posted
"I am curious about why you believe that we have a special obligation to our own territories that goes far beyond what we owe to those outside our country."
Because we DO. By both law and tradition. It's what having a territory MEANS, in fact.
In the same way that I have a special obligation to provide for my wife and child that I do NOT have for, say, Geoff Card, our country has a special obligation to those territories it has sworn to protect in exchange for their allegiance.
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That shows a sense of empowerment and faith in the system that I must have lost over the years. When I look at the government's action regarding the war and the humanitarian efforts I feel angry, not embarrassed.
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quote: If Foreign aid were a significant part of the federal budget, this might be a relevant point, but since Foreign Aid constitutes less than 1% of the budget -- it's hard to imagine that the lower tax rates make a significant difference.
With smaller taxes, a larger portion of the budget has to go to areas that don't receive private funding. Last I checked, private citizens weren't buying tanks for the army, but they were giving large sums of money to charities.
quote: I chose Puerto Rico as example because it was recent and readily available and offers a point of comparison. If Puerto Rico needed $391 million in aid to recover from a tropical storm, it illustrates that the $350 million the US has pledged will not go very far to aid in this disaster. If this we were stretching our resources to do this, it might be considered generous -- but we are not.
I am curious about why you believe that we have a special obligation to our own territories that goes far beyond what we owe to those outside our country. I have been reading a set of philosophical essays on the ethics of aid to the distant needy and have yet to find one convincing argument that would suggest I have a greater ehtical obligation to strangers in Puerto Rico or Florida than I do to strangers in Thailand and Sri Lanka.
First, the "strangers" in Puerto Rico and Florida pay something called taxes to the US government. Second, as I have already said and others have reiterated in this thread, virtually every country capable of giving a dime has done so in this disaster, even India a country that has suffered from personally is providing refief to Sri Lanka (although with alterior motives I suspect). On the other hand no other countries provided any type of aid to Puerto Rico or Florida after the barrage of hurricanes so of course the United States is going to have to provide an amount of money that is disproportionate.
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It's not the system I trust, it's the people. I trust Americans, I wish I liked more of them-- if you really knew how many individuals I didn't like, you'd be astounded-- but I trust people.
Trusting a system means trusting business or economics or engineering or some other feat of technology. I trust the human heart and conscience, and as we elect people and not calculators or strategists, I trust our officials and I take that trust seriously. And when they betray that trust or conscience, I take it that seriously, also.
posted
Secretary of State Powell on Meet the Press this morning gave a good defense to the administration response. He noted that the scale of the disaster only gradually, over a period of days, became evident, and that the amount pledged grew from $15 million to $350 million as more casualties became apparent. He also noted that other countries had similar scale ups in aid pledged. Note that news reports and Quidscribis' thread showed the mounting death toll day by day.
quote: The average american believes that the US spends 24% of its budget on assistance to developing nations, more than 20 times the actual amount
I have run into this wrong belief more than once in arguments with conservatives, who complain about the massive funding of other countries that their taxes pay for. They similarly complain about welfare. With no conception of the real spending, in real dollars or as a percentage of GDP or national budget, and expressions of disbelief and accusations of lying when I recite true figures, further argument becomes an exercise in futility.
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quote:Japan has sent dozens of firefighters, doctors, and other relief workers to affected areas. It also has dispatched two naval destroyers and a supply ship to waters off Thailand to help with the recovery effort.
posted
You can't count our aid to foreign countries in dollars alone. We have two carrier battle groups assisting the aid efforts in the effected regions.
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And a hell of a lot more than dozens of firefighters and a couple of ships....which were a lot closer to the disaster area than most of ours was.
As far as owning anything to other countries, I don't think we OWE them anything...if we did it wouldn't be charity. We help because we feel we should, and we give what we are comfortable giving.
Feel free to discount all the private giving, and all the help given by the US millitary....don't even consider what the US Corps of Engineers will do in helping rebuild....
We don't OWE them anything, just like they didn't OWE us any help when we suffered disasters.
PR and Flordia pay taxes (or in the case of PR we own half the damn island) so they have a reason to expect something from the goverment in return.
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I'm not trying to argue either way- I don't have enough knowladge of the american contribution to this effort. I was just posting some new information on what other countries have given.
