Real Life

28 Responses to “Real Life”

1. The Raccoon on April 29th, 2007 4:26 pm

   Heh. The “exploiting” bit is what galls me about this piece.

   The West is not “exploiting” the rest of the world - the world is exploiting itself, but the West manages not to squander everything it gains.

   I toyed with the notion of zero-sum economics… but later I realized it’s a fallacy

2. Drima on April 29th, 2007 4:48 pm

   I agree with you Raccoon even if not entirely. If the corrupt leaders of poor countries actually took half of the cash they’re hiding away in their Swiss bank accounts and spent it on their *own* people, things would change dramatically. So yes, in a lot of cases the rest of the world is exploiting itself. However Blood Diamond tells the other side of the story.

3. Aaron in South Sudan on April 29th, 2007 5:13 pm

   Raccoon,

   I’m going to have to disagree with you there, not that corruption isn’t crippling countries like Sudan and other would be developing countries in Africa. Looking at how trade laws are structured or institutions like World Bank, WTO and the IMF operate I can’t help but conclude that the scales are tipped to favor the rich nations that hold all of the bargaining power. I fail to see how the poor coffee farmer that ends up selling his crops for less than it costs to grow it is exploiting himself.

   If Western nations and other governments didn’t do business with corrupt oppressive governments things would get better. If there isn’t money flooding in from the west to line these people’s pockets then there would have to be a new way of doing things. I’m not speaking as an naive idealist that believes that these things will happen. But the way that systems are in place right now are to feed the ever hungry mouths of Western consumers for things that they want provided but don’t really want to think about where they come from.

   Aaron

4. Roman Kalik on April 29th, 2007 5:28 pm

   *shrug* Dictators don’t need trade with the West to survive, as numerous trade embargoes proved over the decades. All they need is fear, and fear is not bought or sold.

   Yeah, there are two sides to this story. Numerous corporations play dirty. But at the end of the day, you can develop your country while being a supplier. Easily. It all depends on how *your* laws are structured.

   And the world economic system has plenty of ladders developing nations can climb. Look at Israel.

5. Roman Kalik on April 29th, 2007 5:52 pm

   Take care of your state’s markets, and they develop. Form trade consortiums with other supplier states and you get better prices all around. Focus on education and join the technology industry.

   This would require leaders that care about the people as a whole rather than just a few families. That’s all there is to it.

6. Aaron in South Sudan on April 29th, 2007 6:05 pm

   Roman,

   With the way that the WTO operates with their so called free markets the only ones that stand to benefit in the long run are corporations and companies that can push their products into developing markets tariff free. These newly liberalized markets move into dependency and local business is destroyed. One of many many examples would be agriculture.

   If a country can’t feed itself it won’t be self reliant. Agriculture gives stability to people, when food security isn’t an issue your time opens up to pursue other areas of growth. My country is the WORST example of this. Subsidized farming and exports that are produced at a loss leave local agriculture in developing countries in shambles. Small business and individual families can’t survive in this market much less compete.

   Never mind the fact that this specific practice was agreed upon by the rich nations as contrary to development in poorer countries and was to be stopped. Of course excuse after excuse have kept the West from fulfilling their commitments while the poor nations with little choice left to them have honored their end of the agreements they signed up for.

   Like I said this is one offense in a long list.

   Also giving Israel as an example for independent growth is like saying Germany and Japan rebuilt themselves after the war. Not that this is a bad thing but I believe it’s a poor analogy.

   Aaron

7. Andrew Brehm on April 29th, 2007 6:21 pm

   “I come from a country that makes up just 5% of the world’s population and yet we consume around 50% of the natural resources”

   No wonder, since the US and other western countries produces most of what the rest of the world consumes. Without the west producing pollution and using natural resources, this world would be a much sader place.

   What I would find interesting is whether the US use more natural resources per production unit than other countries. It’s easy to import everything from the US and then complain that the US shows symptoms of producing all those goods.

   “Close to 60% of the world’s population lives on less than two dollars a day.”

