1st World Comfort versus 3rd World Suffering

Now, I am about to rant, if you take offense respond with a logical rebuttal. I'm always up for getting new perspectives.

Today, while I was drinking, an older relative said that my glass was chipped, and I should throw it away. I stared at my glass, and found a small chip, barely 1 cm deep. The chip wasn't sharp, either, but quite dull. I thought (and, starting to get a bit tipsy, I was tempted to say) that to do such a thing would be a needless waste, it's a perfectly usable glass.

Such a mentality is common in the industrialized world. When something becomes slightly defective, throw it away and buy a newer form of the product. It's a symptom of capitalism gone amok. A capitalist system can only survive if there is continual consumption of goods. Aka, people have to be continually buying products. To do this, producers make their products more susceptible to defectiveness after a certain period of time. That way, you'll buy basically the same product more often. Do any of you have an antique pot? I do, it's almost 90 years old. And I'm still using it. Today, you buy a pot, it's gone in 5 years, 10 max. Ford motors in the 70's became an acronym for "Fix Or Repair Daily." That's because around that time this model of continual consumption became popularized, and Ford motors, to their detriment, took it a bit too far. But, as they later saw, you need to make the product to a certain minimum standard before you lose business.

I think our culture is parasitic. We take the cheap labor from the 3rd world, and what do we give in return? Higher paying jobs? What is the use of higher paying jobs if that eventually makes the price of goods they need higher too?

Obviously, I'm no economics expert, but something needs to do be done. You have people in industrialized nations throwing away a crap-ton of usable and recyclable goods that fill up our landfills (I'm from the Shenandoah mountains, NYC offered my county a deal to transport their waste here in exchange for $$. It's saying something when a place over 300 miles away (~500 km) asks to if they can dump their trash where you live.) The system is flawed.

You know when you were a kid, and you didn't want to eat your dinner, and your mom said "think of the starving kids in Africa"? Seriously, that phrase has become trite now- we make fun of it and use it sarcastically. But seriously, WHAT ABOUT the kids in Africa?? We are so jaded we make fun of their suffering. But I bet if half of spoiled Westerners went to Somalia, or poor parts of Ethiopia, they would leave with post-traumatic stress disorder. We are inoculated from the suffering of the rest of the world, and so we don't care. And so we are flippant about throwing away things that we can still use- who cares about waste?

I read the Hunger Games awhile back, and there's a scene in I think Catching Fire, where the protagonist Katniss is at a dinner in the Capitol. For those who don't know, Katniss is from a district in Appalachia (YAY mountain people!) where people can barely survive and are at constant risk of starvation. At the dinner in the Capitol, there is a huge array of food, so much that people would take a bathroom break to throw up what they just ate in order to make room for more. Katniss is disgusted that while they have so much food they have to throw it up in order to make room for more, in her home district her friends are starving.

I read that, and saw it as such a parallel to modern society. Here people are so ignorant to the plight of others they don't think twice about throwing away food or goods. We have been conditioned not to think about it, because that's the only way the system will thrive. And currently, we don't know of a more productive alternative to capitalism. So we keep it, even though it will destroy us.

Hypatia, I must admit that I share similar view of the western world. Our cultrue revolves around a false sense of protection and living life in the status quo. I'll keep this short, as I am using my cellular telephone to respond to this, but Canada, America and the United Kingdom have all become complacent and overly-absorbed in commercialism. We can respond to wants and impulse, yet real human necessities are ignored on the grounds that they do not affect us. The organisation concerned with supporting the hungry and weak only do as much as they can, yet we refuse to see their effets as pitiful because we would rather acceot them as great accomplishments. This false hope and reassurance makes me feel nauseated and disgusts me. Nonetheless, we cannot change things unless EVERYONE responds in a manner which is neither lax nor driven by attempted mass propoganda (much as the Invisible Children campaign of 2012). This is all I can contribute at the present, and I apologize for any errors with punctuation (bloody kepad!), but I promise to further reflect upon this subject in future. Cheers!