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quote:Because we DO. By both law and tradition. It's what having a territory MEANS, in fact.
That's hardly an ethical justification. It was once law and tradition that one could own slaves, kill serfs, beat your children, and steal from the neighboring tribes.
The question is not whether or not we have an obilgation to members of our own country -- the question is why we don't owe that same obigation to every person on earth. If we owe less to those who are of our "tribe", how much more do we owe? This is a classic ethical question that has been asked by every major religious figure for thousands of years.
The relief aid we sent to Florida and Puero Rico was not contingent on how much the victims paid in taxes -- why should our aid to Thailand be different?
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The help that America is providing in military equipment alone is invaluable - one of the UN officials said on Fox News last night that American Army helicopters were the only means of getting food and supplies to many areas.
We should not just be lining up numbers side by side and comparing what is being done that way - personally I'm very proud of how quickly this country has stepped up to the plate and is doing things that make tangible, real differences to the survivors.
Do you think the average survivor right now cares how much money Japan has pledged? On the flip side, do you think they care when they see a helicopter landing full of food that their family desperately needs?
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quote:In the same way that I have a special obligation to provide for my wife and child that I do NOT have for, say, Geoff Card ...
[writes Tom off next year's Christmas list]
Just kidding. I actually agree with Tom to a large extent, though either side in this argument needs to be taken in moderation.
quote:The question is not whether or not we have an obilgation to members of our own country -- the question is why we don't owe that same obigation to every person on earth.
I roll my eyes at isolationists who think that American resources should go exclusively to American interests because America is the only thing that matters to Americans. With great success comes great responsibility. We are one of the richest and most capable nations in the world, and in my mind, that alone obligates us to help out whenever we can.
But at the same time, you just can't compare a nation's internal means of self-support and problem-solving to the support it gives to outside interests.
First of all, there are too many major problems scattered across the globe for America to solve them all. I've just been reading Jared Diamond's new book Collapse, and it's incredible some of the nigh-insurmountable problems that other countries are dealing with. America does not have the means to clean up China's pollution, replant Haiti's forests, import the Dominican Republic's garbage, and desalinate Australia's soil, even if those countries were interested in giving up their own soverignty to the degree it would take for us to do it. There are limits to what America can accomplish, and so we set some priorities. It's like the instructions on an airplane to put on your own oxygen mask before helping your neighbor. It doesn't help anyone for you to run around fixing all the problems around you, only to drop dead yourself after a few minutes.
The American government's first responsibility is to preserve its own people and perpetuate American prosperity. That's why the American government was created. But now that it exists, it is ALSO morally obligated to use its surplus resources to help other nations as needs arise. But that obligation does not trump or replace the original, core responsibility of the government.
Say you're looking at two neighboring families, the Smiths and the Joneses. The Smiths suddenly lose their income right before Christmas, and in a fit of goodwill, the Joneses come over on Christmas Day and give presents to the Smiths' children.
If the Joneses spent more money on their own children than they did on the Smiths' that year, does that make them ungenerous?
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Rape News It seems to me that these people are pretty ate up as they say around here. Nothing better to do then turn on the women in the refugee camps? You would think it was a UN mission!
This is why despite our giving and buying we cannot ever make the third world rich, they are too willing to tear each other down.
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The US is being called "ungenerous" by some based on the amount of aid pledged as a percentage of GDP compared to that of other nations, but I imagine that most of these people simply do not understand the full picture of what is involved in the US aid effort. The enormous amount of military aid - in terms of transportation, personnel, and more - adds up to a great deal more. Particularly considering the fact that much of this aid will remain deployed in the area for a good long while. All those people who talk about the major cost of keeping the military in Iraq? Well, we're talking about the same kind of mounting cost here, albeit on a lesser scale. An article on CNN describes how enormous this military aid effort is. http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/01/03/military.mission.ap/index.html
quote:At least two dozen Navy ships with thousands of sailors and Marines are at the disaster scene or en route...
quote:...ships offer a variety of potential aid, including water purification equipment and medical supplies...
quote:While immediate aid was a priority, the military also was planning for the longer term, as indicated by the Pentagon's decision Monday to send the USNS Mercy, a 1,000-bed hospital ship that is based in San Diego and will take an estimated 33 days to reach south Asia.
quote:While immediate aid was a priority, the military also was planning for the longer term, as indicated by the Pentagon's decision Monday to send the USNS Mercy, a 1,000-bed hospital ship that is based in San Diego and will take an estimated 33 days to reach south Asia.
quote:A major part of the relief effort is a collection of 12 ships from the Navy's Military Sealift Command, including six laden with equipment and supplies to support 15,000 Marines for 30 days, and also carrying food, fuel, medical supplies, construction equipment and other materials.
