Is there a moral obligation for extreme poverty?

[Captain Cardio]

The majority of people in the western world are aware of the extreme poverty faced by the billion+ people in underdeveloped countries, even if they cannot cite the statistics of the link below.

Extreme poverty - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(incase the link doesn't work, this is ' Extreme Poverty ' typed into wikipedia)

If you check a few sources, you'll usually find that the listed statistic for average % income given away by people in the western world is between 0.5 and 4%.

My question is this; is it possible to be moral and still buy comparatively trivial things for ourselves (ie iPods, nice cars, big houses, other luxuries)
when we could be giving our money to help innocent people end the cycle of struggling for necessities?

If not, are we obligated to do nothing less than absolutely everything that we can, if we are to really be good people? Is our society morally repugnant?

If there is a middle ground, at what point can a person be absolved, and why?

[Captain Cardio]

Nobody want to take this one on?

[nilan3000]

Coming from a devoloping country myself, I find this an interesting question because I dont support the view that the western world has to feel the 'moral' need to help devoloping countries.

I feel that what they do with money is their business. If someone told me that it was immoral of westerners to not help the east, I would say that it is even more immoral to strip someone's cash off him.

I agree that westerners will not have to lose a lot by contributing to the solving of the poverty problem (the exchange rate does wonders), but I must say that it is their right to do what they want with their money and using 'morality' as a basis is something I would be uncomfortable with.

[LordCaelvan]

I am inclined to think that while Westerners (herin refered to as Americans, as it is us who I feel are the true personifiers of greed and waste in the world) don't need to give all of their income to developing countries, at the same time I feel as though any person who has the "I earned it, I can waste it" philosophy should be ashamed of themselves.

Often times people don't realize just how wasteful they are, or what little they would have to change to greatly reduce the resources that they consume. A good example is in cars. No one should feel bad about not being able to afford a super fuel efficiant car, but at the same time they have no buisness warming up their Hummer for twenty minutes every morning.

Waste is unethical. If the average American cut down their waste output by 300%, and decreased their acerage/person use tenfold, then they would still be living incredibly inneficiant lives compared to many other parts of the world. However, I wouldn't call them bad people as long as they are trying genuinly their hardest to live sustainable lives.

[Slevin57]

I don't think anyone deserves to starve while their is enough food for everyone.

However, I don't think the "average westerner" is capable of delivering that food to poverty stricken people. I think it is the duty of our governments to aid these countries, which we do.

The United States gives out more aid than any other country in the history of the world. But it goes largely un-talked about.

When they do mention it, they will tell you it's taken by the government. Yes, some of it is taken by the governments, however, most of it does get to the villages.

Unfortunately our efforts are not enough. It will take a global effort to dent this poverty. A global effort it seems no one is willing to make, because let's face it, those people do not affect our standards of living.

[Alive]

No, I don't think it's moral to buy ipods etc. when the money could be better used. We can give a lot of excuses, but ipods simply aren't as morally valuable as people's lives.

Still, I bought an ipod. I'm an admittedly immoral person. Our moral senses didn't evolve nearly as strongly as our selfish ones, sadly.

[Epistemologist]

I think most people in the so-called "first world" () aren't morally giving their money to the so-called "third world" ().

That is, they aren't sincere. They have ulterior motives, e.g. advancing their own culture with religious missions and other things, flaunting their culture's supposed wealth by making others beg and be submissive, loudly proclaiming to all others about how altruistic they are (really pseudo-altruism), give because it's the fashionable thing to do, wear a trendy wristband, etc., etc., etc.

So really, in this situation, I think it's much more moral to not do anything at all than to give without real purpose. And someone with real purpose is extremely rare in my observation.

[Alive]

I disagree, Epid. I think a lot of people do give based on their moral beliefs. Even if there are sometimes other things mixed in. The feeling of helping people is nice, we like it. Most people generally are good people. We're just even more inclined to selfishness.

It's a nice excuse, though--everyone else has ulterior motives when giving, so I can feel good and honest about not giving myself. Like I said, we have a lot of excuses.

[Epistemologist]

Ah, then it's that rush, that good feeling, that motivates giving, and not care for the people themselves. Ha, maybe I'm being a bit too cynical here. When I say it's more moral to not give than to give pseudo-altruistically, though, I don't say that giving is totally bad. Of course, to sincerely help another out is great.

