Some of it is quite funny, some is informative and thought provoking...
... but there is also quite a lot that saddens me. However, since I personally know all 17 of my FB friends, I've taken to gently challenging views that are not mine; views such as this one...
In an odd way, I'm not ungrateful to receive things like this as it not only makes me stop and think about the issues, but do some research as well. In this instance, I strongly believe that all developed nations have a moral responsibility to help those less well off than ourselves. The difference between our standard of living and (say) that in rural Tanzania, is colossal and I applaud the work of organizations such as Tear Fund and Medecins Sans Frontieres.
As a country, we have little of which to be ashamed in our aid to poorer countries. Only five other countries in the world – Sweden, Norway, Luxembourg, Denmark and the United Arab Emirates – met or exceeded 0.7% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2013. The United States, the largest contributor in monetary terms, gave a paltry 0.17% of it's colossal GDP.
The UK's Department for International Development's priorities for 2015 included helping nine million children into primary school, immunising more than 55 million children against preventable diseases, saving the lives of at least 250,000 newborn babies and encouraging global action on climate change. Not bad, eh?
Unsurprisingly, not everyone agrees with me, as the responses to my contribution confirmed. "Too many foreign leaders are corrupt. As we give them aid, they spend their money on arms"... etc. But I'm undeterred, and (at the time of writing) I still have my 17 friends.
Finally, the "billions we donate to other countries" is actually a very small proportion of government expenditure. Courtesy of the Inland Revenue website, I've been looking at how the government spent the £1473.20 of tax that they took from me last year. It makes interesting reading...
So 1.3p in the pound was spend on Overseas Aid. And look — just 0.6p went into the EU budget. With all the talk of EU bureaucracy and wasted money, who would have believed that?
So much personal opinion is based on misconceptions and misinformation. Most people won't take the trouble to seek out whatever good information there may be, and appraise it fairly. I think it would be a very good thing if schools taught children lessons in how to weigh up what they are told or hear about, and learn to be good judges of what is really going on.
ReplyDeleteLucy