Those six ships also have water purification equipment that is capable of producing 600 gallons of potable water per hour from sea water. They can pump water from ship to shore from up to two miles away using floating hoses, according to a Military Sealift Command fact sheet.
I couldn't begin to tally up how many millions of dollars this is equivalent to, but just paying a few thousand sailors and marines for a month no doubt adds up to quite a few million, and that's not counting the priceless - absolutely priceless - contributions of water purifying equipment, a 1,000 bed hospital ship, and countless military doctors.
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quote:We don't OWE them anything, just like they didn't OWE us any help when we suffered disasters.
If I own a mansion in the country, with a barn, and it's a hurricane and outside a vagrant--I don't sense danger-- rings my door and asks to sleep in the barn, I owe it to them to least let them sleep in the barn, and that's when the debate starts.
I don't know how we have forgotten this, it's not only the degradation of our moral fiber but manners.
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No we don't...we may CHOOSE to offer it. That is what free will is, the ability to choose.
If we had no choice in the matter it wouldn't be generosity. It would be obligation. Generosity exists when you do something you have no obligation to do.
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Now we are talking about fundamental metaphysical differences, then.
We have a different understanding of basic rights, responsibilities, and duties. It's not any more of a choice than peeing my pants at the dinner table, rather than getting up to go to the bathroom.
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Kwea is right in that the US does not owe any foreign countries aid. Canada doesn't owe us anything either, neither does Japan, or anyone else. As soon as we start feeding into that mentality, we create a culture incapable of taking care of itself. Unfortunately, that attitude and that culture is already prevalent in Sri Lanka.
I'm worried that getting so much aid will reinforce the attitude of expectation that I see so frequently here. They expect that, because I'm a foreigner, I ought to pay ten or a hundred times what the locals pay to get in to the zoo or the museum or any other sites of cultural interest. They expect that, because I'm white, I'm rich. They expect that, because I'm white, I can afford to give them anything they demand. They expect that I'll gladly do this for them or that for them. Because I show up, I'm on time, and I'm responsible, and therefore, they don't have to.
Not everyone has that attitude here, but enough of them do that it's a huge problem.
Having said that, I still believe that it will be beneficial all the way around if prosperous countries and prosperous individuals give as much as they can to help.
But I want that tempered with the locals giving of their time and money, as much as they can. If they've lost their homes, then they need to help rebuild. If they have no money to donate, then they can give of their time. But somehow, they have to play a part in rebuilding their country. It will help them become more self-sufficient, something which is now lacking.
Having said that, I am extremely grateful for those countries, corporations, and individuals who choose to help the affected areas. Many here are extremely poor beyond any standards that most in western nations can even comprehend.
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QS, I've been wondering, do you know if the Tamil Tigers are suspending their rebellion until after the disaster has been taken care of?
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Depends on how you define "suspending their rebellion". There's been a cease fire since 2001, but there have been a lot of squabbles since then, and the cease fire is no longer due to a written peace treaty or anything, but more because both sides are playing the waiting game, waiting to see who will give in to demands first.
However. A police station was bombed a few months back. Tamils? That's the theory, but who really knows?
The Tamils control the north and the east. There are army checkpoints all over the place there from what I've read. I haven't actually been there, although it is open for tourism, at least theoretically. Well hell, I write for a travel magazine, and that's what the magazine says.
Some news reports said the Tamils weren't letting relief people in, but other reports said they were. Some news reports say that they're letting a limited number of people in. Some reports indicate that there are trucks in those areas that have been hijacked at gunpoint.
News has been scanty coming out of the Tamil controlled areas, and as near as I can tell, there is no government verification of numbers or statistics. But then, at this point, the Tamil control everything in those areas. At gunpoint.
