[QUOTE="swamprat_basic"]
[QUOTE="mrbojangles25"]I used to be like you, a glass is half empty kind of guy, I understand why you feel that way. But then I got out of school, got a job, and realized "Wow, life is actually pretty cool. I'm done feeling sad and/or angry". I hope you turn your state of mind around someday, yours is a depressing and self-defeating attitude that won't lend itself well to living your life.
In short, you might like to mourn the loss of a kid every 5 seconds. Me?I like to celebrate that every 2 seconds or so there are some happy parents with a nice new kid with that new kid smell, and that new kid might cure AIDS or cancer in 30 years or so.mrbojangles25
Thank you for your concerns, but they're completely unecessary. This is not a glass is half empty / glass is half full situation, in which two people are looking at the same situation and taking two different views on it. I am looking at the problem, while you are ignoring it.
I think most people are like you, happy in their own little individual snowglobe lives, ignorant of the fact that as good as we have it here in the first world, there are even more people who have it equally bad, if not worse, in the third world. But I understand why you feel the way you do. When you have everything you need, it is very easy to become ignorant of those who don't have access to those same necessities. And the even sadder part is that much of the ammenities we enjoy in the first world have only come about through the blood and sweat of the third world. Our fortune is their misfortune.
People have to be educated about the problem before they can find a solution. People have to be angry. Ignoring the problem only allows it to grow even worse.
oh no, I am not ignorant. I know how bad the world can be; I've been fortunate enough to travel to a lot of different parts of the world and see how people live their lives differently and, in many cases, to a lower standard than should be accepted.
But unlike you, I refuse to feel bad about it. We have it "good" in the first world because we work hard for it. My dad worked 60 hour weeks for 35+ years at the post office to ensure I had what I needed growing up. My mom went back to school and finished her degree at age 40 to help supplement this income and woke up at 5am every day, went to work, and didnt get back to 5 or 6 PM. I don't have it easy, either; I work 50 hours a week, I make under 20k a year (very little for California), I have loans to pay in addition to money to save for furthering my education. You need to keep in mind that everything is relative as well: some Amazonian tribe member might technical be poor from a wealth-standpoint, but I can guarentee you he or she is happier than I am. Its a good example of the things you own owning you.
At the risk of sounding like I am putting words in your mouth, you make it sound like the first world is privelaged simply out of coincidence or luck, and that the poor parts of the world are poor because of some sort of wrong-doing and that it is not their fault. If this is the case, then you are the one living in ignorance, a distorted "snow globe" world of cynicism and flawed statistics.
The world is anyone's for the taking, all it requires is hard work. It is time to stop blaming others, and time to start blaming yourself if your situation is crappy.
In short, I am not ignoring the problem because frankly, it is not my problem. I did not make anyone poor, I certainly dont owe the majority of the world anything, andif I did I am too poor to do anything about it. If someone is unhappy, well, t hey can work hard to rectifiy the situation.
You have absolutely zero idea how the world works, if you think that hard work is all it takes for someone to escape poverty in an underprivileged country.
Log in to comment