I understand your post however it seems to be slightly misleading...

How long has there been a '1st world' as we know it? Maybe a 200 hundred years at the most, perhaps even as low as 50 in terms of globalisation...

How long have humans been living for? A few hundred thousand years?

The only reason we have a 3rd world is simply because they haven't yet caught up. We got there first and the nature of being a 1st world country is that you grow at an increased pace

Taiwan is an amazing example. In 3 generations they went from being 3rd world to 1st world! If you lived there now your grandparents would have been farmers, your parents would ahve worked in factories and you might be a software engineer

That is mainly because Taiwan embraced capitalism and free trade and liberated its own people and gave them freedom

Many 3rd world countries have such defunct governments that those governments themselves (often little more than brutal dictatorships) are holding those countries back

Now I'm not saying that we are justified in our actions and some people really don't know the value of their goods...

But I think it is a little harsh to condemn the entirety of the 1st world. I think a good comparison to our society now to our society in the medieval ages can be made...

We forget that this whole '1st world' concept is really relatively new so it might instead be better to look at the 1st world in terms of how much we have risen as opposed to how much we have fallen

We have risen a lot. We might not be perfect yet, but don't condone people for not being perfect..

i think you missed her point slightly, akkarin. well, there are a few that i caught. nice rant by the way, hypatia.

first, where does the waste from taiwan go? its an island right? tons of people? either its shipped to some part of podunk china or dumped in the ocean.

1st world countries (with the US leading, of course) produce the most waste and byproducts. all that crap has to go somewhere. and ultimately, its a zero sum game. all the material we have to produce more goods is right here, on our little blue planet. all the material we will ever have most likely. and each year, it gets harder and harder to find more, because we got the easy stuff years ago.

ex- i bet none of you ever heard of oil shale or fracking over 10 years ago. i know i hadn't. now, its all over the news. oil shale, because theres some oil in it and we need it, even if its harder to process. fracking, because we can squeeze the last little drops out of the ground of oil and natural gas by flooding it out, and water tables and purity be damned.

all this means there is not enough capital in the world to bring everyone up to 1st world standards. what would they all be doing for jobs? computer programmers? pro gamers? recycling engineers? its absurd.

soon, this system will collapse. you see the rumblings of it in greece, with the rejection of austerity measures. why should 90% of the pop take pay cuts so the oligarchs can maintain power? i give the EU 2 years at the most before it is a thing of the past.

why? greed. unfettered capitalism, aspects of which hypatia touched on. its destructive, right down to the soul. and shes right. most of us DONT care whos starving where, be it africa or down the street. why should we? whats in it for us? and these questions i use rhetorically, cuz i am fairly certain its not jedi who ask it. or really, anyone with an ounce of compassion.

but most people DONT have that compassion. those aspects that i would argue make us human. greed is good, you see. i gotta get mine, and screw yours.

im tired of that game. and i dont think im gonna play it anymore.

occupy. whatever. but do something. if not you, who? if not now, when?

source- me, w bs in finance, minor in econ, an mba, DECADES of deep interest in international economics and policy and an ounce of compassion.

What you guys talk about are two different issues:

-1 We use highly toxic products, using rare materials we're running out of. Our society encourages us to consume more and more and to have the very latest products.
-2 There are people significantly poorer than we are.

For #2 I'll go with Akkarin. They brought it upon themselves. In the so-called first world we've learned what's good for us and what isn't. Look at europe. It's small, no natural resources. It definitely should not have the largest economy in the world, yet, it does. Dismantlements of the empires actually severely widened the gap between first and third world.