   And the reason they live is, again, the west. The west produces the medicines that keep people alive, the security that keeps people from killing each other (although that often fails, especially when the UN get involved), and the food that is brought to regions that don’t have adequate food production.

   The question is, how much better off would the world be if there were no people living on less than two dollars a day? Of course, the alternative is that these people would not be alive.

   Should the situation improve? I think so, obviously. But I’m afraid improving the situation requires more consumerism, more pollution, and more resources.

   You cannot get anybody to produce more for other people without giving them a greater share of the produced goods.

8. Andrew Brehm on April 29th, 2007 6:23 pm

   “Also giving Israel as an example for independent growth”

   I think his point was that nobody is independent. Any country could have done what Israel did. The Jews are not that special.

   The Arabs do not even notice that they could be just as rich and influential as Israel, if they had chosen to improve their lot rather than bring down the Jews.

9. Aaron in South Sudan on April 29th, 2007 6:52 pm

   Andrew,

   You lost me here.

   “the security that keeps people from killing each other (although that often fails, especially when the UN get involved), ”

   The fact that you’re implying that conflicts fail more when the UN gets involved is silly at best. However I don’t want to start debating the UN, I’m merely point out that this is one of a few outlandish statements from your post that caused me to ignore everything that you wrote.

   Aaron

10. The Raccoon on April 29th, 2007 6:59 pm

    *sigh*

    Gentlemen, let us leave the Jooooz out of it, shall we?

    And Aaron… Africa is rich beyond imagining - in human power, in water, in soil, in minerals, in oil, in everything. Most African states could have incredibly successful autarchic markets if they actually developed themselves and kind of ignored the rest of the world.

    They don’t. They prefer to fight each other, sell their riches for cheap, destroy what little infrastructure they have, mess up the bounty their land gives them… Yes, the West is making use of this incredible stupidity. But then again, if people would come to you and sell you, I don’t know, the very best cars for 2$, would you say no?

    It’s easy to blame the West.

11. Andrew Brehm on April 29th, 2007 7:14 pm

    “The fact that you’re implying that conflicts fail more when the UN gets involved is silly at best.”

    Really? Did you have a look at the Rwanda and Bosnia conflicts?

    “However I don’t want to start debating the UN, I’m merely point out that this is one of a few outlandish statements from your post that caused me to ignore everything that you wrote.”

    Yes, I was going to mention that I thought that you seem to be ignoring too much.

12. Roman Kalik on April 29th, 2007 8:12 pm

    *shrugs again*

    I do believe we survived somehow prior to 1973, Aaron. It was only then that we became a US ally. And we weren’t piss-poor either. Learn from that.

    As for true prosperity, it is impossible on your own. That’s the thing about trade, it takes at least two. Mutual dependency is the key. And another point, ideas are endless commodity. We were smart to focus on that.

13. howie on April 30th, 2007 1:56 pm

    You know…I am a very unpatriotic guy…until I read stuff like this…then I get annoyed…

    Aaron sounds like my son the UCLA student…

    If the USA didn’t do business with corrupt countries…well…then we would have trade with Canada and that would be that.

    If the USA didn’t support dictatorships…then we hang out with Europe and Canada and Israel and the world calls us racists.

    Pollution? The biggest polluters in the world right now are probably India and China…even here in California part of our bad air is blown over from those to countries who have almost no anti-pollution laws..anybody want to drink a little holy Ganges water?

    Big cooporations are not terribly moral…and without them…the world goes under. How did you get to Sudan Aaron…walked? Even horses and camels can be huge polluters by the way…as can people if we don’t have large greedy cooporations installing water treatments facilities.

    I don’t think Africa has much room lecturing the United States about moral behavior.

    I do strongly agree about materialism…it is overdone, gaudy, and ultimately empty.

    But you know….we have to FIGHT to keep people OUT…while many countries in the world fight to keep people IN. There lies an enormous difference…though we still remain one the biggest refuges for oppressed people…though 9-11 certainly changed that.

