Haiti

Hi everyone,

After the devastation Haiti has experienced over the past few weeks, I am sure everyone as I have, has seen countless stories on the news, or read in the papers, about the continued hardship. The earthquake left the country devastated and had far-reaching effects that expand into education, various social services, secure housing and food, virtually all basic needs are struggling to be met. In spite of this, I have seen people on facebook posting messages that read, "Have you heard about Clearasil's new product? It's called "Haitian Earthquake". It's guaranteed to wipe out 200,000 blackheads in one use". Another one reads, "Oh America: the only country where we have homeless without shelter, children going to bed without eating, elderly going without needed meds, and mentally ill without treatment- yet we have a benefit for the people of Haiti on 12 TV stations. 99% of people won't have the guts to copy and repost this." I have also seen messages "reminding" everyone that "no one helped us after Hurricane Katrina". My response to this is confusion, sadness, and pure shock.

I was appalled at the fact that people honestly post messages like this without considering what is actually going on in the world and with very little compassion. The first, which I am sure was considered to be a joke, is beyond inappropriate in the face of such a huge disaster. The earthquake that hit Haiti could have just as easily been somewhere in the United States, as we have seen from devastation such as hurricane Katrina. The United States, and really no country is immune to natural disaster. Haiti was probably harder hit due to the temporary nature of many structures. This should only draw attention to the fact that we should be working harder towards bringing ALL people up to a standard of living where they can meet their basic needs and have some safe and security. Of course, this wouldn't have stopped the earthquake from happening, but it may have left Haiti better able to withstand the disaster and the chaos that has followed.

As to the second statement, it is just blatantly inaccurate. Yes, the United States does have homeless, we do have hungry children, trouble accessing healthcare, among countless other problems. However, it is nowhere near as severe as it is in the majority of the "third world". Add to that, my first thought when I saw that message, was, "you know even if we had a telethon or benefit to solve all of our own problems (which we often do), would the American people be as willing to give?" Everyone seems so concerned about the amount of taxes they pay, about the wrong people getting welfare, about helping out your neighbor a little too much... honestly, it all overwhelms me. As you can see from the amount of money raised for Haiti, the American people are far from selfish. Even during extremely hard times and at a period of very high national debt, we still managed to raise an enormous amount of money for Haiti. My point is: this is the way it SHOULD be. The better off regardless of where you live should think about our common humanity and rise to the occasion of helping those in need. We should be setting an example. Using arguments such as, "no one helped us" isn't going to build a world community where we come to the aid of the countries most in need (including when it happens to be the United States that needs the help). Any one of us could have just as easily been born somewhere like Haiti, or had a disaster like this affect us at home in the United States, and lucky for us, it didn't. We should be proud that in spite of the own problems we have in the United States, we stepped up and did our best to help those in need. I certainly am, although people spouting messages like the above, make me feel ashamed. We are lucky beyond measure.

Even countries such as Botswana, Morocco, Indonesia, and countless others gave in excess of one million dollars to aid Haiti. Check out this link:

http://awesome.good.is/transparency/web/1001/haitian-aid/flash.html to see which countries have given what amounts (it is a bit dated since it was as of Jan 19 and I am sure there is something more recent out there, but for these purposes, this should do).

I don't normally use my blog to rant, but after reading daily about the strife Haitians are facing, and seeing messages like this, I had to get it off my chest. Below is a link from the New York Times about the children of Haiti.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/27/world/americas/27children.html?pagewanted=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

I hope that Haiti is able to reconstruct a stronger more stable state after this disaster, and I would be proud if the United States helped them do so.

My love to all.