At this point, that's pretty much all I know. I'll see if I can dig something else up. Heck, now I want to know. Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:As soon as we start feeding into that mentality, we create a culture incapable of taking care of itself. Unfortunately, that attitude and that culture is already prevalent in Sri Lanka.
You seem like a nice and competent woman, but I'm a bit of a twit. By some act of luck and circumstance, as an American, I get to live my twit lifestyle in relative luxury, I still get information from Ancient Greece, clothes from China, and apparently I can even borrow money from future generations with relative impunity while my creditors are learning to walk, even though I'm a twit.
It's nice life, but I'm not one to pretend that I am self-sufficient. Maybe if I were "a self-employed accountant for nine years, and now I'm a stay at home writer/lazy person who plays on the internet all day," it would be different. (The quote is lifted from the Hatrack Superiority thread.) If you were accounting your own books from your own brick and mortar business, which did not deal with other cultures, even indirectly, I could see possibly where you are coming from, but that wasn't the case.
Look, lawyers, accountants, doctors, and the rest-- especially writers and teachers-- are all to some degrees parasites or symbiotes with the society, and the profound assertion I'm going to make is all of this is perfectly appropriate, and to ignore our interrelations and luck is dishonest and a little beastial, not to mention that it wreaks of an assumed and unfounded superiority and high-handed neglect of ones responsibilities, under the assumption that you earned everything you have and if people don't have as much, they didn't earn it. Bean Counter was similarly blessed in the now deleted Guns, Germs, and Steel thread.
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It is funny that you are so damn high and mighty Irami, when she is over there DOING something...even if it is just what she can do, no matter how little...while you are here at Hatrack proving you are a twit.
There is no entitlement that forces other people to pay for our mistakes. What makes charity so special is that it isn't forced, that it is offered freely, no strings attached.
What you describe is more like welfare than charity.
You don't prove anything by being pompous, Irami, other than proving your critics right and turning off others here.
You know, the people you like to lecture at, even though they aren't your equals, because they are always here....
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I don't see how anyone can really criticize the US in what we're doing to help. I don't see anyone other nations sending in half their navies to help rebuild, or thousands of troops, thousands of tons of supplies, so on and so forth. We'll probably end up spending a couple billion dollars on this thing total. And sorry we spent a lot on Florida and Puerto Rico but those are AMERICAN territories, you have to expect us to treat our own slightly better than the rest of the world.
We didn't even hesitate to help. We heard there was trouble and we kicked it into high gear, and there's a 1000 bed hospital ship on its way to the area from San Diego. Stop blabbing on about "small donations" and Bush taking too long to make an announcement, those things don't matter. What matters is what we do now and in the future. (I can't believe I defended Bush, I'm a bad, bad Liberal)
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As we aren't sending anywhere near half our navy, your hyperbole isn't exactly strengthening the position we're doing an extreme amount.
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And I forgot to mention this but wow Irami, you called Teachers parasites?
I'd call them champions, to get paid less than pretty much any other occupation that demands higher education, and getting no appreciation (obviously) to do so. It's amazing how people can say stuff like that and then still get angry when their own kids don't get the very best education in the world, there's a link.
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I didn't mean half OUR navy. But even a sixth of our navy is still larger than most other navies in the world. I think we have 22 ships in the area right now, with something like ten more on the way. Besides, I don't know of any large numbers of other naval ships there to speak of, i know Australia sent one ship. My point is that we're still doing leaps and bounds more ON THE GROUND than anyone else.
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In absolute terms we may be giving quite a bit, while in relative terms we may be giving little (note that I haven't actually touched on that question, merely on those who attempt to dismiss it).
Envision a world where there are 3 countries. One country suffers a massive disaster. Country A, which has an economy that produces 100 a year (the units don't matter, except that they're the same), donates 1 to the devastated country. Country B, which has an economy of 100,000 a year, donates 2 to the devastated country. Which country is more generous?
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posted
Except the real world isn't that cut and dry. America has a higher GNP yes, but our taxes are lower than all of Europe's based on our economy type. We are currently in debt from a myriad array of stupid programs and the Iraq War, and we look to be spiraling down a rabbit hole of even more debt, and at the same time are being scolded for not spending enough. Sorry, but we have our own problems to fix.
