I have received the following question:
“Please, I hope nobody takes offense to this. I’m not trying to start any arguments but I have to ask, “How many mouths could have been fed with the monies being used for this crusade?” When talking about raising awareness, I don’t believe there are too many people around that don’t know about world hunger.”
Thanks for tuning in and subscribing to the blog. This question is valid and no offense taken. My response is an open letter to you and those with the same curious mind.
I used to make fun of an organization called “Bladder Control Awareness Group” and I used to say well, if you have a bladder control problem, I’m sure you’re aware of it! It was funny then, but I really didn’t know squat about that issue.
Awareness is not just knowing, but doing. When I was a kid, my mother always told me that if I don’t finish my food, some kid in Africa will die, and I used to think how preposterous that statement was. We as individuals are responsible for what we do, whether it’s what we do at home or at large like voting to elect our servants (AKA government).
We have neglected and for most parts forgotten our rights. Our rights have become temporary privileges that our so-called servants take away whenever they feel like it. If you ask 10 people what their political views are, 9 out of 10 will claim to be either Republican or Democrat. This is a country which was supposed to be ran by the people for the people, but it’s being run by Corporations for the Corporations.
When you go to a supermarket, there are over 100 brands of cereal, 50 different types of soft drink, 200 different brews and there is even a whole aisle devoted to tampons. But when it comes to political parties, we are only allowed to choose between two. This is not a freedom of choice; it’s an illusion of choice. The illusion that you have the right to choose between Pepsi and Coke, Captain Crunch or Corn Flakes, but in presidential debates there are only two parties to entertain the American public while they forget how badly they are getting screwed with red, white and blue bullshit being shoved down their throats.
I have no problem with Democrats or Republicans or any other party as long as they do their job which is serving the people, but do they? I’m probably coming across as a hippy dreamer or a tree huger but I’m not. I’m not against guns (I have quite a collection myself), hell I’m not even against killing people. BUT and this is a very important BUT: when it’s justified, not by the greedy corporations, but by our constitution, our true civil laws and our morals.
Let’s put the rest of the world aside for a minute and concentrate on our own country. There used to be activists who stood up to corporate greed, wrong doings and out-of-line politicians; that was 40 years ago. Speaking of politicians, in the Roman era, being a politician was an honor, a noble position to be a servant of the people, but now days, being a politician is worse than being a crook – because they ARE.
There are over 50,000 lobbyists on Capitol Hill as we speak, lobbying for their corporate bosses. They don’t care about you, they don’t care about me, they don’t care about us. All they care about is their own pocket and their own power.
People of modest means, poor, middle-class, hard working people of any race continue to elect these rich crooks to the office with hope of CHANGE but refuse to question their integrity and qualifications.
Change: \ˈchānj\. a) to make different in some particular b) to make radically different c) to become different
Maybe my dictionary is wrong or I can’t see the “change,” but I’ll let you be the judge. Have you seen any? Change for greater good that is.
One in every six adults in this country doesn’t have health insurance including me, or perhaps you too. There are 13 million children suffering from hunger in our own country. We have 680,000 homeless in this country. We have a 64% obesity rate with over 80 billion dollars in medical expenditures. The unemployment rate has rocketed to 9.5% in 2010 and that’s just the federal figures conducted by our trustworthy government, the more realistic figure is 16.6% nationally. We handed a small chunk of change, 700 billion dollars, on a silver platter to our financial criminals no question asked. If that wasn’t enough, our heroes of the auto industry took 17.4 billion dollars back home on their private jets to “save the auto makers jobs”, visit Michigan and Illinois to see how many auto workers are left. Journalists, bloggers or any schmuck with a reputable voice is forbidden to say another word about the Gulf fiasco, yet we concentrate on our “biggest issues”: abortion, gay rights, gun control and foreign policy. Good thing we have figures like Mahmud Ahmadinejad, Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro to pick on, otherwise the American people would actually realize there was something beyond wrong in their own homeland.
Our system has and will continue to produce a generation of obedient workers who are just smart enough to push the buttons and run the machines and dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, longer hours, reduced benefits, the end of overtime and the vanishing pension. They don’t want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. That’s against their interest. We are dedicated to fight street crimes given that street isn’t Wall Street. So it’s not “change” that we are seeing, for lack of a better word, it’s diversion.
