Noire Nightraine
(?)Community Member
Offline
- Posted: Fri, 07 Jan 2005 20:20:27 +0000
The tsunami issued is becoming a huge part of everyone's topics of discussion. A day can't go by without everyone being reminded at least one time, thinking one time, of all the people killed by the freak of nature occurence, the damage, and to some, the huge ammounts of relief the United States is sending over to South Asia to assist those alive.
I've seen all kinds of mixed reactions to the US's approach, ranging from indifference to utter joy to complete disgust. My topic is to those who express the disgust, the anger, the confusion, that this country, their country in many cases, is spending so much money on a different country and people when it could be turned and used for ourselves.
I was cruising around in one of the many Tsunami threads out there when I received this reply to my own.
How would you put that money to use? Name the ONE leading cause of children death, and how could you possibly alleviate that problem with that 400 million.Every freakin day, I see on the news about how 5 or 6 people in my area (Se Portland Oregon) were murdered. In Japan, 98% of people who commit crimes of any sort, petty or felony, are convicted. Why can't America have a police system that works so efficiently? And why don't these children in ophanages need to be adopted? Should they just be happy being couped up with 20 other kids in one house? I KNOW that the kids over there are dying and homeless and s**t, but what about BEFORE this happened? Hasnt' america Always been capable of doing something like this? Does it require 100 Million people to go homeless for us to get off our asses and do something GOOD?
As you can see, JoshyKins is quite angry not only with the Tsunami relief effor, but the way many aspects of American works, relflecting, it seems, on what the people in power of the pocketbooks deem issues and important and their own personal morals and agendas. My question, to most people veterened in some ED, seems like I'm avoiding the issue, that I'm trying to get him to prove what he's saying while I'm going to slam on him with my own opinon and how he's stupid and yadda yadda yadda etc.
Right now I'm enrolled in a course at my university, right here in downtown Portland Oregon (so we share a common ground and I can know where he's coming from) called Pathways to Sustainability and Justice. Though we haven't discussed the tsunami, we HAVE discussed the policeand the homeless. Extensively. In fact, half of last semester we focused on these groups alone, included in there poverty and the enviornment issues.
First, we'll look at the crime rate. First off, it's not the police system that convicts those arrested and charged with crime. It's the judicial system, which is part of the government triad and run by people elected by the people as well as your peers, lawyers and witnesses and juries. It's up to them to convict rightfully or wrongfully who seems guilty until proven innocent and deserving of punishment. However, I can see his anger at the police, especially with murders and deaths. The police force can only intervene when they are informed. One of my professors for my Sustainability class is a police officer, and every day before class we ask him to tell us how his night of policing went. It's obvious this man loves his job. He gets into car chases, breaks up domestic disturbances and fights. He carries a gun and a tazer, but guess what he told us? A cop is more likely to pull his tazer than his gun if he deems it necessary. The police have been instructed to use as little force as necessary, but when people fight pretty damn hard, they're going to receive the necessary force. Just the other day we heard that one of his friends and fellow policemen was shot and killed because he pulled a tazer instead of a gun. The police are there to protect the public, but are given a bad reputation because people don't see their work unless it's being media publicied and usually about brutalities. Police protect people everyday, but they can only protect those people if they're willing to call them in for assistance. Most the time they aren't, as they are frightened of either the cops or if harm will come to them as a result.
I have not researched the adoption and thus am unable to provide an argument for that issue.
As for the homeless, what are some causes of homelessness? Obviously, lack of suitable jobs for people. Lack of shelters for the homeless to turn to, half-way houses to help them turn their lives around. All around, a lack of funding that goes into the homeless. So fix it! Lets pour funding into homeless programs. Let's take half of that 400 million we sent over to Tsunami victems and fix the homeless problem! How? Building shelters and half-way houses, using it to create jobs, create relief programs that gives out food and clothing and blankets, make housing with affordable rates, give them health care and education. At least 20% of homless suffer from mental illness, from retardation to psychosis such as schizophrenic and paranoia. Also, there are addiction disorders, such as drugs and alcohal. There's rehabilitation and institutionization for both of those problems, right? Well... alright. Most of this stems from the problem of poverty, does it not? From a breadwinner in the family dying or losing their job to any number of occurences could cause the family to lose all their material posessions and forced into homelessness. It's not as uncommon as people think.
But... how can you cure poverty? I know that there are going to be several in-depth and valid answers to this one, and guess what: they're all true. As stated at http://www.nationalhomeless.org/, the causes of homelessness is "...from a complex set of circumstances which require people to choose between food, shelter, and other basic needs..." (See 'Causes' section) All of these which cause and in turn are cause by poverty.
But lets think of solutions to this. Take all that money, Where is it going to go first? Imagine this. You choose, say, lowering the cost of living. You are going to have it put into creating housing that is lower in cost for people who can't afford it. First, you have to plan this community, where it's going to be, who's going to help run it, get government permits, as well as for the land you're going to be using cause a piece of property that would normally rent for $500 a month isn't going to go over as well as say $50. Say you get this all taken care of and homeless start moving in. What are you going to do when those who get back on their feet become successful, successful enough to move on and rejoin the rest of society paying regular bills? Are you going to evict them, kick them out? Who's going to set parameters for that, and what would those parameters be? What about people who refuse to join into these homes, and who's to say there's going to be enough for all the homeless that require the housing? As stated by the website again, "...3.5 million people, 1.35 million of them children, are likely to experience homelessness in a given year (Urban Institute 2000)..." (http://www.nationalhomeless.org/numbers.html)
Obviously this is a huge issue. As is it and many others. The point of Sustainability is to bring to light and educate the issues of our modern society and help try to encourage people to think of creative solutions. However, the solutions are not always as straight foreward as JoshyKins stated above. There are innumerable factors you have to take into account, and many of which you probably woulndn't think of without extensive research.