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posted
First, most certainly so does the rest of the world have problems.
Second, as a large and growing part of our economy is closely related to that of the damaged region, this should not be thought of so much as charity but as investment and loss-management.
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posted
I don't understand how people can criticize generosity anyway. It's charity. Can you honestly tell me if you were walking down the street and a beggar asked for spare change, and you gave him a dollar, and he said "what? that's all?", you wouldn't want to take the dollar back and be angry?
That's why so many Americans think US Foriegn aid should be CUT not raised. Personally I think we SHOULD do more, by leaps and bounds. I think people tend to ignore money we spend that helps other nations, like medical research, biotech research (thanks to us, India can feed itself) and other things that don't have high profiles or big dollar signs. But when we give to the world, and the world slaps us on the wrist, it makes us not want to give anymore. Not saying I agree, but I certainly understand the feeling.
Personally I'm very internationally minded. I think the US should work more with the United Nations on things, shouldn't have the whole bravado go it alone we're the best attitude, but I'm also an American first, and think a lot of domestic issues are more important than international (though not the Tsunami Aid).
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quote: I think the US should work more with the United Nations on things
No, Personally I think we should get out of the United Nations. I would love to elaborate, but I am in a hurry.
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posted
Oh how ye are wrong, let me count the ways...
Getting out of the UN would be the most horrible thing the US could right now. If the world didn't hate us before, they would now. We've been to the UN several times in the last few years to ask for help, and a couple more to admit we were wrong. Why would you want to leave a world body designed to help nations coexist peacefully? The UN does immense amounts of good around the world, far more than the US does (not that im knocking the US, just saying). Just because we're selfish and the world tends to not agree with us on a lot of stuff doesn't mean we should act like four year olds and pull out of the organization.
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That's the money that's been donated as of Tuesday. I know I donated again after I got paid, and I'll donate again next payday. America's not doing so bad, in my opinion.
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quote:... are in addition to the $350 million pledged thus far by the U.S. government. Two ex-presidents renowned for their fund-raising prowess - Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush - have been recruited to spur more private giving.
From the link above this post.
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quote:There is no entitlement that forces other people to pay for our mistakes. What makes charity so special is that it isn't forced, that it is offered freely, no strings attached.
What you describe is more like welfare than charity.
There is a difference between being forced to do a something and being obliged to do something. If you have a STD, you are not forced to tell your partner. If you have a child, you are not forced to read to him/her. If you are a US reporter with immediate knowledge of tactical US troop movements, you are not forced to hold the story. If you see someone being raped/kidnapped on the street, you are not forced to call the police or otherwise intervene. And when you are American, you are a not forced to do much of anything.
Force isn't a factor in any one of those decisions, and what's more profound, but harder to understand, is choice is not a factor in anyone one of those decisions, either. A parent's taste or preference or choice is not a relevant concern about whether they ought to abandon their infant. And more importantly, nothing that matters is ever an issue of choice or even charity, as we currently understand charity as a matter of choice.
Any moral issue is an issue of responsibility/propriety and understanding how one is obligated/obliged.
I've wrestled with manners all of my life, but the virtue of manners are that they concern propriety and not choice. For example, scratching ones private parts in public is not a matter of whether one wants to relieve an itch.(The problem of course being that propriety for the sake of propriety is as alien to morality as choice is. Propriety has to be for the sake of the thing it concerns, and not for its own sake. This can easily explain why there are so many well-mannered suburbanites are not very not good people at all, it's a misunderstanding of the role of propriety. Another aside, the same can me said with people who misunderstand the moral role of consistency, which was discussed on another thread.)
I've wrestled with religion for a while and one of the virtues of religion is its concern with propriety and not choice. When God said, "Thou shalt not murder," he didn't mean accept on tuesdays and sundays, or in cases where you want to, nor was it a matter of force under penalty.
Manners and religion presuppose that we are obliged not by a matter of choice--or by fear of force--, but by circumstance and the human condition. there is a difference between oblige and obligate. There is a sense in which we can pick and choose our obligations, enter into contracts or break these contracts at our fancy.
There are some very smart people who want to banish our understanding of the word "oblige," and say that everything is a matter of choice or maybe obligation. I think they are gambling with the dignity in man.