And we know what happens when some brave souls stand up to these fascists, they get imprisoned, beaten and disappear. This is not a conspiracy theory, this is reality. Look back to Pittsburgh just a year ago. Water cannons, sound cannons, tear gas, batons, these are the instruments I am quite familiar with; it’s a daily life in Iran. But Pittsburgh is not in Iran, it’s in the United States of America. That’s what they got for trying to voice themselves peacefully around the G20 summit. Maybe it is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of nonviolence to cover impotence.
Next time your friendly neighborhood senator comes around for more votes, don’t be fooled by their label, Democrat, Republican, Independent, whatever he is, hold his feet to the fire. Put away your political brand loyalty and be loyal to your family and community. Demand your rights, your hard-earned money, your freedom. They are your servants not vice versa. Demand equal opportunity to live, demand a shelter over your head, demand three meals a day for your kids, demand free healthcare for all. If you don’t, they will happily give it to their friends and supporters on Wall Street and Capitol Hill. Know your rights, demand and take them with vengeance.
Some of you might say mind your own business, ride your damn bike and take care of the hunger issue, don’t get involved in politics. Hunger doesn’t come out of nowhere, it comes out of poverty and poverty is a bastard child of this fascism. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: imagine all the money spent on nuclear weapons and meaningless wars each year, all the embargoes and sanctions imposed upon innocent people – trillions of dollars. If we spent that money feeding, clothing and educating the poor of the world, not one soul excluded, it would pay for itself many times over.
Awareness is knowing and doing, otherwise it’s just a headline. A trendy buzzword. Meaningless. We are too concerned with our daily lives and the so-called “American dream” that we forget to look behind the smoke and see the fire. To see that in our own neighborhoods, there are hundreds of kids going hungry every night while we fill our shopping carts with useless gadgets and imitation food to feel better and get closer to the dream. We don’t have the power; we ARE the power.
You ask questions, I admire that. This is what everyone should do. No one should be afraid to ask. It is with questions that we get answers. Give us a helping hand. Let’s make it happen together. I hope to see a day that we shouldn’t have to call it awareness anymore. We will call it reality.
~To know and not to do is not to know
The one thing I’d like to add to the above is this:
The fact that 1/5 of the world consumes 3/4 of the resources doesn’t mean that we should destroy the standard of living of the top 1/5.
What we need to do is intelligently develop the (natural and human) resources of this planet to lift the standard of living among the remaining 4/5.
Instead, we often hear that we can’t develop those resources without “destroying the planet”. The folks spouting that nonsense are more worried about what might happen in thousands of years, than the millions of lives being destroyed right now.
Cad,
They don’t give a damn about the planet or resources. They care about their pocket book. They already have monopoly on oil, gas, electricity and water. Why would they want to lose what they already control?
Power companies build dams and sell the power. They don’t like it when someone goes off the grid wit solar panels. Gas companies don’t want efficient cars, they want you to burn more gas but they have the audacity to advertise their “Green” Intentions. BP for example. This company slogan was going green. Look at the gulf now, probably not one fish left in it.
Using natural resources are fine and that doesn’t mean just drilling for more oil. Solar, Wind, Tide, … we have many resources but no real investment to make it a reality.
Absolutely, which is what makes it such nonsense.
“Live simply, that others might simply live”
Nice,,, let’s see how this goes. Peanut gallery?
Where does the continually exploding population, especially in the third world, fit into all this?
The world has limited resources.
Until the population explosion is dealt with the number of poor and hungry across the globe will continue to grow.
Thank you for this thoughtful and insightful post. I hope enough people take notice, because the realities of your statements are far too overlooked. In the US, we have been recklessly wasting nearly everything available to us, as it becomes less available to everyone, even us. Anyone who thinks there won’t be debts to pay for our waste hasn’t been paying attention, and anyone who discards other human beings just because they aren’t a relative or someone they can see is out of touch with what it is to be alive and supposedly free.
Very deep, sir, and thought-provoking.
I’m not used to seeing this kind of posting here on this forum, among our casual little group. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.
I’m not saying I agree or disagree, but kudos to you for making a statement.
I do not have to say a thing for most of the posts above me have said it. Personally I make a minimum income on a lowly fixed-oncome. So there is no money around here to be handed out. I receive plenty of phone calls on the same or close to it & when I say “I am 80 yrs of age & on a minimum income” they know not to ask me anymove.
Always good to see another dreamer…
Unfortunately the power hungry, greedy, wealthy elite have always run this world for their own gain.
The only thing you can really do, if you want to help, is to figure out a way to become wealthy and powerful yourself, then divert as much money as possible to benevolent deeds.
