A Witty Title.

The sad thing is that these things are considered poor for first-world countries. Imagine what a poor person from a 3rd-world country would live like.
 

I was having similar thoughts to Stu- it is a sad thing when I think about some of my kids at school who probably see this thing on a day to day basis- it is a normal thing and when I see this stuff all I can think is that I have been given so many blessings- I did not grow up with much in the way of possessions- I did however grow up in a family where there was food on the table, someone to have cuddles with at night and parents who loved me- this is more than I can say for some other children
 

Okay, I hear that opinion voiced an awful lot, especially by christians, people opining that we are rich in monetary wealth compared to people from other countries, "third" world countries, and therefore we shouldn't complain about poverty. But at the same time, there are people here with more money than any third world person, who live in worse conditions. So my feeling is that that attitude is not only basically bullshit but is also downright offensive and inconsiderate. It is... unloving. We live in a society that requires a certain income, a certain level of wealth, and there are many people here who cannot get what they need to survive. Others in other societies may have less wealth, but are no more poor if any comparison can be made.

While I look at a number of my friends who complain about being poor or broke and think, "Hey, I have half the income you do and live quite comfortably because I manage my funds sensibly and don't buy the luxuries that you do," at the same time, there are people who have much less than I do, who live frugally and still can't make ends meet. And that is people here, in Australia. A "first world" country. And it is exactly this kind of attitude, attitudes that say, "You are still better off than they are so cope with what you have," which means they cannot even ask for help.

Sorry to be aggressive, Matt, but I really feel this is a seriously unhelpful and unloving attitude to have.
 

Have to say that I basically agree with what I think Laurel-li is trying to say here: We don't have to look very far past our own door step to find people in a really bad position, many as bad as those poor souls in third world countries if not worse, yet they are largely invisible to us.

I think once we can confidently say that we take care of /all/ our own sick and needy, then we are in a position to extend a hand to others.
 

To be honest Laurel-Li, your comments on how unloving my and Mels comments are, are pretty unloving in themselves. It's like you havent even bothered to think of people outside Australia (or America for that matter).
I think people who have to choose between whether they get to eat once every second day, or afford to rent a 3mx3m square that shelters their whole family are actually poor.
For example, the first 2 items on the post are assuming you have a TV in the first place and you can afford to buy and run a car that costs $800.
I understand and sympathise with the people who are 'relatively' poor compared to the rest of the society they live in, but alot of it is just who you compare yourself to.
 

I am abundantly aware (intellectually, since that is the most that the majority of us can actually know of it) of the difficulties experienced in third world countries. And it just so happens that there are people in our own country suffering just as badly, who have no roof over their heads, who cannot afford to feed their families because they simply don't have the money that living in our society requires. These individuals may have more money than someone living in Ethiopia (for example) but that does not make their position better. I believe firmly that caring for your neighbour includes caring for those nearby as much as those overseas, and any attitude that ensures that the plight of such individuals continues to be unrecognised by people who send their thirty dollars a month overseas so that they can wallow in smug self-satisfaction about what wonderful people they are, that attitude beyond unhelpful. So I stand by the descriptor "unloving", as it shows a wont of feeling, a wont of love and respect for our immediate neightbours, the ones we are directly in a position to help.
 

The reason I found this so powerfull was that it was something I can relate to.

As horrible as whatever people in third world countries are going through is, I really cant imagine what it would be like to be going through what they are. The whole situation, the background, the ingraination into their culture of the effects of poorness are I think, too extreme for me to ever understand.

Where as the details in the linked article are things I can relate to. Their things in this culture, this society. Things that I feel empathy for so easily.

Does that make me a bad person? That I can feel empathy for the poor of this country because I understand them better, but feel nothing for people in poorer countries?

As to Psi/Laurel-li point. I don't know. Im sure there are people in our country who live lives just as deficient as those in third world countries. I think the difference is not in an individual level but a corporate one. We actually have a large middle class, who are not poor and not rich. Many of these third wolrd countries do not. Which makes it near impossible to move out of the lower class.

Im not saying they have it worse on an individual level. I'm sure there are people who have it just as bad the world over.

I guess my point is that there society is far less able to support them than ours. But I still feel far more sympathy for people living here.

I think its easy to discount how hard things are for them, simply because we cant identify with them as easily.

LL I would never tell a perosn suffering in this country that "they live in a rich country, they have it so much better, deal." The realities of this situation are as you say, you do need a certian income to survive here.

That said, the income provided by our welfare system is (proposedly) enough. Im not saying its an ideal, or even a fun way to live. But its an option that you dont even have in a third world country.

Psi. You say we need to be taking care of all of our own poor before we even consider looking to helping others.

I strongly disagree with that. I dont believe it is possible to solve all poverty in australia. But even if it were why do we take a priority over the third world. Particularly since it will be far cheaper to help out one person in the third world.

Anyway.. I dont have all the answers guys, but you both have a point.. try to keep it civil.
 

I wasnt disagreeing with LL's point. Just that I felt like, for trying to expand the way we think about poverty, I was being labelled as 'unloving'.
My parents got divorced when I was 10 (I am the oldest of 3 boys). My mum and us moved to Ulladulla and she raised us by herself by working 3 days a week (that was all her work could give her) with no help by my dad (didnt pay child support). I should have got braces when I was young but we couldnt afford it. We used to go to the tip and get a few old bikes and pull them apart and make one working bike. My mum always looked after us and there was always food on the table but it was pretty meagre.
I thought we were pretty poor, like the people in the post Matt was referring to. But there was always food on the table and a home to go back to. I am grateful for what I was given and to this day always finish everything on my plate at meals.
There are people in other countries who would kill for that upbringing. Instead of thinking how badly off I was though, I give money to try and improve their quality of life.
 

Matt, sweetheart, I really don't think that feeling sympathy for those you can relate to more than those you can't makes you a bad person in anyway. It is, in fact, natural. Empathy (and therefore sympathy) requires a certain amount of common ground and the bigger the gap the harder it is to really feel for someone. As with many things in the christian faith, God doesn't require that you succeed, only that you keep on trying and recognise it when you fail. Remeber also that we are all given different talents and abilities and the ability to empathise indiscriminately is the rarest, the most underrated and the most often unacknowledged.

Stoobie: I didn't mean to indicate that I thought you unloving. I simply feel that too often the problems at home get ignored in favour of the problems abroad and I have too often heard people espousing exactly the point of view you were and, in doing so, minimising the plight of the people round the corner, some of whom are in situations just as bad, purely in terms of poverty, putting all the other personal problems that come up in our society completely to one side. I certainly didn't mean to be rude so I apologise.

(Sorry to Matt too: it's been a really bad couple of months healthwise (especially when this is the time of year that I should be feeling somewhat better), and in terms of mental crap, and having 4 family members and my godmother's father die, and my grandmother in and out of hospital, and my mother,nephew brother, and sister-in-law all sick... it's just been rough. So sorry.)