Moderate Simplicity

Before Merkel, I was blinded by my luxurious ignorance. I mean sure, I knew there people suffering in developing countries due to the lack of needed resources like water and sanitation, and definitely food, but I didn’t pay attention to that as much. There would be nights when I was hungry and there was nothing to eat but cookies, yet this wasn’t enough suffering compared to kids in poverty who go through this every day. In order to alleviate this problem, I wanted to donate money to the Red Cross but I don’t know how charities like them would distribute our help to thousands of poor souls without missing a person or if they even gave all the money (or just kept a fraction of it). My next idea was to go out and help the poor myself by giving them my spare change and then some, but soon I realized that's just not enough. If I give a hobo a $1, they'll spend it on bread, and then what? Who knows when they'll get another dollar, probably in 5 minutes or maybe in 2 hours? Like the saying goes, "Give a man a fish and feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime" or something like that.
The problem is people in poverty don’t have higher education and don't know how to fix their problem. They're just focused on living one day at a time. Some even go near a freeway with signs saying please help. Others say they’re veterans, but I don’t know if that’s true, although there are cases where the U.S abandoned Vietnam veterans when they lost a leg or something else and they were left on the streets, unable to work. I felt like telling those people that, unless there’s traffic, those cars are more likely not going to stop just to give them some coins. Besides, with many cars passing by, there are several air pollutants like CO2 in the air and they get heavily exposed to it, shortening their lives.
I hate to say it but right now we shouldn’t focus on Haiti and Chile as much but rather on ourselves first. To show international leadership, we need to start with fixing our country domestically. Stop spending so much time and tax money on war for oil or other foreign goods. Use that money to help the poor, because if psych stats has taught anything is that just because our average national income has increased doesn’t mean everybody is better off. You could screw the poor and make the rich richer and still have those results, pardon my French. Instead of feeling sympathy and donating to causes dealing with Haiti, first take a look at the homeless in Westwood, in Santa Monica, further on in Downtown, Highland Park, Pasadena, etc. We’re the richest nation on earth but we sure like to turn our backs to those in our backyard. Why? Why do commercials care more about people in other countries? Because those countries are poorer than the U.S? Look, being poor in a rich nation is still being poor. Just because you’re in Westwood doesn’t necessarily mean you’re better off.
As more people are in financial crisis, it’s getting harder to ignore the fact that we need to change. Do we really need another French Revolution here? Sometimes you gotta stop watching lies on the news and just go outside to see for yourself, and I mean outside, not just the door of your dorm building. Now since I lost my train of thought and realized this blog is going nowhere since this wasn’t what I meant to say, I still hope you learned something useful and do something. Or at least tell others to do something, that’s usually what I do because it’s easier lol.