On popular charity

Today my mum told me to pick out some nice clothes and stuff that I do not particularly want so she can bring them to this collection point in town which will deliver the donations to the earthquake victims in China.

I asked, “Why don’t we send them to Africa instead?”

Strangely, nobody knows how to get anything to Africa because that’s old news. Sure, tons of people are dying everyday from famine and diseases that afflict entire populations of people who are too poor to afford any form of hygiene. But hey, that has been happening forever now and has lost its novelty. Never mind that Somalia has just been declared a state of humanitarian emergency, the new common charity game is now the big earthquake in China.

I’m not saying it’s not sad – I think it’s tragic, and personally I cringe each time I catch a glimpse of the news on TV. I was on the verge of tears when I saw my colleague frantically trying to reach her family in Sichuan on the afternoon of the earthquake. In fact, I do consider myself pretty affected by the stories I have heard and read even though I do consciously try to block out the all the irrational emotions I have for the situation.

What I AM saying is, charity for the affluent (and Singaporeans are generally affluent compared to most of the world) has become more of a little game of feeling good about yourself. Most of these disasters are nothing more than a little story in a little black box in your living room. They evoke for a brief period of time a “Oh, the poor things” sentiments, and people go “Oh, let’s do something for them, shan’t we?” and they donate their old clothes and stuff that certainly are not part of the immediate needs of hunger and disease stricken disaster victims, and then they go “Awww, how nice we are, let’s go get our friends to donate their unwanted items too~ *heart*”

Remember the Tsunami that struck the coasts of many Asian cities in December 2004? Nobody remembers it anymore. In fact nobody has remembered it for a good 3 years now. For about 1-2 months, there were huge donation drives. People were donating their junk (like wedding dresses and broken toys) and organsing various fund raising activities. And then it was over, for the first world countries, at least. The reparation work goes on for months, years after the incident, but first worlders don’t give a shite.

It’s going to be the same with the earthquake. Next month, it isn’t going to be on the news anymore. The donation drives will be over, there’s be billions of dollars in donations from various parts of the world hovering about various parts of China, passing through many hands, a large fraction of which will be siphoned out by unscrupulous random persons. At the same time, there’ll be piles of old unwanted clothes and toys from first world countries stuck in many large boxes and taking up space while the victims’ basic needs of food and hygiene are still being met.

Meanwhile, the children and adults of Africa will continue to die of hunger daily because droughts keep killing their crops and livestock.

I think about these occasionally, but most times they’re just very fuzzy remote images in my sub consciousness. They will perhaps touch me enough to want to blog an entry about it, but it’s nothing a good night’s sleep and plenty of work and personal emotional trauma cannot cure.

*yawn* Back to my first world comfy life. Tata.