Saving lives, an obligation?

[Dodo25]

In his book 'The Life You Can Save', Peter Singer argues that giving to charities is an ethical obligation, and that one shouldn't donate anonymously but instead go public about donating because it motivates others to do the same.

A summary of the argument can be viewed here: http://www.thelifeyoucansave.com/

He basically asks whether we would save a child from drowning in a pond, even if it ruined our expensive shoes. And then he points out that children are dying easily preventable deaths all the time, not next to us in a pond but in Africa and Asia, and we have the means to help. And it's not just about saving lives, one can also greatly improve people's quality of life, i.e. curing blindness or chronic diseases, or educating them so they can make a living without having to go hungry all the time.

Obviously not all charities are useful, some have been found to be a hundred times more effective than others. Here an independent assessment: http://www.givewell.org/

Is someone who spends millions on a new house without donating significant amounts acting 'immoral', because he could be almost or just as happy in a normal house and use the rest of the money to help people that really need help? What I find really astonishing about Singers argumentation is that we wouldn't even have to abandon everything luxury-related to end world poverty. The money Americans annually spend on booze would almost cut world poverty in half!

It really alters one's way of thinking. What are your thoughts?

[The Atheist]

It really alters one's way of thinking.

Didn't alter mine in any way, but I'm a lot more cynical than you. I'm pleased it changed yours, and hope like mad it changes millions of others, but I'd settle for thousands.


What are your thoughts?

It won't work.

But don't be disheartened, nothing else does either, the whole issue is a clear case of a Someone Else's Problem field in operation.

The main message you, and anyone else that has a conscience, can take out of it is to never give up. I've been bashing my head against the problem for 30 years and I've never managed to gain one "convert" to the cause of thinking: "If I am able to drive to buy a meal, and live in luxury, is it reasonable for me to not give?"

On the other hand, what still works is, every now and then I make the bastards pay anyway. While people won't take positive action themselves, if you're taking positive action, every now and then you can make them dig in their pocket for a specific thing.

Never give up!

[papayahed]

What do you call living in luxury? Is buying books a luxury? I mean I can get them for free at the library.

[Jack of Hearts]

Just read Nietzsche's writings on altruism a while back. Something to the effect of taking out an aggression on the self that one is too weak to impose upon others. Ethical arguments are as easily discarded as soiled panties if you tap on the right premise.







J

[The Atheist]

This is somewhat relevant:

Some people will not just not help the needy - in Somalia, the local bandit chiefs are stopping aid and shooting aid workers (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/more-than-2-million-somalis-out-of-aid-groups-reach-2319278.html).

[JuniperWoolf]

I think that it's a good idea and entirely possible, as opposed to The Atheist I'm suprisingly optimistic. When I lived in Mill Woods beside a hindu church, they told me that members were expected to donate a pretty large percentage of their pay to charity every month no matter their own financial position because even if they were poor in Canada it beats being forced into prostitution or dying of aids or something. The woman that I talked to sometimes was always outside pouring water on a statue for some reason when I was walking home from school, she said that 10% of monthly earnings was usual and my community was mostly comparitively poor Indian immigrants working at fast food chains. I've heard about similar practicies on CBC radio, and talking to that lady influenced me to give 10% of my monthy income to a charity of my choice every month because being a (again, comparatively) poor student in Alberta reading library books and attending lectures is nirvana compared to some lives that people have to live. So, I make sure to conserve 10% of what I make a month (which, when I'm in school is only about $100) whether I have to eat an inordinate amount of spaghetti or forego going to the movies once a month or live without ordering takeout, or whatever it takes to save that little extra 10%. It just makes sense, it's easier than you might think and really not that big a deal once you get used to it. It's a direct and obvious way to make the world a better place without just sitting around being entirely impotent crying "why oh why is there suffering in the world?!?"

If people in positions of power and influence, not just stupid celebrities but also political and community leaders and educators adopted this practice, I think that it has the potential to become a cultural norm in the first world if the idea spreads, which I think it might be - change happens, but things take time and struggle against resistance. Take the enlightenment for example, or democracy. Hundreds of years of bloodshed, but now I as a woman can vote, become an anatomy student (the study of anatomy itself would have been cause for execution, whether the student was a woman or not). If you would have told someone that five hundred years ago, they would have shoved a hot steel poker up your *** and burned you at the stake. Hell, I could even practice witchcraft if I wanted to. Sure, I'll give humans the benefit of the doubt and say that we can solve global poverty in a few hundred years. Why not?

