Poverty can profoundly hurt the onlooker as pointed out by Nandita. However, I grasped the full power of her words only after reading Ice Candy’s comments. He went on to layout a useful framework to discuss poverty. The feelings Nandita expressed are felt, I believe by many of us and, certainly by me as I pondered my choices when confronted by poverty. This post presents my reasoning as I decided my actions struggling with those feelings.
Initially, when I was confronted by beggars, I had no doubt that the right thing to do was to donate money, because I was told that it is good. However, if I gave more money, my elders objected. They allowed only “limited charity”. I tagged along as the money wasn’t mine. However I wanted to know, why they are limiting me while also saying that the greatest individuals are those that sacrificed everything? There was never a valid answer. One day in mid-teens I asked myself, “What is my goal in donating money?” The question set off a chain of thoughts that overturned the ideals I held as a kid. I wanted to donate as I wanted to be considered good by others and, when I believed in the usual god, so I would go to heaven. That goal, however, was obviously flawed. The goal ought to be to eliminate/reduce poverty. Importantly, I was not going to kid myself that my donation of whatever amount would eliminate (even individual) poverty. Such donations result in a permanent loss of my money while providing only temporary relief to the receiver.
I further reasoned that Edison by inventing the light bulb has done incomparably more for poverty alleviation than a billion Mother Theresas put together. The same could be said of Pasteur, Watt, or Gates. There was one friend who argued that they are not greater than Theresa as they did not “sacrifice” anything and they did it for “selfish” reasons. That may be true. However, I did not want to be “considered great”. I just wanted to do what is best for poverty alleviation. It is obvious to me that if Bill Gates today were to liquidate his wealth and distribute “everything” among all the poor in the world, within a week the number of poor will swell to include Gates, now depending on charity from others. There will also be negative repercussions for Microsoft employees/shareholders/customers.
Consequently, my choices were obvious. I should keep my money almost exclusively in banks/businesses or spend it. This generates income and capital for economic activities for others. I have to pay taxes to fund government’s plans. I believe charity must concern itself only with food, clothing, and shelter, and only temporarily as the receivers look for opportunities. Unless very critical I would rather spend/invest my money rather than donate for charity. For me charity is a bottomless pit adding to the problem. Pondering non-existent choices is a waste of time. When I realized what is good for me is good for the world, I saw how obvious all this was. Why would god create a world where I should suffer for another’s happiness? To make others rich, I have to be rich. Simple!
On a societal level, I am for legalizing child labor, gambling, porn, wrestling etc. Some societies by refusing to recognize the inevitability of a supply, black or white, if demand exists are promoting internal poverty. Simply, the more the items black-listed, lesser are the economic activities and subsequently jobs/income. This demand is anyway catered to by the underworld. I would value a person more if s/he does a billionth of a Gates/Edison than a billion altruists. Of course, my views can change in the light of convincing alternate perspectives/data/analysis.
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Nandita wrote "...poverty is depressing and an individual has very little power given the pressures of family,career,success that he must cope with...". The above post is my suggestion on what an individual can do. We may not eradicate poverty, but that is no excuse to stop ourselves from doing the best we can; keep our money white, not black. We all know the predominance of black money in the so called poor countries. A little observation will show that the capitalist countries keep their money white, and also have a wide variety of economic activities, a lot of which we tend to ban/restrict citing morality reasons.