    It is a less than perfect system…but I would rather live someplace where I can vote, move about, write what I want, practice the religion I want, experience minimal bigotry, see balance of power, have a free press, see people from every religion and walk of life out on the street and often together, see a new immigrant, like my friend Jose…start as a dishwasher and end up being able to retire at 45…because he had opportunities Mexico would not afford him…

    The USA has lots of problems…like anyplace where there are hunams…but the key is that we have check and balances, rights and freedoms…up to us…not up to some glorious piece of shit furher.

14. howie on April 30th, 2007 2:56 pm

    Aaron-

    I should add…as a guy in my twenties into my 30’s, I thought a whole lot like you…and much of your idealism is good…but as you go along, you see how much more corrupt and complex the world is…much more than you currently think.

    I even did the Peace Crops type thing, working in a prison with addicts…think I saw Raccoon there.

    You are trying to to good…most folks don’t get too interested in that…I still do.

15. Rihab on April 30th, 2007 7:50 pm

    If Western nations and other governments didn’t do business with corrupt oppressive governments things would get better.

    Not really, and I’ll use Sudan here as an example. Compare Sudan in the 1990s, when Western nations and other governments didn’t do business with its corrupt and oppressive government and Sudan in the 1970s when it received a lot of investment from Gulf Arab countries, as well as loans from the U.S, the European Community, and China. Out of both, which period showed better economic performance and the start of large scale agricultural projects throughout Sudan?? Sudan’s economic problems didn’t come about as a result of countries “doing business with it”, they came about as a result of bad political decisions (e.g. the September laws which triggered the civil war between North & South Sudan), as well as economic mismanagement by the government during the 1980s. Sudan’s economy only started to get re-energised in the late 90s when we started exporting oil, and started to liberalize the economy to attract foreign investors. There is still a lot of political corruption and economic mismanagement, and a lot of improvement is needed, especially within the agricultural sector but truth be told, trading with other countries has improved people’s lives in Sudan, and yes I’m aware of the fact that it hasn’t improved everyone’s life but it has improved it for a lot of people, and as a result of that Sudan’s government is and will be under more pressure to improve it for more people.

    Cutting off relations with corrupt governments may do a lot to ease people’s conscience but in reality it doesn’t do all that much to help the people in those countries. “Africa” (which by the way is a continent that has countries experiencing varying levels of development) is almost always used by people to show what good Samaritans they are. I do prefer having a corporation such as ZTE Corp investing in “Africa” and starting up training centres to equip the locals with better skills, over economic isolation and food from the sky - investing in people is far more beneficial for them and for their countries than isolation & pity.

16. Howie on April 30th, 2007 9:46 pm

    Ribah-

    Give a man a fish…he eats for a day

    Teach a man to fish…he eats everyday

    Teach a man to havest fish…he starts an industry and feeds many

    Get a man married…he jumps in the ocean and feeds the fish.

17. Roman Kalik on April 30th, 2007 10:11 pm

    Howie, t’is the circle of life, indeed.

18. Howie on April 30th, 2007 10:21 pm

    On a more serious note…I agree with Rihab…The economy is very global and, unless you have a super rouge…it is tough to pick and choose and also, as he notes, often does Joe Lunchbox more harm than good.

    Runaway materialism is despicable….like any extreme…but a whole lot of good comes with progress and developement too.

    I remember when my kid was very ill and I spent a couple of months inside one of the Children’s Hospitals. Place was backed with a whole lot of folk that did not look very American to me…in fact I gave an illegal alien several hundred dollars to bury his son back in Mexico…Those folks were there not just for the freebies…but because they knew “materialism” and “capitalism” also tend to bring out the best through competition, investment, incentives etc.

    To me…it mostly comes down to how people choose to act within the context they find or put themselves into. There is NOTHING inherently righteous about poor or indigenous people though some tend to romantize them.

    It is like the story of Moshe Dyan, back in the 50’s picking up this new immigrant from Yemen. Dude was hitchiking in the desert. Dyan asked the guy about his impressions of finally making it to the holy land etc.

    Dude says, “hey doesn’t this car have A/C and a radio?”