For #1 This wasn't always the case. We've pretty much always had a capitalist society. Although trade wasn't as developped before, it was still capitalist. People didnt get social coverage, minimum revenue or anything like that. It was a proper unleashed market. What changed this is the arrival of what I call the cheap chinese crap. Produce as much as possible the fastest possible at the lowest price possible. This results in substandard products, which, to put it bluntly, suck, and won't last more than a few years. This however is not a capitalist issue. It's a consumerism and competition issue. The consumer wants to get more for their money, so they look for affordable products they can get now. And the supply complies with the demand. Relocates to china. produces microwave ovens for 20 pounds instead of 100. Microwave oven only lasts 2 years instead of 10... resulting in trhe consumer getting used to replacing the microwave oven every two years. Because of this, the consumer would now never consider buying a microwave oven for 100 pounds and generally speaking gets used to HAVING to replace stuff regularly. To put an end to this, laws could be passed to force corporations to do things more ethically. Treat your employees well, dont throw shit in the river, etc.And that's what the EU does... unfortunately whilst maintaining free trade. The problem with free trade is that when your standards differ, the situation won't be fair, and the one who always win are those with the lowest of standards. The most affordable place to put your production lines in europe is poland/romania. But even they want a decent salary. Social security. Free school for the kids, etc. So even they can't compete in a free trade environement, because the competition will always be able to beat their price, and the consumer will always go for that lower price.

Desolous wrote: i think you missed her point slightly, akkarin.

Yes I seemed to have gone off at a tangent slightly

I would however respond to what ren said regarding the EU and free trade... The EU absolutely does not support free trade lol. It is MASSIVELY protectionist!

Within the EU yes. Lots and lots of free trade. But if you're outside the EU expect your items to have a lot of tax added to them when they're sold. Especially on food items

There is a problem with human consumption I'll agree with that. People probably ought to get their priorities right...

One interesting example is a country called Bhutan. Ever heard of it? I doubt it as it is one of the smallest countries in the world lol. Well they have something called Gross National Happiness

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_National_Happiness

For English people this might be comparable to the question on the 2011 census 'How happy are you?'

The idea is that it is more important to be happy than rich...

I would however respond to what ren said regarding the EU and free trade... The EU absolutely does not support free trade lol. It is MASSIVELY protectionist!

hmm anti-eu boy here. The Eu needs to be a lot more protectionist than it actually is because it has the least competitive worforce in the world.

ren wrote: hmm anti-eu boy here. The Eu needs to be a lot more protectionist than it actually is because it has the least competitive worforce in the world.

At the risk of thread derailment...

The EU isn't competitive enough... so instead of making people in the EU more competitive we will just make it harder for people to compete with us by imposing taxation on their goods

That method however still leaves a country (or trade bloc) with a lack of overall competitiveness and efficiency (economically)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/gavinhewitt/2010/06/the_case_against_the_euro.html

Note how nearly the entire article is talking about how the PIIGS (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain) which are funnily enough the worst affected by the Euro crises... suffer massively from a lack of competitiveness...

Maintaining the status quo will only do more harm than good

By reducing competition manufacturers expose themselves to market turmoil by becoming unable to adjust and change to a shifting market. It is very tempting to just go on speculation... and indulge beyond your normal capacity for expansion... hence debt...

Jack let out a low whistle. She almost anticipated a screaming rant from some other characters, except the ones whom she was thinking of in particular were not of the temperament to do so.

'Haid?' When Jack looked over her shoulder, she could see the CMC very carefully attempting to console Haid. Oh, yeah - Haid had originally been a slave, hadn't she? She'd know about these things.

'I'm not angry.' Haid was murmuring, even though her white-knuckle grip on her skirts spoke volumes louder than her words, 'I'm not going to lose my temper. I can be calm when I talk about this...' And Jack was also fairly confident that Haid was really only trying to convince herself. She looked back to the comments -- after all, Hypatia hadn't said anything too wrong, not that Haid would be upset over. And then, she saw it.

"Oh... what Master Ren posted is upsetting you..." She murmured.

