The international compassion industry December 14, 2007

My blogging and writing brain cells have been quite uninspired lately though I had many things on my mind. I just did not have the will or inspiration to really put something in writing for others to read. But right now, I remembered something that I always wanted to blog about and it has fired my mind! It is the fakey fake Western/White/European compassion as carried out by some bored Western men and women who are just looking for some sort of escape to the poor parts of the world. I believe it has more to do with their own personal egotism and search for adventure, museums etc. than to really help the poorest of the poor. It all also reeks of fake sentimentality. I truly believe in the saying, “Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime.” This is even more true regarding international compassion, aid industries and organizations because even any ”fish” they do send to Third World is often stolen and eaten by the privileged, powerful and corrupt people in those countries.



But there is something even worse, these fake compassionate people often end up (intentionally or unintentionally) making heroes of themselves by going on TV and all. I can name any number of these people; Christopher Hitchens (In his book, ”The Missionary Position”) among many others have written much about Mother Teresa who loved to encourage and proliferate poverty than to reduce it, maybe because she needed the poor more than the poor needed her. Then there are these World Vision people (According to Wikipedia they have$2.6 Billion budget!!) who are often showing poor, hungry third world children, shedding tears on the camera. They have their ads on TV (and in newspapers) all the time, here in New Zealand and I am sure in other rich countries too. These ads are dripping with dramatic and affected Television sentimentality to ask people to write checks for them.



Today what reminded me to write a post on this issue was an Interview (Click to Hear) with Dominique Lapierre from Don Swain’s website. Dominique Lapierre is the French writer who, in the 1980s, made it some sort of crusade to depict poverty of India and get money for some poor children’s home that houses about.. hmmm… 250 children. My point is that it’s all a wasteful drama that only ends up bringing money and celebrity status to people who run it. For example, with all its power to put up glossy ads and do effective advocacy World Vision should be putting pressure on the governments of third world countries to stop horrendous corruption, human rights abuses that are the only reasons to blame for the horrible poverty in these countries. Sending money to feed, clothe, educate some kid every month is a wasteful solution when that kid will grow up into a corrupt, violent, diseased society and will eventually perish anyway. What’s the use of ”education” in a country like Rwanda or Sierra Leonne or say in Darfur region of Sudan? World Vision could also lobby the foreign affairs departments of Western countries to force the corrupt leaders in the Third World to fix their problems. But no, World Vision is busy showing sentimental stuff on TV and get checks. Because it is the easiest thing to do in this world, not to mention gainful.



Another thing that these individuals can do is to use some brain. If, let’s assume, they’re really interested in reducing poverty in these regions and give those people some resources to feed and clothe themselves, the compassion industry should be advocating Foreign Direct Investment into these countries that will give people some useful employment. If you listen to Dominique Lapierre’s interview he mentions once he noticed a very sweet little Indian girl in the slums of Calcutta who always walked off to some place very early every morning. And he wondered what she was up to. One morning he followed her to find out. She walked to the railway station and waited for the first train that came into the station. After that train stopped for a while and left the platform, it would leave chunks of half burnt coal (as most trains in Indian in the 1980s were powered by coal/steam engines) on the tracks. This little girl would pick them up, at the cost of burning her fingers. She would take them home; half of these would be used to cook the only meal they could afford in one day and the other half would be sold to buy some rice for another day. I found it utterly depressing.

 

 

But Dominique Lapierre is ecstatic and calls that girl the hero of her family. Maybe he would say the same thing if that girl sold sexual favors to other people. Anyway, Dominique clearly fails to notice the sheer desperation of these people to survive. What they need is useful employment. I am sure if Dominique Lapierre had invested some money to open some small scale businesses or cottage industry in those slum areas, the results would be dramatic, taking into account the availability of endless cheap labor and overwhelming desire of these people to make a living. The profits could be used to start more industries and employment projects. These people could earn their own living and bring more dignity to their life. But no, Dominique Lapierre (like others) was more interested in selling stories of their poverty to the rest of the world. Fucking Sad, Stupid and Hypocritical.