But you can't approach it systematically and force yourself to "care," you sort of miss the point. That's what I see nowadays with mindless volunteers casting dollars into pots and waving their colorful, wristband-covered arms for the whole world to see. It's the same insincerity that I unfortunately see in other aspects of life as well.

To many ethicists, though, it's the product--not the intentions--that really count. I disagree though.

[Mia]

What about people here in the US? There are children going to bed hungry right here.

My aunt does one of those Save the children foundations. She researched one where the money actually goes to the kids. Also, she sponsors a kid to go to private school (only way in his country to go to college) for $500/year.

That $500/year will change an entire family once he is through with school. I think if everyone did something along those lines, helped one person at a time achieve a goal to become self-sufficient, or just to eat....I don't want to sound cheesy but it would really make a difference..

If their governments would stop stealing all their resources, that would help even more.

[Alive]

Quote by: Epistemologist Ah, then it's that rush, that good feeling, that motivates giving, and not care for the people themselves.

Well, I think the good feeling comes from caring for people. But who cares? It is right to do moral things even if your motives are not purely moral, no? The people on the other side don't care why you are helping them so much as that you are.

Guilt is another pretty strong motivater.

It's hard to distinguish "moral feelings" from "feelings connected to moral action" such that you can say, this feeling is a justified reason to be moral, this feeling is not. I'm wondering where you would draw the classifying line. You seemed to indicate that "care for the people themselves" is a valid reason, but not a general feeling of goodwill. Is that a fair characterization of your view?

To many ethicists, though, it's the product--not the intentions--that really count. I disagree though.

I think it matters more to a starving person that they get food than that the person who gave them the food gave it because they got a rush or a wristband.

I agree, though, on one level--just giving money to feel good and not because it actually is good is a problem. Wealth needs to be used in the right manner to be effective, and you need to care on a stronger level than just giving relieves me of guilt or makes others think higher of me in order to have incentive to use it in the most effective manner.

[Technosoul]

To begin with I would question the notion that a place such as Africa is a "developing country"... that place and it's culture has been around for as long as we have fosil records. How long does it take to "develope" anyway? And developing what ... blood diamonds?

The poverty in such a place is mostly due to bad weather and mostly due to very bad governmental managment in Africa. No organization from the top brass. What they need is some governemental leaders who are sharp about business ideas and who actually are looking for ways to improve poverty standards for the people under their official-dom. And they need to boot out those who traffic in weapons... so all those poor people cannot buy those expensive machine guns and run around in jeeps killing all their neighbors off. Get organized and overcome anarchy.

If they were deveoloping and moving towards becoming a hard working sensible country then fine... lend them a hand. And even if not we should try to aid those innocent ones who are the victims of that whole historical system based on "being the best savage in your area" mentality. Sorry... but what I have seen in news reports has demonstrated that those in control still act like savages. Perhaps they need a good dose of good old style American religion so they can stop those tribal wars. I don't know if that is the answer or not. But if we saw them acting with compassion towards their own neighbors we would have more compassion to help them from outside their country.

The point being is that providing food out of mercy is not enough because of the over-all situation happening there. And yet we cannot provide them with a government or task force to create gun control or and such thing, as that would be "occupation" and then the U.N. would get on our case for trying to "take over" a countries' government.

So we get stuck in this rut of trying to help people who are enslaved to poverty by thier won corupt governments or by their local "gangs". And no end in site to resolve that problem (as far as I know). Which is as bad as trying to make President Bush to "go Green" for us.

They lack the right attitudes as well as food and other needed resources. But what can be done to bring about the "total solution".

[tman_ndsu08]

Quote by: Captain Cardio My question is this; is it possible to be moral and still buy comparatively trivial things for ourselves (ie iPods, nice cars, big houses, other luxuries) when we could be giving our money to help innocent people end the cycle of struggling for necessities?

This argument is nothing more than general utilitarianism.


The simple defense goes something like "there are millions of people dying right now because they can't get organ transplants, if we kill only a small number of people and give their organs to others, we can save many more people, for a net gain".


But obviously that is not a moral thing to do.



I think basically it comes down to this: it is not immoral for a person to decide not to decrease their own pleasure to increase the pleasure of someone else.


If you choose to do it, that's a nice thing for you to do.


But you're not immoral for choosing not to.

