XPost: talk.religion.buddhism   
   From: ralph@eddlewood.demon.co.uk   
      
   In message , Evelyn   
   Ruut  writes   
      
   >The real culprit is ignorance.   Ignorance gives rise to selfishness.   
   >Selfishness gives rise to all the troubles on earth.   
      
   Is this right, Evelyn? I would have thought that the guy in the BMW was   
   more likely to know about the global problem than the landless peasant,   
   but that doesn't necessarily make him less selfish.   
      
   And isn't the second Noble Truth that human suffering is due to us   
   wanting what we can't have? On this reckoning, the landless peasant   
   would suffer less if he didn't expect to eat, wouldn't he?   
      
   I admire the work the Rotary Clubs do, but it clearly isn't enough to   
   cure the world's ills.   
      
   Humanism seems to me to offer two useful contributions. The first is the   
   acknowledgement that prayer isn't going to fix them, either. If people   
   don't fix them, they won't get fixed. The second is the belief that all   
   humans are valuable, and that we should be concerned for them all.   
      
   Having got that far, the next question is, how? Examining my own   
   behaviour, I conclude that only political action contains a realistic   
   hope. I give money to various charities, and I tend towards those   
   looking to the future, like UNICEF. I find it interesting that the most   
   potent factor in reducing birth rates (because the Beaver is not   
   entirely wrong) is female literacy. But I don't give as much as I   
   should, and if I ask myself why not, selfishness is clearly a reason - I   
   do compare my giving with what I would do with the money otherwise - but   
   I would like to feel that the major reason is the ineffectiveness of the   
   charities.   
      
   Governments, and especially groups like the G8, can amass funds (from   
   us) and can mount programmes that can make a difference. Individuals   
   like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet can do likewise. I can't choose not to   
   pay my taxes, and I have no control over how they are spent. So I do   
   exhort my political masters to do good things for the world.   
      
   The main reason that politicians in rich countries don't do more to help   
   is that they fear they may not get re-elected, so I do believe that is   
   something useful I can do - that  we can all do. And the louder we   
   campaign about it, the more true it becomes.   
      
   The other major thing I campaign about is happiness. If governments   
   tried to make their people happy, things would improve. As long as they   
   remain (and we remain) obsessed by growth, the world's problems will get   
   worse. We can't (and shouldn't try) to stop less developed economies   
   growing, but we should not be trying to make ours gruw. There just isn't   
   enough planet. It has been demonstrated quite rigorously that growth   
   (after about $15,000) does not increase happihess, so there's no real   
   point in it.   
      
   --   
   ralph   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)