[Jack of Hearts]

What about the fundamental questions? Why should we help others, how we value other individuals (the familiar and the strangers)? And at what point do we abandon pursuit of reason and just act?

Why not apathy, this reader has always wondered? Why is there a social agenda so closely woven in? If you're living your destiny and self-actualizing by giving, why is there a need to extend externally and exert your will upon others?


Some are born to endless night,
some are born to sweet delight...
- Blake. Auguries of Innocence

This reader really doesn't know and isn't baiting for a specific answer- just hungry for insight.





J

[JuniperWoolf]

Well, when you see kids on tv starving to death with little bloated stomachs, don't you feel sick? Most people do, seeing other people in pain causes discomfort to the majority. That isn't blind optimism, it's been tested and proven. Though the external reaction is different cross-culturally the more telling physical reactions are always similar for the significant percentage of people who haven't been ruined by excessive exposure to trauma. Isn't that evidence for some intrinsic need for people to help each other, and isn't that reason enough? Negative emotions affect our lives in a negative way, it's reasonable to work towards alleviating those emotions.

On top of that, take that nauseous feeling that one human experiences when they watch images of genocide and rape on a television screen in a science psychology research project and amplify it for every human who feels sick when they think of people in pain. There's an undercurrent of guilt permeating the first world, which is why we're having this conversation in the first place. That doesn't make for a healthy society. Helping people who need help will make our own society better, because we won't feel as collectively bad.


why is there a need to extend externally and exert your will upon others?

It's not about will, like when Christian organizations agree to help people in desperate need in return for conversion (which I think is even worse than giving nothing at all). It's about standard of living, the basics like sustinance and shelter NOT exported religion or cultural influence. It's not through my own merits that I happened to be born in Canada, just like it's not through anyone else's deficiency that they were born somewhere without any food or water. For everyone who's too proud to recieve aid or who are actually benefiting from poverty (think militia, pimps and arms dealers), there are a million more at home and abroad who are just desperate to feed themselves and their families who would welcome help from people who just-so-happened to be born lucky.

Donating some of your income doesn't have to be a big ego-stroking deal, which I think might be a big reason why people shy away from the entire idea (they're reacting against self-rightous people who use "helping the needy" as a status tool). I'd feel better if it were simply a rational obligation and I'm not against it being government-orchestrated through simple taxation. I think that there are enough reasons to donate to charity outside of being a bleeding-heart or wanting to look like a big shot by buying morality points. Historically, if standard-of-living for the entire society improves, everyone benefits. Well, in the modern age of computers and cellphones we're living in a global society. We as a species have had some pretty amazing accomplishments, raising the quality of life for people to such a degree that they at least have a chance to contribute is a good step for our species' advancement and something worth working towards I think.

[papayahed]

The main message you, and anyone else that has a conscience, can take out of it is to never give up. I've been bashing my head against the problem for 30 years and I've never managed to gain one "convert" to the cause of thinking: "If I am able to drive to buy a meal, and live in luxury, is it reasonable for me to not give?"
up!

Wait, what? I wonder what the statistics are for giving, I have always been under the impression that most people who can give do give.

[papayahed]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/sep/08/charitable-giving-country


I was mostly right.

[The Atheist]

Wait, what? I wonder what the statistics are for giving, I have always been under the impression that most people who can give do give.


I was mostly right.

I think you'll find you weren't right at all and the data you've used is extremely weak.

At the start, it makes the following note:


In most countries surveyed 1,000 questionnaires are completed by a representative sample of individuals living in urban centres.

That's all very well, but extrapolating statistics purely from urban dwellers cannot give a true picture.

The bigger point is that while 30% of all people who were surveyed giving money in the past month is admirable, it is also appallingly low, for several reasons.

The question of "have you given any money to charity in the past month" is abysmal, because it includes "giving" to churches and political parties. Churches are arguable, as most of the money harvested through tithing is demonstrably spent on the church itself - buildings and wages. Giving to a political party is not charitable giving.

Along with those two non-charitable outlets, we must then make due allowance for the fact that giving 50 cents to a street collector will count towards that 30% you quote.

There are two types of charitable giving - reactive and proactive. A reactive giver is the guy who flips 50c to the street collector, or who drops a dollar in the door-to-door collector's bin.

That money is important, but far less important than those who give proactively. Those people deliberately apportion an amount of their funds to charitable purposes and form 80-90% of the income for most charities.

I firmly believe that number is extremely low, and that even the numbers provided by Gallup/CAF prove that, despite them seeming to be quite positive. I work closely with several charities and can tell you that obtaining money is very hard work.