[tman_ndsu08]

Also, I think you have to ask yourself this:


What did their forefathers do so drastically different from our forefathers that caused them to be in the situation that they are now?

[Athena]

Quote by: Captain Cardio The majority of people in the western world are aware of the extreme poverty faced by the billion+ people in underdeveloped countries, even if they cannot cite the statistics of the link below. Extreme poverty - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (incase the link doesn't work, this is ' Extreme Poverty ' typed into wikipedia) If you check a few sources, you'll usually find that the listed statistic for average % income given away by people in the western world is between 0.5 and 4%. My question is this; is it possible to be moral and still buy comparatively trivial things for ourselves (ie iPods, nice cars, big houses, other luxuries) when we could be giving our money to help innocent people end the cycle of struggling for necessities? If not, are we obligated to do nothing less than absolutely everything that we can, if we are to really be good people? Is our society morally repugnant? If there is a middle ground, at what point can a person be absolved, and why?

The book "Abandon Abundance", asks to live simply so that others may simply live. I think most people would accept a moral obligation it they could not so easily be unaware or choose denial.

For example one of the most immoral things we do, is contribute to world hunger in a few ways. One of them is the global warming issue. But another is the world bank makes loans to poor countries that then have to use their crops to pay off the loan, instead of feed their people. This is just wrong, and I find it very unpleasant to read the post that are careless of other people's lives and suffering.

[Athena]

Quote by: tman_ndsu08 Also, I think you have to ask yourself this: What did their forefathers do so drastically different from our forefathers that caused them to be in the situation that they are now?

There are huge environmental differences that lead people in different parts of the world in different directions. This is one of things that was taught we when had liberal education. Our apparentally immoral judgement at this time is, due largely to our ignorance. And I will point out this means to ignore something. Plenty of people argue their opinion without making an effort to be well informed. But when education leaves people completely unprepared for getting some forms of information, we need to blame the education system, not the people subject to it. Education that leaves people dependent on authority and is preparing them to serve the industrial/military complex, results in immoral masses, and that is the New World Order.

[Osborn F Enready]

Captain Cardio said: Nobody want to take this one on?

Few people have integrity in line with their claimed morals, beliefs and ideals.

I strive everyday to be closer to mine, and it isn't easy.

Integrity is a word more people should learn, and attempt to achieve.

I don't see world problems as my own in the sense being implied, but we all, if we seek respect, should strive for integrity.

Integrity is action based on a consistent framework of principles.

How many people claim to be relgious, but wholesale ignore their religious "claims" until they stand in church, or before their pastor, father, or whatever?

[nilan3000]

Quote by: tman_ndsu08 What did their forefathers do so drastically different from our forefathers that caused them to be in the situation that they are now?

Your forefathers had the luxury of creating a nation when the world had already seen civilisation. Places like India and China for example, were great empires once for thousands of years. The European and American Empires are relatively new in comparison with them.

In time, a new country might grow to dominate the world and the USA might be pushed to second place. Its happened with every other great nation before, it can always happen again, though not too soon.

[Captain Cardio]

"tman_ndsu08 said:

This argument is nothing more than general utilitarianism. The simple defense goes something like "there are millions of people dying right now because they can't get organ transplants, if we kill only a small number of people and give their organs to others, we can save many more people, for a net gain". But obviously that is not a moral thing to do. .

"

I agree, that isn't a moral thing to do.

If people were convinced that the ends justifies the means in this sense, the mess this would cause in society would be much more complex than your example delves into. No one could be so sure about the consequences of their actions, that the total effect of them murdering a healthy organ donor would actually be a net good. To name a couple things somebody planning like that hasnt considered: Life-long scars resulting in friends and family of those killed; even depression and suicide. Poverty might result if the deceased organ donor had been a source of income for a household. In the case where we are talking about this scenario being considered by an individual rather than society, investigations would take place. (Assuming the 'utilitarian' didn't turn himself in, so he could repeat this act of self-assessed goodness) This would mean a larger workload for law enforcement agencies, other crimes not intended by the 'utilitarian' murderer might go unpunished, or tax payer money that has to come from somewhere else important in society would help fund the investigation. A good person could wrongfully be found guilty of the crime and sentenced. I'm sure there are several more things we could come with. In this situation, killing healthy organ donors couldn't be the right action, because that line of reasoning has so many unavoidable, unintended consequences, and leaves it very difficult to determine the actual ends for the means.