This is complicated by the fact that often, the best person to properly understand ones obliges and obligations is the individual agent. This can give the appearance that the agent is making a choice. This appearance is so convincing that even the agent is fooled into ignoring thinking and responsibility, and instead, the agent makes a mere choice by taste or calculation. But what is at stake is the very dignity of the human condition, which is tied to our understanding of responsibilities and duties. Heck, one very appropriate pro-life argument is that people who are pro-choice are essentially immoral because they are taking something that is essential moral-- a baby's life-- and subjecting it to a matter of taste.
Responsibilities are understood by thinking; choices are made by calculating interests. It's important even to draw attention to the fact that responsibilities are understood and choices are made. In those two verbs we see the difference of who is control, and why choices are more sexy than responsiblity. Choices put us in control, responsibities are more complex.
To further the abortion example, if a person is thinking about what it is to be a parent and baby in a womb, then whether one has the right to terminate the life becomes a decision.(decision is from the same root as incision, it means cutting off. This always concerns a morally relevant issue, and the world is being cut for good or ill.)
If that same person is making a choice, doing a cost/benefit analysis and calculating the hassle of housing, feeding, and clothing this kid for x amount of years, then that's taking something that properly belongs a decision and making it a choice.
Again, nothing that matters is an issue of choice, and as we elevate choice above propriety and responsibility, then we confuse that which is trivial with that which is precious.
Freedom is not concerned with choice. Choice is a matter of license, a matter of calculating the costs and the benefits-- including the governments threats or jail time. Contrast this choice with freedom, as the ability to act in accordance with responsibilities as they are understood by a thinking mind. While the US may have a choice on whether to help out Indonesia, we do not have the Freedom to not help. Our freedom lies in the thinking and deciding how much is appropriate by understanding the situation.
Once again, this is why US aid has nothing to do with Luxemburg or choice, but everything to do the problems in Indonesia and Sri Lanka.
posted
I agree that what we contribute has little or nothing to do with what any other country is doing, and everything to so with the needs of the people affected by this disaster.
What I don't agree with is your assumption that our government has an obligation to contribute at all.
The entire function of our government is to look after our interests in this country. We pay taxes to pay for debts our country incurs by doing just that...by building roads and highways, paying for emergency services, for maintaining a military to protect us. To provide us with a level of protection and care that would otherwise be unattainable.
No one but us pays into it, and the resources that are allocated only go so far.
quote: 1 : to bind legally or morally : CONSTRAIN
So while you may feel morally obligated to help others in far away countries, I may not.
And our governments primary obligation is to the people it represents, not to other countries. That is why disasters in this country get more money than other locales, and why that is the right thing to do.
We pay into the system, so we gain the benefits of it.
As a society a lot of people HAVE made the CHOICE to contribute....either out of sympathy for their situation or out of a feeling of private moral obligation.
But as far as obligating our government to said other countries more than we are doing currently, I don't think so.
quote:We pay into the system, so we gain the benefits of it.
Once you bring anything into the world, it comes with a set of responsibilites that aren't of your choosing, with scant regard to how much money you puts in, and how involved you are in its creation and maintenance.
We could ignore the moral character of our nation, like a corporation, and pretend that America is merely an organization for the efficient division of labor for the sake of production. Or we can take moral fiber seriously, or at least acknowledge the responsibility that a nation has in the world, independent from the mere wants of any of its benefactors.
And as I'm pretty sure I think that this dignity lies in accepting responsibility and not neglecting it, I think the latter interpretation is more appropriate. Maybe I'm wrong. But I don't believe that the great rallying cry for WWII was, join up, it's in our best interest.
posted
Irami, your distinction between obligation and force is blurred when you cite examples like "thou shalt not kill," in which the obligation is also backed by a promise of punishment. Consider paying taxes; we are obligated to do so, to keep the country that benefits us solvent, but we are also forced to do so.
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posted
But even then we didn't bear the whole of the expense, did we?
I feel that there are a whole set of obligations we incur, and that the obligations we have towards other Americans, particularly those who share the responsibilitys with us, far outweigh the others you feel we have worldwide.
Who determines that moral fiber, Irami? You? Once you begin mandating charity where does it stop?