You can’t change human nature.
You can’t enlighten willfully ignorant people.
You can’t fight evil with altruism.
Some might say I’m a pessimist, but I think I’m more of a realist. Politics and religion are just a show to keep us entertained while we are fleeced… by our own government, the drug companies, the banks, the energy providers, all of those industries that rely on our willing compliance.
We are our own worst enemies, unable to see who we are fighting, powerless to stop their onslaught.
The new revolution is coming. The Thomas Paines are out there. The world is now connected and a new awareness is evolving. It is hampered by language and the inability to communicate effectively, but it struggles on. People are starting to see how they are being manipulated and used. They are starting to become aware.
The powerful elite know this is happening and are are worried, but they also know they can count on human nature. Distract the sheep with some drama and fleece them some more.
Its an ancient and effective formula.
Fight the power!
Fortunately the ocean is really big. It sounds like a lot of pollution (and it is) but compared to the volume of the ocean it’s still a drip.
I’d sure like to hear from Texasfisherdude on what it’s really like down there right now. On the news they make it sound like the end of life as we know it.
There are a number of contradictions in your post.
Anytime the phrase ‘for the greater good’ is brought out of the stable, watch out! Someone is trying to take something from you or tell you how they think you should live your life.
You point out how fallible our gov’t is several times…yet you propose we demand health care, free shelter, and free food. Just what organization has the means to enforce the policies so all these ‘rights’ are provided?
The American dream is for equal opportunity, not equal results.
So, how is this graph supposed to be shaped?
Is that “bait” or don’t you really know ??
“Supposed to be” isn’t an appropriate phrase; there is no “supposed to be”.
It would be theoretically better if the “rich” didn’t consume such a big dis-proportionate share of the resources.
For one thing, they can, and do, bid up the price so that the other groups can’t afford some “stuff” that they really could make good use of.
It IS a complicated discussion, however, and you can’t take it very far without getting deep into politics AND religion…….so I hope we don’t feel a need to turn it into a debate here.
Darwinism isn’t “fair” either.
Thanks for the reply.
GAJ said…
Darwinism isn’t “fair” either.
Having the most money doesn’t automatically make you the “fittest”.
That wasn’t quite what Darwin had in mind.
“The American dream is for equal opportunity, not equal results.”
Food, shelter and healthcare are the basic needs of any human being, regardless of the race, nationality or religion. They should not be dreamed for. These are not the elements that should make one happy, they are necessities. If the American dream was more like having a shot gun, a dog, big Cadillac and a big screen TV, sure, the result wouldn’t matter.
“Just what organization has the means to enforce the policies so all these ‘rights’ are provided?”
All of these rights are already provided. It is called the Constitution. And our government is supposed to enforce it. And if they don’t, the people of the United States should. Don’t underestimate the power of the masses. People have changed the course of history many times; the formation of the United States itself is the best example of this. Throughout history, people rise up for what inconveniences them. These might not be necessarily ethical issues, most of them are actually the issues that hurt their pocket. The Stamp Act of 1765 (Imposed colonial tax by England) was arguably the single greatest catalyst of the American Revolution.
We, as the people, have to get our priorities straight. We have to ask this question: what do we need the most? Food, healthcare and shelter or bombing another nation with brown people in it.
It’s interesting and somewhat ironic that I’m saying this to someone in Germany (No matter that you are a German or not) that in 1944, Franklin Roosevelt proposed an amendment to the constitution of the United States, called the Second Bill of Rights, which vanished by his death. The Second Bill of Rights would guarantee:
Employment, with a living wage,
Freedom from unfair competition and monopolies,
Housing,
Medical care for all,
Education, and
Social security
The irony is that in reconstruction of Germany and in particular your constitution, these very same rights were implemented, but not in our own country.
And if you have never read the American constitution or just need refreshment, here is the preamble to it:
We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
I wasn’t born in the United States by accident of birth. I chose to become an American citizen by making a pledge to protect, carry out and defend this very important piece of paper: the constitution. Am I being holier than the pope? No. I have lived under a totalitarian government to see the result of negligence and willful ignorance of its people. I don’t want my new country to go down that road. I believe that we already possess what we need; we just lack the willingness to see it through.
By HillBillyVW in Germany:
“There are a number of contradictions in your post.
Anytime the phrase ‘for the greater good’ is brought out of the stable, watch out! Someone is trying to take something from you or tell you how they think you should live your life.
