idBlog
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Shame and the Butterfly Effect
Heard this story on the radio...
Within a span of about five minutes I first felt terribly angry that these injustices and atrocities take place in the world, and then I was overcome with a sense of extreme thankfulness that the awful conditions that were being described were not those of my own life. It was a real "there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-go-I" moment; there's no reason (other than my good fortune of being born here in this country to my wonderful parents) that I couldn't be in the awful situations that are being endured by those people in Cambodia. The fact that these problems exist, that we know about them, and that we choose to not do anything to address these problems should be a source of profound shame for our country. When you think of the CRAP that we find to spend our money and effort to do - whether it's ill-conceived nation-building, Congressional pork-projects secured through an absurd ear-marking process, or just the amount of tax dollars wasted by some of the unmotivated, unimaginative people in the bloated federal workforce - it is positively shameful that something so obviously heinous going on in the world does not receive more attention and resources to improve the lives of those in need.
Though my feelings of outrage and shame are real, I can't say that these feelings are very effective in moving me to act in response to this new-found awareness of atrocity. I guess I feel like the problem was there before I heard about it and it will continue to be there tomorrow. The only action I feel I can take is to post these thoughts to the web and pray that the impact of feelings shared through words and ideas will propagate from person to person until my butterfly-flapping expression of feelings may eventually cause the required cyclone of meaningful decisions in someone in the world who is in a position to make a real, tangible difference for those in need.
posted @ 10:13 PM
Within a span of about five minutes I first felt terribly angry that these injustices and atrocities take place in the world, and then I was overcome with a sense of extreme thankfulness that the awful conditions that were being described were not those of my own life. It was a real "there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-go-I" moment; there's no reason (other than my good fortune of being born here in this country to my wonderful parents) that I couldn't be in the awful situations that are being endured by those people in Cambodia. The fact that these problems exist, that we know about them, and that we choose to not do anything to address these problems should be a source of profound shame for our country. When you think of the CRAP that we find to spend our money and effort to do - whether it's ill-conceived nation-building, Congressional pork-projects secured through an absurd ear-marking process, or just the amount of tax dollars wasted by some of the unmotivated, unimaginative people in the bloated federal workforce - it is positively shameful that something so obviously heinous going on in the world does not receive more attention and resources to improve the lives of those in need.
Though my feelings of outrage and shame are real, I can't say that these feelings are very effective in moving me to act in response to this new-found awareness of atrocity. I guess I feel like the problem was there before I heard about it and it will continue to be there tomorrow. The only action I feel I can take is to post these thoughts to the web and pray that the impact of feelings shared through words and ideas will propagate from person to person until my butterfly-flapping expression of feelings may eventually cause the required cyclone of meaningful decisions in someone in the world who is in a position to make a real, tangible difference for those in need.
posted @ 10:13 PM
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
