) and then there are the kind that have no choice. They are born into it. They have no options.
Why cant they grow food? Because of drought, because of bad land, because they dont have the food to feed the cows that give them milk and food, or seeds to grow crops, or tools to take care of them. If their homeland cant provide them with food then what are they supposed to do...hop on the next plane out of there? I dont think you understand that people dont just sit around relaxing all day, people are dying from AIDS, from Malaria, people are starving to death. You make it sound like it's their choice...
I just think you've spent too much time in your own comfortable world to know what the real world (the non-westernized, third world) is like.
As for the sacrifices I was talking about...when you stop and look at your life and think about how much money you waste, money you spend on capuccinos or on a new t-shirt you wear once and throw to the back of the closet or on whatever you spend your money on...money like that can make a real difference to people that need it.
And I dont think that we should feel guilty about spending money, but it is true that in western society money is so important that we end up just throwing it around because we get so much of it.
We spend our money on material things that dont last and dont have any sort of value in our lives, when we could invest in the future of millions. And no we shouldn't just have to KEEP giving money to the poor forever, but I think it's important to invest in resources to help them sustain themselves. That way, in 20 years we still wont be faced with the same problem. And there are plenty of organizations and charities and NGOs that work to help the poor people help themselves, by teaching them how to grow crops, by putting wells and dams in villages so that they dont have to worry about drought wiping away their crops. THAT is what I think is important, teaching them how to survive on their own. I dont want to give my money to buy them food, I want something long-lasting that will continue to benefit them, and that is the whole point of sustainable development, which is what makepovertyhistory and other groups are trying to accomplish.
First of all, i don't think you know enough about me to comment on my comfortable world.
Also, what makes the third world any more real than life in a developed country? As for money,
i would say that 90% of the money i spend goes to food, tuition and rent. I have not bought a tshirt
in a couple years because i don't need one. I'm guessing that you have a lot of money to
waste and don't hesitate to invest in clothes you don't need and other superfluous things.
I agree that we need to teach people basic survival skills, but even this isn't enough. Perhaps you don't realize
that a lot of the arable land in developing countries is used for growing crops such as coffee and tobacco.
These products are all exported to rich countries such as the ones we are living in. Research makes it obvious that donating money or food is simply making things worse for these countries. We need to return the land to the people. Finally, these people need to take initiative and stop having more kids that they can support. In conclusion, it's embarrasing to be human.
You may think it's embarassing to be human, I think it is embarassing that there are humans like you.
Looks like i just won the argument.
I cannot take your arguments seriously. Fighting poverty/world hunger is NOT a part time job.
holy smokes, when did this happen?
I see what you're saying about people not having kids they can't support, but you could stand to be a lot more sensitive about it. A lot of poor people have lots of kids because they'll need a big family to support them when they're older. Droughts and epidemics aren't always planned ahead. Furthermore, war tends to throw a bone in a lot of development, or entire skeletons.
I do find it startling though that the world may have more than twice as many people yet in my life time than it has now. It certainly seems as though the world is falling apart as it is, we hardly need it to be any more crowded. Free contraceptives worldwide would be a good start in the right direction. So would making sure people have enough opportunity to support themselves that they don't need to rely on having a large family to survive.
Lou, you must realize why people can't just pick up and move out of poverty. Thousands upon thousands of people every year get apprehended by various coast guards around the developed world and sent back where they came from. Millions more don't have the means to make it that far in the first place.
My last point on this: I have a feeling that the majority of people in Africa work a lot harder than I do everyday. Considering I've been given almost every advantage in life and how I've barely accomplished anything; I find it hard to expect someone who's parents probably couldn't afford grade school for him/her to go from having no money and no land to being wealthy and self-sufficient. Something tells me if I had to live like many of the world's poorest people I'd more likely be dead than one of the people struggling to survive. Oreo's absolutely right, I probably could've saved dozens of lives by now if I wouldn't have been spending money drinking and watching bad movies still in theatre for $10. Or I could have built something useful or learned something useful instead of playing video games near constantly. And don't pretend like you couldn't have too.
Weapon : i have talked to many people on this topic. My thoughts are mainly summed up in the comments section of the post after this one. I realize that i am a consumer whore and still buy a lot of shit i don't need. This doesn't mean i can't take a realistic point of view on the whole thing. I think i'm gonna need to go to Africa and see for myself what is going on. Just because you have a "feeling" that they work harder doesn't mean they do. I think it's impossible to give everyone the same opportunity and standards of living. I'm just trying to find the way in which I can be most effective in trying to solve the problem. I feel like you are trying to say that anyone born with opportunities is a bad person. In conclusion i care much more about myself, my family and friend than those people in Africa. It's terrible but at least i'm being honest.
Well, it's not terrible to feel that way. I think it's probably the only way to feel if you're not going to go crazy worrying about the starving children in Africa. At least a lot of Africans appear to have their sanity, so there's no shame in you keeping yours. However, I do personally feel guilty for having so much opportunity and squandering so much of it, regardless of who I care about.
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