I've seen all kinds of mixed reactions to the US's approach, ranging from indifference to utter joy to complete disgust. My topic is to those who express the disgust, the anger, the confusion, that this country, their country in many cases, is spending so much money on a different country and people when it could be turned and used for ourselves.
I was cruising around in one of the many Tsunami threads out there when I received this reply to my own.
JoshyKins
Noire Nightraine
Xhon
I think you guys are brainwashed. Seriously, America just plucked this money out of it's giant freakin couch. Why couldn't this money, or hell even another 400 mil be put to use on US!? Why can't we save dying AMERICAN children, why does everyone want to adopt homeless Chinese girls instead of homeless American born children? Explain that.
As you can see, JoshyKins is quite angry not only with the Tsunami relief effor, but the way many aspects of American works, relflecting, it seems, on what the people in power of the pocketbooks deem issues and important and their own personal morals and agendas. My question, to most people veterened in some ED, seems like I'm avoiding the issue, that I'm trying to get him to prove what he's saying while I'm going to slam on him with my own opinon and how he's stupid and yadda yadda yadda etc.
Right now I'm enrolled in a course at my university, right here in downtown Portland Oregon (so we share a common ground and I can know where he's coming from) called Pathways to Sustainability and Justice. Though we haven't discussed the tsunami, we HAVE discussed the policeand the homeless. Extensively. In fact, half of last semester we focused on these groups alone, included in there poverty and the enviornment issues.
First, we'll look at the crime rate. First off, it's not the police system that convicts those arrested and charged with crime. It's the judicial system, which is part of the government triad and run by people elected by the people as well as your peers, lawyers and witnesses and juries. It's up to them to convict rightfully or wrongfully who seems guilty until proven innocent and deserving of punishment. However, I can see his anger at the police, especially with murders and deaths. The police force can only intervene when they are informed. One of my professors for my Sustainability class is a police officer, and every day before class we ask him to tell us how his night of policing went. It's obvious this man loves his job. He gets into car chases, breaks up domestic disturbances and fights. He carries a gun and a tazer, but guess what he told us? A cop is more likely to pull his tazer than his gun if he deems it necessary. The police have been instructed to use as little force as necessary, but when people fight pretty damn hard, they're going to receive the necessary force. Just the other day we heard that one of his friends and fellow policemen was shot and killed because he pulled a tazer instead of a gun. The police are there to protect the public, but are given a bad reputation because people don't see their work unless it's being media publicied and usually about brutalities. Police protect people everyday, but they can only protect those people if they're willing to call them in for assistance. Most the time they aren't, as they are frightened of either the cops or if harm will come to them as a result.
I have not researched the adoption and thus am unable to provide an argument for that issue.
As for the homeless, what are some causes of homelessness? Obviously, lack of suitable jobs for people. Lack of shelters for the homeless to turn to, half-way houses to help them turn their lives around. All around, a lack of funding that goes into the homeless. So fix it! Lets pour funding into homeless programs. Let's take half of that 400 million we sent over to Tsunami victems and fix the homeless problem! How? Building shelters and half-way houses, using it to create jobs, create relief programs that gives out food and clothing and blankets, make housing with affordable rates, give them health care and education. At least 20% of homless suffer from mental illness, from retardation to psychosis such as schizophrenic and paranoia. Also, there are addiction disorders, such as drugs and alcohal. There's rehabilitation and institutionization for both of those problems, right? Well... alright. Most of this stems from the problem of poverty, does it not? From a breadwinner in the family dying or losing their job to any number of occurences could cause the family to lose all their material posessions and forced into homelessness. It's not as uncommon as people think.
But... how can you cure poverty? I know that there are going to be several in-depth and valid answers to this one, and guess what: they're all true. As stated at http://www.nationalhomeless.org/, the causes of homelessness is "...from a complex set of circumstances which require people to choose between food, shelter, and other basic needs..." (See 'Causes' section) All of these which cause and in turn are cause by poverty.
But lets think of solutions to this. Take all that money, Where is it going to go first? Imagine this. You choose, say, lowering the cost of living. You are going to have it put into creating housing that is lower in cost for people who can't afford it. First, you have to plan this community, where it's going to be, who's going to help run it, get government permits, as well as for the land you're going to be using cause a piece of property that would normally rent for $500 a month isn't going to go over as well as say $50. Say you get this all taken care of and homeless start moving in. What are you going to do when those who get back on their feet become successful, successful enough to move on and rejoin the rest of society paying regular bills? Are you going to evict them, kick them out? Who's going to set parameters for that, and what would those parameters be? What about people who refuse to join into these homes, and who's to say there's going to be enough for all the homeless that require the housing? As stated by the website again, "...3.5 million people, 1.35 million of them children, are likely to experience homelessness in a given year (Urban Institute 2000)..." (http://www.nationalhomeless.org/numbers.html)
Obviously this is a huge issue. As is it and many others. The point of Sustainability is to bring to light and educate the issues of our modern society and help try to encourage people to think of creative solutions. However, the solutions are not always as straight foreward as JoshyKins stated above. There are innumerable factors you have to take into account, and many of which you probably woulndn't think of without extensive research.