You point out how fallible our gov’t is several times…yet you propose we demand health care, free shelter, and free food. Just what organization has the means to enforce the policies so all these ‘rights’ are provided? The American dream is for equal opportunity, not equal results.”
I think this sums it up quite nicely, for many on the fourm.
What sums it up Dave? The fact that we shouldn’t stand up for anybody else but ourself just because we might be personally inconvenient in the future? And who are these many on the forum?
Over 90% of american citizens fall into that ‘top 20%’ slice of that pie. We keep forgetting that we make up about 350,000,000/6,500,000,000ths (about 5.5%) of the world population. Western europe and parts of asia make of the rest of the rich slice. The middle 60% is the 2nd world, most of China, lots of India, most of Mexico. That bottom 20% that lives on a sliver is the 3rd world. 98% of Rwandans would give a testicle to be homeless in Central Park NYC.
Is it right, is it fair? of course not. Think of this,,, by giving up just 3% of the total, about 4% of our haul,,, we could triple the standard of living in the 3rd world. So what do we do about it? Send Sally Struthers money? Give it to the Catholics? (Teresa did a lotta good stuff). Bomb some sense into them? Jesus said to sell your stuff and give it to the poor, but most of us aren’t ready to go quite that far. I dunno what the answer is.
Sam Kinison was funny, but he had a point. Maybe we should give them Uhauls,,, and a place to move to that will support crops. Hmmm
Originally Posted by Dave8338
“I think this sums it up quite nicely, for many on the forum. ”
Sure, but it’s only a dream for a whole lot of people. I was born on third base, but I know a lot of folks that have tried like hell just to get the bat. Unfortunately, most don’t recognize it and actually believe we all have even grossly similar opportunities..
I appreciate your reply, its a nice speech, but there isn’t anything left in this country that I know of to make any of that happen. Each of us is saddled with huge debt we can’t or won’t pay. Our clothes, our tools, our jobs, virtually everything we buy, and our way of life is financed by foreign countries. It seems we just don’t get our situation.
The investment guy I trust is recommending foreign bonds.
So, we have “popular uprising” and “take over”. Well, its like taking over a farm that owes millions in back taxes and debt. Who wants it?
Equal opportunity is such a pile, I can’t even begin. You walk out here to Nebraska and see how much equal opportunity there is if you want to farm for example. I’ll tell you how much there is. Zero. Its a closed system. The yeoman farmer that is the foundation of the whole American ideology no longer exists, period. No opportunity at all except if you want to work for Farmland (which is my “inverted totalitarianism” point).
The America and the constitution you speak of used to mean something. We pretend it still does……but in practice it does not.
I’m still waiting for someone to say something concrete that we citizens of this once great country can do to revive the thing. The people I run with say forget it, work in your local community to help the people out who need it. Here the folks who have really gotten screwed are people left unemployed by all the manufacturing that left for China, only to find that now even if both mom and dad both work they don’t make enough to raise a family.
By “Darwinism” I assume you mean survival of the fittest,,, the strong eat the weak. We are human beings, some say we were created in the image of a loving G-d. Could we aim a little higher than that?
Wow. When mark is even more cynical than I have become, I guess we are really screwed.
That said,I have had a bizarre reminder of how resilient life can be. I kept hearing a weird noise in my kitchen, where I unexpectedly hung out for the night. After a while, I figured out it was a grasshopper which made its way in. I tried to gently shoo it out with a broom, but it wasn’t having that, after several attempts interspersed with a few quiet times, followed by it showing up on the ceiling or perusing my cupboards again. In between all of that, I noticed a part of a green leg (foot/ankle?) stuck to the ceiling.After that, I saw it trying to invade a cupboard, and again, I tried to gently shoo it, but since it flew off and hit the ceiling again, I tried to smoosh it with the broom. I have no idea where it is now, or if it will or will not start chirping again out of the blue like it did in the past, or if it finally found the door and made its way out. I just heard some buzzing behind me, so I’m thinking it’s still survived…
Maybe if we all, or half of us, or 1/3 of us, or 1/8 of us showed the tenacity to thrive the way this grasshopper (?? haven’ seen it close enough to get a good ID, and have never had anything like it in the house) then maybe we could get a whole lot more done that we think.
Yeah, I know… motivating the masses is damn hard and often fleeting… that said, I hear that bastard grasshopper clicking again…
I’ve read the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the following 17 Amendments many times and no where does it say that anyone is guaranteed shelter, food, or healthcare.
FDR was a piss poor president. Thankfully his intrusive policies were not ratified. What he proposed in the second bill of rights is irrelevant.