19. JMac on May 1st, 2007 6:07 am

    I think the US needs to be more responsible with demanding satisfactory working conditions from countries we buy from. This should be our responsibility. We provide demand and as Aaron said

    “close to 60% of the world’s population lives on less than two dollars a day”

    We should bear responsibility for that demand, realizing that we create conflict and corruption in other countries. US consumerism makes me ill. I wish folks here realized how foolish it really is; how insecure.
    I don’t know what the answer is, until people become self-conscious about what they are buying, what they are consuming, where it comes from, where it goes when we throw it away. People in America generally don’t ask these questions (some do!) There’s just so much waste here. We certainly have a long way to go.

20. Finnpundit on May 1st, 2007 9:12 am

    I’m sure Aaron is a nice guy, and I don’t intend to demean him, but it just seems that his kind of moralizing sounds a lot like the kind Christian missionaries and Islamic jihadists like to preach.

    What’s disturbing is that there is an undertone of moral superiority in this kind of talk: one that condemns the profligate lifestyles of others, and extols the virtues of more “pious” living.

    These kinds of people are usually the first ones to suggest that the freedom of choice of others should be curtailed in favor of their kind of morality.

21. Andrew Brehm on May 1st, 2007 10:48 am

    How many people in Africa would die of disease, especially AIDS, if it wasn’t for western capitalism and the medicines it produces?

22. Roman Kalik on May 1st, 2007 12:54 pm

    By the way, great reply, Rihab. Many people fail to see that the best charity is helping remove the need for it.

23. Drima on May 1st, 2007 1:43 pm

    “Many people fail to see that the best charity is helping remove the need for it.”

    That’s exactly what I believe and it is also one of the main reasons I’m a passionate, struggling and aspiring entrepreneur.

    There’s a story or a hadith if I remember correctly about an old poor man who approached Prophet Muhammad and asked for charity. The Prophet told the old man that he was in good physical shape and that he shouldn’t ask for charity but instead find some work to do to earn a living. So the Prophet took the old man, bought him an axe from the market, gave it to him and pointed him towards the direction of trees that grow on an open land that was owned by no one. Eventually he was able to support himself financially by selling fire wood from the trees he chopped down with the axe Prophet Muhammad bought for him.

    Start companies and create jobs for the jobless. That’s better than handing out donations.

24. Roman Kalik on May 1st, 2007 3:33 pm

    A very wise hadith.

    Charity is important, but it can also destroy people. People can end up believing that charity is their lot in life, that they’re worthless and can’t do better…

25. Andrew Brehm on May 1st, 2007 8:07 pm

    Occasionally the real Islam re-appears…

26. The Raccoon on May 1st, 2007 11:04 pm

    “I even did the Peace Crops type thing, working in a prison with addicts…think I saw Raccoon there. ”

    Hey, I resent that!

    *pouts*

27. Finnpundit on May 2nd, 2007 3:37 am

    I agree with Roman Kalik: Rihab’s post is a great reply.

    I do prefer having a corporation such as ZTE Corp investing in “Africa” and starting up training centres to equip the locals with better skills, over economic isolation and food from the sky - investing in people is far more beneficial for them and for their countries than isolation & pity.

    I think one of the great failures of European foreign policy is that hundreds of billions in foreign aid (charity) has been spent on Africa, yet the results have been so dismal. The fact that Europeans still want to continue this kind of policy implies that another political operative is at work. That operative is simply the self-preservation of European, ethnically-based welfare states that want to shield themselves (through trade barriers) from cheap African products that threaten the status quo of the welfare state.

    The foul aspect of this kind of policy really comes into focus when we realize that foreign aid is just enabling a corrupt elite to hold power in various African recipient states, destroying any chances for the poor to even get a toe-hold in economic advancement.

    The only real counterforce for this kind of perversion… is the globalized, international corporation that seeks to exploit opportunities wherever they may be. Of course, this is anathema for people like our friend Aaron, yet it is the force of globalization that provides the real antidote against the damaging effects of foreign aid.

28. Andrew Brehm on May 2nd, 2007 1:15 pm

    “That operative is simply the self-preservation of European, ethnically-based welfare states that want to shield themselves (through trade barriers) from cheap African products that threaten the status quo of the welfare state.”

    Indeed.

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