We are an amalgamation of beliefs and race here in the US, and just because I don't feel it is the place of the US government to fund every little action the UN feels is necessary doesn't mean that I am heartless, or that I am immoral. It simply means that we differ in our priorities. If the US wants to help, which we are obviously doing, then we should....but o other country has the right to DEMAND it of us, or to question the amount of aid we send.
It is ignorant and ungracious to do so. Point blank, we have no legal obligation to do so, nor is the moral obligation as obvious as you would like it to be.
I have personally donate as much as I am planning to by now, but I still have cable, a TV, DSL, a phone....by some peoples standard I would not have given enough, as evidenced by my current standard of living.
I could care less what they...or you....say about the level of my charity. I didn't do it for them, or you.
And until you leave your home behind and give those same things up, you simply don't have the moral authority to require me to do anything....not even as much as I have already done.
And if you do go and leave this all behind, at least I won't have to listen to you whine about the ignorant, selfish Americans anymore. Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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quote:It is funny that you are so damn high and mighty Irami, when she is over there DOING something.
I think this is the key statement here. quidscribis was speaking from direct experience with the people here. I have no idea if her conclusions are correct, but I believe her observations are basically accurate.
Meanwhile, she's been condemned for her conclusion by someone with no personal experience whatsoever.
Combine that with the work quid is doing to help, and we get a true case of "doctor heal thyself."
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Whereas I was thinking more along the lines of Irami judging me (attacking me?) as, I don't know, stupid or ignorant or something, based on his perception of my occupation or personality rather than my experience.
In my experience, when people resort to insulting a person rather than using logic, it's because they have no more ammunitition left and they're reacting emotionally.
I don't owe Irami any explanations or justifications on my life. Therefore I don't care what Irami says about my life.
Edit: perception. Dagnabbit, perception. Let's be accurate!
quote:Irami, your distinction between obligation and force is blurred when you cite examples like "thou shalt not kill," in which the obligation is also backed by a promise of punishment. Consider paying taxes; we are obligated to do so, to keep the country that benefits us solvent, but we are also forced to do so.
Obligation is appropriately problematic. It's the natural place for debate to begin. WIth taxes, we are obliged to pay something, how much and for what are different issues and are properly controversial.
The same with the disaster victims. We are obliged to help somehow. How far are we willing to obligate ourselves is a matter for debate. I'm not sure it is a matter of choice, but it is one for debate. I've only taken issue with people saying that we don't owe them anything.
The second issue concerns self-sufficiency. Is someone who has to file bankruptcy self-sufficient? We talk a good self-sufficiency game, as individuals and as a nation, but it seems that a lot of that is self-delusion. We have fertile farms and even more fertile minds, but I don't know if we should consider ourselves self-sufficient, and in this interrelated world, I don't even think should even try to be self-sufficient, but I think these are some loaded terms that can be misapplied.
I'm not sure there is a virtue in self-sufficiency, I think the bigger virtue lies in working well together. I mean, there is a very good argument to be made that anyone who is paying off a mortgage is not self-sufficient.
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But there is a distinction you fail to make, Irami....that of people who are involved in the system on both ends.
Teachers and writers are not parasites. They due work that is necessary, and are compensated for it. They pay taxes, and partake of the same society as the rest of us do.
If anything we don't pay teachers enough.
We are dependent on each other to a point, no doubt about that. But that is actually irrelevant...I don't know ANYONE who means completely isolated when they mention self-dependency, other than you.
There is a difference between everyone being dependent on the society in which they live, and people from without that society believing they have a right to all the rights associated with the society without any of the personal obligations to that society that go with it.
As a person in this society I am obligated to do my best to provide for myself, and to contribute to the whole. Doing so gives me certain rights that create an obligation TO me from that same society.
There is no obligation to someone outside that system who has no obligation to that same system itself.
We have every right to spend our own monies on people within our own borders if you choose to do so. I refuse to feel guilty for giving money to FL and PR, even if it means I have less to give to the current relief funds in Asia.
And I feel that out country has a greater obligation to its own citizens than to the citizens of other nations.
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As we spend over 600 times as much on ourselves as we do on other countries, I feel in no danger of us putting everyone else before ourselves.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Just kidding. I actually agree with Tom to a large extent, though either side in this argument needs to be taken in moderation.![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