'We brought it on ourselves?' Haid mumbled, choking, '...How? What else COULD we have done? So many of those places, the culture doesn't value education for their girls, so women in those societies cannot work, and all that's left is for us to become wives who give birth to more children than they can carry. And that's only assuming the government is TRYING to make things better, but more often than not, they couldn't care less. There are no resources left for ourselves, after all the resources are bought up by other countries. Or what about when the ecosystems collapse, because of droughts or recurring storms, or because the expansion of cities pushed the natural species out... but that only happens because there's nowhere else to go, and because we can't even provide for ourselves and our families for the next day, let alone worry about the economic and environmental survival of tomorrow...' Oh dear, and she was starting to cry. Jack really wished she could stop writing this.

'Haid.' The CMC interrupted, very gently cradling Haid's face in his hands. Aw, how cute - Jack was going to be sick, 'I am sure Master Ren meant that in a very different sense - one that could have been worded better.'

'In other words, he can bite you.' Kendalina intruded. The CMC shot her a glare.

'I would prefer to put it less provocatively.'

'I'll bet you would.'

"Guys!" Jack moaned, "In any case, there's a whole argument about 'bringing it on ourselves' that could totally apply to even first world countries, so let's leave that out of it, for now."

'Ahem-stockmarketcrash.' Kendalina coughed.

"In any case, the discussion of the massively opulent wealth in the first world, while there are, as he said, countries where there are massive amounts of people starving, dying from very simple diseases that have been completely eradicated in the first world, caught in wars and conflicts, and bearing the brunt of global climate change damage..." Jack trailed off.

'Unfortunately, Selle Hypatia gave a perfect comparison when she mentioned the Hunger Games -- the books are mostly perfect comparisons of the standards of living in, say, America and all the countries which they ship in their products from. Heat and power sources from coal, like oil, from countries where the people have olive colored skin... if that was not a metaphor for the U.S. and the Middle East, I shall eat my shoes.'

'An' in terms of what can be DONE about it...' Kendalina half-commented, having picked up Jack's copy of 'Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide' by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. Not that Jack was trying to subtly promote OTHER members to read the book by mentioning that detail...

...Maybe, just a little.

"Well, consuming less is a 'Duh' solution. Hell, that's what I do -- limit my meals and how big they can be, not buying what I don't need, in things like clothes or electronics or cosmetics or any of that nonsense. And then, watching what you throw out, in terms that you might be able to use it someday." Jack pointed out, and then, as Kendalina was obviously about to comment on the enormous pile of stuff that she'd pack-ratted away, "Shut up, Kendalina."

'And, after that, learning more about the direness of the situation in other countries, and then what can be done to assist them -- sponsoring Medicins sans Frontieres for me, personally -- would be an action to take on the whole.' The CMC agreed.

Jack groaned. That reminded her....

Sapadu wrote:
"Oh... what Master Ren posted is upsetting you..." She murmured.

'We brought it on ourselves?' Haid mumbled, choking, '...How?

i, too, vehemently disagree with master ren. i have had the 'pleasure' of travelling a large portion of the world. at least half of the countries i have been to would be considered 3rd world. my own mother is from bolivia, a landlocked country in the heart of south america. i have travelled there 3 times in my life, spending the better part of a year there in total.

and the sentiment that 'they brought it on themselves' is entirely a delusional 1st world construct.

did my ancestors bring on themselves the conquistadors, who destroyed entire civilizations in their quest and plunder for gold? did they then bring on themselves the social stratification where mestizos and indians were treated as subhuman for CENTURIES til even recently? bolivia only just elected from its populace the first indian president, evo morales. imagine that happening in the US. a cherokee or some such in the white house. inconceivable.

they/we did NOT bring it on ourselves. they/we have EVERY right to the same pursuits of happiness, the same government representations, the same EVERYTHING. why? because they/we ARE the same. if the tables were turned, and some now-opulent 3rd worlder said that you guys 'brought it on yourselves', i would rail just as loudly against that sentiment as i do here.