However I don't think my original scenario is general utilitarianism. It is not suggesting that it is always right to do actions that result in the greatest good. Your example with the organ transplants is an interesting argument against utilitarianism, but is not appropriate in this situation.

We are not talking about taking any actions that harm people against their will, even for the greater good, as we would be in your killing people for net lives example. We are talking about the chosen sacrifice of one's own luxuries, to the cost of no one but the person deciding.

To take the murder aspect out of the equation you could say: it is immoral for any healthy person to live, knowing that they could give up their life so many people could live through their organs.

(note: This should include that the person considering their own morality believes that there is no better way to save the most lives or stop the most suffering; that giving up their organs is the very best they could do. Someone thinking like that, should consider that if they lived their life in a simple, charitable way, their lifetime of donated money to humanitarian organizations would probably save many more lives than their organs alone could. It could also have a spillover positive effect, making friends and family more charitable than they would be otherwise, by setting an example for them to donate their money. One could do this by showing how one can be very happy, if not happier, by living simply, charitably, and not giving in to a (albeit debatable) happiness=money epidemic. If you were able to discover who needed your organs though, you could make an informed decision about whos life would do the greater good. A situation could exist where you know your organs could save the life of somebody much more capable at earning income, who has shown in the past that they are just as commited to the idea of the greater good as you.)

This a bit more reasonable, (refering to the paragraph above the note) as it is not advocating to those who claim to be utilitarian, the murder of healthy organ donors. It still however, does not reflect the original argument.

In this case, the whole organ idea, has taken the idea of giving up small things so that others may live and not suffer, and warping the ratio of personal cost to others gain. In the original argument, nobody is required to give up their life, or dedicate their life to philatrophy. We are taking about minor decreases in satisfaction for reductions in suffering and death. It should be noted that there is an inherent value to most people, of knowing their money has gone to a good cause. The idea of giving up an iPod might not actually be giving up much, if any satisfaction. It could be only mistaken assessment of the situation, that people DO buy iPods and not give that money to charity, even from self-interest point of view.

(note: I haven't heard of people who say they regret giving money to charity. It's possible if they plan their finances terribly I spose.)

"tman_ndsu08 said:

I think basically it comes down to this: it is not immoral for a person to decide not to decrease their own pleasure to increase the pleasure of someone else If you choose to do it, that's a nice thing for you to do. But you're not immoral for choosing not to

"

In the case of extreme poverty, we aren't talking about giving up pleasure to give pleasure to someone else. We are talking about giving up pleasure, to save lives and end pain difficult to imagine. Those receiving benefits of donation may feel happy, but the important thing is that they aren't suffering.

(this is only my interpretation) I kind of see your thought line here as taking these people as if they were innately ok, as if it was a measure of who has the most happiness points. example: I have 856. Impoverished child has 34. This is as if the starting point was 0. Like the child is ok, just not great. I think it is more of a negative positive scenario. If we are living in western society, maybe my happiness is +400 whereas an impoverished child would have -300. The capacity of the human brain to experience subjective positive and negative feelings might be different from either of these scenarios. It could be that we can only ever be so happy, but relative to the level of unhappiness we can expierience, this happiness is only mildly above the 'ok' line. It could be that we have been built (by god or evolution - not touching that one) to avoid bad conditions by experiencing pain, but once we have all our needs satisfied, we reach a plateau. This would result in something like: My happiness is +40 (say the max a person can be is +100 in euphoria). Impoverished child's happiness is -300 (say the least a person can be is -500 under torture. If this were the case, my giving up of an plasma screen tv (ignoring that i might be happy that I helped somebody) might reduce my happiness by say, 5 or 20, but might raise the happiness of an impoverished child by 310 or even more than that, given that they have the vividness of their previous circumstances to help them appreciate how great it is to now have necessities.

Regardless of where our opinion lies on the issue of western luxuries vs poverty necessities. I think it is important that we not assume that our society is moral. Not too long ago, it was normal for those who considered themselves to be good to have slaves, and for the most part were just going along with what everyone else was doing. If citizens in our western society are acting morally, or immorally, we cannot simply think they are one way or the other, we must know why.

[PatrickHenry]

How about challenging each other to at least do something?

Support a World Vision kid, work for a food bank, donate to a walkathon?

Or just about anything for someone besides yourself and your own family?