There are some fantastic people - and I don't just mean the Gates/Buffet billions - who donate money consistently and who bequeath money when they die, but overall, the world of charity is a constant battle against apathy and detractors. Thinking "most people give enough" is far from the truth.

[Dodo25]

What do you call living in luxury? Is buying books a luxury? I mean I can get them for free at the library.

That's a good question, it depends on several things. In theory, everything you don't REALLY need is luxury, but it would be insane to ask people to live an ascetic life. On the other hand, one can certainly justify owning things like cars and computers, because those things can be used to make even more money which one could donate. So even a perfectly altruistic person wouldn't have to give all possessions away, because that would mean there's no way left to make more money.

For people that earn above average, it should be easy to donate at least 5% of their income, or significantly more. Below average earners actually donate more than the middle class, which is a shame! Only very rich people give more on average, but to them, it wouldn't even really matter if they gave away like 30%, but only very few really do it. Gates and Buffet have come to realize their responsibility, they've done a lot of good. Others just keep buying yachts, private jets, and a **** load of villas...


When I lived in Mill Woods beside a hindu church, they told me that members were expected to donate a pretty large percentage of their pay to charity every month no matter their own financial position because even if they were poor in Canada it beats being forced into prostitution or dying of aids or something.

Good point, almost all religions actually have that tradition / law. Islam for instance is very strict about donating, Christianity technically is too (there's some passage about a camel and a rich man). The problem with that though is that either people don't take their religion that seriously, or they do donate, but to very inefficient causes, i.e. to churches and missionaries, or to national charities (which are important too, but seriously, how many people starve to death in one's own country? how many die from diseases that could be cured with less than 100 dollars?). Some religious charities aren't that bad, I'm not saying religious charities spend all their money for Bibles, but the top charities have no religious affiliation. So it should really become a habit to make sure WHERE one's donating, so it actually makes a difference. The GiveWell link I posted is perfect for that.



If people in positions of power and influence, not just stupid celebrities but also political and community leaders and educators adopted this practice, I think that it has the potential to become a cultural norm in the first world if the idea spreads, which I think it might be - change happens, but things take time and struggle against resistance. Take the enlightenment for example, or democracy. Hundreds of years of bloodshed, but now I as a woman can vote, become an anatomy student (the study of anatomy itself would have been cause for execution, whether the student was a woman or not). If you would have told someone that five hundred years ago, they would have shoved a hot steel poker up your *** and burned you at the stake. Hell, I could even practice witchcraft if I wanted to. Sure, I'll give humans the benefit of the doubt and say that we can solve global poverty in a few hundred years. Why not?

Well said, though the timescale seems a bit long (I doubt humans will survive for that long). The really appalling thing is that we could solve the problem within two decades, without even having to go hungry ourselves.

[LitNetIsGreat]

I have conflicting thoughts about charity in general. On the one hand of course it is a good thing to help out and donate what you can. But on the other, I feel that Wilde had a point when he strongly opposed any charity/philanthropy on the grounds that it prevents the full horrors of the system being fully realised. I know that many will disagree with that for different reasons, but it is the system which allows extreme wealth and extreme poverty to co-exist which is truly at fault. Of course one thrives upon the other.


The really appalling thing is that we could solve the problem within two decades, without even having to go hungry ourselves.

Of course, probably sooner, but human beings are greedy and self-driven so it will never happen.

[Dodo25]

But on the other, I feel that Wilde had a point when he strongly opposed any charity/philanthropy on the grounds that it prevents the full horrors of the system being fully realised. I know that many will disagree with that for different reasons, but it is the system which allows extreme wealth and extreme poverty to co-exist which is truly at fault. Of course one thrives upon the other.


Yeah, the reformism vs abolitionism debate. But I think the effect is overestimated, we see the horrors well enough now, yet people don't care enough, not nearly.

It should definitely be said here though that a huge part of the world poverty problem is due to rich countries 'stealing' the taxes from rich people in developing nations, and due to the subsidizing of products (i.e. US cotton) so it can be sold even cheaper than the stuff produced in poor countries. I'll stop here or else it'll get too political.

And for the record, eating habits contribute a lot too. Poor countries with people starving on a daily base export huge amounts of soy or crops, so they can be fed to animals in factory farms. The plant food is ineffectively (9 to 1 or so) converted into meat, that's a big aspect of the 'distribution problem' leading to people starving to death.