You are given the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. What you do with that is up to you. The only way you can guarantee all these other rights that you demand is by infringing upon the rights of others. Your rights stop where mine begin.
For every government given secuirty, you give up some of your freedom. The more security you are given the less freedom you have. Sort of sounds like the road to a totalitarian gov’t to me…
“demand a shelter over your head, demand three meals a day for your kids, demand free healthcare for all.”
Sorry Chris, but shelter, food and healthcare all have to be earned. No free lunch. The world owes you or anyone else nothing. IMHO one should have the right to the opportunity to EARN a living – that’s all. Don’t like it? Go live in a communist country.
Doc,
You don’t seem to care one bit when using the Canadian Healthcare system; a free (well sort of) healthcare for all. Some could argue that’s communistic. If you have ever been to the library (they loan free books to EVERYONE, don’t they?) you are a communist. Police services are free, fire departments are free, public schools are free, free public radio, free public television and so on…
You don’t seem to argue with any of that. If someone broke in to your house and the police didn’t show up you’d be furious, because you would be personally inconvenient. But if some kid died on a side of the road you would give less than a damn. Who cares? No free lunch eh? So if you get it for free, it’s just fine and dandy, but god forbid if someone else demands the same thing.
I’m not a communist nor I ever will be and this is not capitalism vs. communism. Wish it for your own family before you wish it for others and see how it feels. My argument is that If we can build a free library, organize a free police force, have a free fire department all with our tax money, we should be able to give free healthcare to everyone, access to food to those who can’t afford it, a roof over head of those who don’t have the means. We have the money but we spend it on wrong things, we give it to crooks rather than the people. If caring about someone other than myself is communism, call me a communist all day long, it’ll be an honor.
HillbillyWV,
“You are given the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
What is life and how do we sustain life without its necessities? How is it possible when our farmers are being controlled beyond means by a handful of corporations? How is possible when every piece of packaged meat you eat in this country comes from factories with different names but in reality they are controlled by the same body and they decide what goes in that cow. How is it possible when our government misuses our trust and hands over our tax money to people who don’t deserve it? How is one supposed to pursue the happiness? Or is just the right to pursue but not the tools and freedom to achieve it?
I’m not proposing that everyone should sit and do nothing and they should be entitled to everything. We are talking about hard working people. We are talking about people just like yourself who put in their fair share and they still get screwed. Or maybe I’m wrong, maybe you are pretty well off. All I’m asking is this: Live and let live or perhaps don’t make it harder on the rest. Live simply so others can simply live.
“For every government given security, you give up some of your freedom.”
You couldn’t say it any better it seems like that we have lost a lot of our freedom for securities already, should we wait till the rest is gone too or we should do something about it?
Casper said…
GAJ said…
Darwinism isn’t “fair” either.
…….We are human beings, some say we were created in the image of a loving G-d. Could we aim a little higher than that?
nice!
Their will always be poor and rich people.What is the most foolish waste of money is when governments try to put their “solutions” to work usually at the over burdening of tax payers like my self.What are you doing personally to relieve poverty Chris? I have had three fosters kids in my home at one time or another. I support an orphanage in Lima Peru and the family that runs it.
https://hopetoperu.com/ a city with 400,000 orphans and a population of 7,000,000. I support and have supported 7 children from Vietnam to Columbia through compassion international. I have been a big brother to two boys in Philadelphia. and ii never give less then %10 of my earnings to help those less fortunate.Sorry if I’m a bit cynical but every time I see some one get on this band wagon it usually mean that they want politicians to jam their hands further into my wallet.The waste %85 of what they collect the use the other %15 percent on programs that actually foster poverty thru not teaching self reliance.A liberal spirit is a joy to the Lord But do it with your own money.Look around Chris there are MANY ways to help besides putting pie graphs on message boards.
Casper said…
Sam Kinison was funny, but he had a point. Maybe we should give them Uhauls,,, and a place to move to that will support crops. Hmmm
Sam was hilarious. My favorite line of his was along the same line:
“We have deserts in United States, too— but we don’t LIVE in them!”
A government that decides who gets what part of the “private consumption” pie wouldn’t be totalitarian, at least to some extent? I’m all for feeding the hungry, but I start to get uneasy at some of this, governments in general don’t have the greatest track record of doing the right thing. Maybe it’s sad, but one lesson Katrina hammered home to the folks around here was that if you can’t take care of you and yours, you’re gonna be in a bind.