But as I said, I don't think it helps much to try to get people to realize that the whole 'system' is the problem. It arguably doesn't even have to be. (And there can be 'wealth' without people starving, the alternative wouldn't have to be pure socialism but some kind of hybrid-form.)

[The Atheist]

But on the other, I feel that Wilde had a point when he strongly opposed any charity/philanthropy on the grounds that it prevents the full horrors of the system being fully realised.

I'm going to disagree with it, because it's both out of date and completely incorrect.

Without aid workers showing the true horror of famine in Somalia/East Africa, we wouldn't even know it was happening.

[LitNetIsGreat]

I'm going to disagree with it, because it's both out of date and completely incorrect.

Without aid workers showing the true horror of famine in Somalia/East Africa, we wouldn't even know it was happening.

Of course people will disagree. It's out of date in so far as Wilde was talking about the Victorian fad of philanthropy amongst the fashionable class of the day, but the story is the same and has been, and no doubt will be, repeated on and on.

I want invention and help in Somalia without doubt, the whole thing is a modern disgrace, but there is no escaping the argument that charity to temporarily ease such things helps to prop up the system which caused it (or helped to cause it) in the first place.

[The Atheist]

Of course people will disagree. It's out of date in so far as Wilde was talking about the Victorian fad of philanthropy amongst the fashionable class of the day, but the story is the same and has been, and no doubt will be, repeated on and on.

Yep, the world will never run out of people at the bottom.


I want invention and help in Somalia without doubt, the whole thing is a modern disgrace, but there is no escaping the argument that charity to temporarily ease such things helps to prop up the system which caused it (or helped to cause it) in the first place.

That's an often-heard reason not to give - I'm not accusing you of it, I'm just telling you how it is. Trouble is, what's the alternative? To have no system? We can't really discuss that without going straight to politics, but I just contend that what might be is of little relevance in the face of the kids dying right now; we deal with the world as we find it.

A classic example is South/Central Somalia, where aid virtually cannot get through as the area is controlled by Al Qaeda-linked muslim extremists [al Shabab] who will not let anyone but other muslim extremists in and not too many of them are humanitarians. Aid workers are being killed for their efforts. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attacks_on_humanitarian_workers#List_of_recent_att acks_on_humanitarian_workers)

If we wait for political solutions, there'll be nobody left to save.

[LitNetIsGreat]

That's an often-heard reason not to give - I'm not accusing you of it, I'm just telling you how it is. Trouble is, what's the alternative? To have no system? We can't really discuss that without going straight to politics, but I just contend that what might be is of little relevance in the face of the kids dying right now; we deal with the world as we find it.

Yes I know. It's a no win situation.

[YesNo]

I agree with The Atheist that the problems of starvation have political causes which have to be addressed first and with Neely that charity may be just co-dependence which props up the worst parts of the system or the behavior of individuals.

If the problem of starvation could be solved with money, it would have been solved long ago. If nothing else, governments would have taxed their citizens to get the money and then distributed the food.

People want to do good with their lives and do something about the problems they see on the news. Sometimes the main beneficiaries of those who donate are the ones who do the donating: they get to feel good. The actual money, or whatever is donated, is consumed by administrative expenses of the charities or is diverted by governments elsewhere.

I think the best approach to charity is to keep it as local as possible, starting with those closest to the giver. In doing that you will see all the problems that charity involves, both the diversion of funds to where they were not intended as well as the co-dependence that is created in the process.

[Dodo25]

If the problem of starvation could be solved with money, it would have been solved long ago. If nothing else, governments would have taxed their citizens to get the money and then distributed the food.

People want to do good with their lives and do something about the problems they see on the news. Sometimes the main beneficiaries of those who donate are the ones who do the donating: they get to feel good. The actual money, or whatever is donated, is consumed by administrative expenses of the charities or is diverted by governments elsewhere.

I think the best approach to charity is to keep it as local as possible, starting with those closest to the giver. In doing that you will see all the problems that charity involves, both the diversion of funds to where they were not intended as well as the co-dependence that is created in the process.

You're doing gross injustice to the effective minority of charities. Please research the following website: http://www.givewell.org/

It's been founded by financial specialists that wanted to use their knowledge for something better than just maximizing profits. They demanded data from charities and ranked them in effectiveness.

Starvation can be solved with money. People just don't care enough. The amount Americans spend annually on booze could nearly cut world poverty in half (per year, that is). Obviously one also has to improve structures, but the most effective charities are doing just that! When child mortality goes down, and education goes up, then the birth rate goes down. The demographic change. The population explosion would go down, and we have less people to feed. It's all connected, and it works with effective charites.