It’s worth noting that from a historical perspective, it’s much better than it probably has been at any point in history. Governments in the last century killed millions of their own and others’ civilians, and we’re only a few decades removed from large portions of Americans subsistence farming. It hasn’t really been that long that the major religions were killing millions also, and I know of none extant that practice ritual human sacrifice. We’ve got a long way to go, but it looks to me like we’re definitely making progress. It took us hundreds of thousands of years to transition from hunter-gathering to agriculture; thousands more to make it to industrialization.
Well Enuff said…
Casper said…
Sam Kinison was funny, but he had a point. Maybe we should give them Uhauls,,, and a place to move to that will support crops. Hmmm
Sam was hilarious. My favorite line of his was along the same line:
“We have deserts in United States, too— but we don’t LIVE in them!”
Chris, in your opinion, what countries are doing it “right”?
I wasn’t born in the US either and find things here to be far more “fair” than when I lived in South America, for example.
There it seems to be a sport to keep the lower classes down…and those, like Chavez, who purport to be “fixing” that are as corrupt and selfish as those they vilify.
eli iceman said…
Their will always be poor and rich people.What is the most foolish waste of money is when governments try to put their “solutions” to work usually at the over burdening of tax payers like my self.What are you doing personally to relieve poverty Chris? I have had three fosters kids in my home at one time or another. I support an orphanage in Lima Peru and the family that runs it.
https://hopetoperu.com/ a city with 400,000 orphans and a population of 7,000,000. I support and have supported 7 children from Vietnam to Columbia through compassion international. I have been a big brother to two boys in Philadelphia. and ii never give less then %10 of my earnings to help those less fortunate.Sorry if I’m a bit cynical but every time I see some one get on this band wagon it usually mean that they want politicians to jam their hands further into my wallet.The waste %85 of what they collect the use the other %15 percent on programs that actually foster poverty thru not teaching self reliance.A liberal spirit is a joy to the Lord But do it with your own money.Look around Chris there are MANY ways to help besides putting pie graphs on message boards.
Thank you and bless you Eli. We’ve had a couple of late teen fosters too, they’re great. You can fix a lot of damage even with a mixed up 17yo. If everybody did what you do, that chart would look a lot different and we wouldn’t be having this convo.
Curious,,, where’d you get that “they waste 85%…” statistic?
I see a lot of political debates going on in this discussion, and rightly so I guess given the nature of the topic. However I would ask you all to take a step back for a moment and consider the world we live in from a different perspective.
My younger brother wrote an essay at Harvard about child honoring, and was so excited to talk to Raffi about it and have it posted on his website. I didn’t really get the idea or concepts till after I checked into it really is a great way to consider what is right and not.
Basically look are areas in our world in need and do not think about the adults that may or may not have had a role in getting that country in that situation but consider the innocent children born into it at no fault of their own. If we sit back and do nothing they will continue to die every minute, hour, and day. Those that survive will have no better chance at change than those before them and the cycle continues. We change the world with giving respect and support to the children of the world. That starts with basic human needs, like clean water and a source of food and medical care. We spend millions a year on research for diseases that our poor lifestyles have created when the number one killer has a much easier sollution and the cure is known.
The whole idea with the journey is to put you the reader closer to the realities of the world without the risk that Chris is taking on, as he gets out of the country you will see this a little better. The reason I took on helping was not to shift our military budget to food programs but to shift our personal views to what really matters and some of our wasteful spending on helping others in need.
For the cost of what some people pay for cable tv I sponsor 2 children in Hait, $30 a month each covers food, school uniforms, books, the school and teachers, and medical care. I can live without cable tv, but these children might not live without my help and even if they survived they would not have a CHANCE to help their country out of the state it is in. Haiti needs a cultural revolution to get out of the day to day survival mode they are stuck in and real change comes from the next generation and the children if they are only given that chance.
One more comment I wanted to say, even though not everyone posting here agrees with each other, the fact you are all here reading the blogs and dicussing the topics makes it all worth while. It doesnt help anyone to just preach to the choir so thank you for being open to the discussion.
Of course all very interesting and nice to see so many here exhchanging thoughts. Changes will take a while. The Book “A New Earth” I read a while back really scared me… “Greed”, the basis of it all. As ourselves have been on the rad now full time for the past 4 years, I do however feel a kind movement of awareness. I should say, as I am involved also with much of Pit Bul rescue “one dog at the time”…
Be well and hope that our path cross some day around a campfire.
Ara & Spirit
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