First off, I’m not insensitive to the needs of others, but I have serious problems with the attention that Haiti is getting right now.
1) Haiti needed help way, way before this earthquake happened. If every “humanitarian” who is out collecting donations now did that annually for a few decades, perhaps Haiti would have had the infrastructure in place to have prevented such devastation from this earthquake.
2) On the other hand, it’s great people are out there getting donations, but, six-months down the road, when all our energies have been expended, and everyone has forgotten (again) about Haiti, there will still be sick, lame, homeless, impoverished, mal-nourished CANADIANS who will STILL NEED YOUR HELP.
I can’t see how people can get all humanitarian over one incident in an already devestated place, and spend all their time doing that, when there are people in THEIR OWN FUCKING COUNTRY who need their help, day-to-day, and they ignore it. To me, that’s fucking gross.
I’m going to donate more time and money to local organizations helping those AROUND ME in need, rather than ship it off to a country that is likely unfixable anyway. WHY DON’T PEOPLE CONTINUALLY CARE ABOUT THOSE IN THEIR OWN COUNTRY EVERYDAY? Does it make people feel good to “give” to some foreign country because it’s on the news 24/7. What about other third-world countries that also need your help EVERYDAY but don’t receive shit from you?
SERIOUSLY: we need to help Canadians, Nova Scotians, and Haligonians first, you fucking selfglorifying hypocrites. Yes, Haiti needs help, but fucking Canadians need help. FUCK!
–Hait-mail
This article appears in Jan 21-27, 2010.
While I did donate to Haiti, I can kind of see where you’re coming from. I always say this about people who are adopting children from China and other foreign countries…. there are plenty of Canadian children who need to be adopted… why not pick them??
Listen fool, there are people there right now with amputations and festering wounds who have no medications for the pain. Hungry Canadians are not going through that.
Your head is buried in the sand, you are a very sad person to compare that devastation to some unemployed people in our country.
So go, donate your time to any cause you wish and thank you. But keep your mouth shut because what you said above is an embarresment to your country.
Thank you, If not for you, you took the words out of my mouth. To compare the horrible devastation in Haiti to the plight of the poor in Canada is ignorant.
Ok wait… I never said I didn’t agree with helping out… because I am in the process of going over there to volunteer through Red Cross. I am definitely at fault for saying I can see where that person is coming from… I admit. I do stand by my opinion about the adoption thing though
Maybe both are important causes. Those who feel Haiti is more important should give to Haiti. Those who see the need at home as greater should donate their time and money here. Charity is a very personal choice and everyone has a different cause to support and a different level of commitment to that cause. The important thing is finding balance. How can we, as a country and as individuals, help Haiti, other developing nations and our own people best? The answer, to me, is to work on all fronts at the same time.
agreed
personally, I think it’s just more of the same.
two months from now there’ll be another disaster somewhere else and the world will stop to help. send people, send meds, send help… don’t just write a cheque and pat yourself on the back.
I’m likely going to get flamed for my insensitivity but this is happening all the damn time.
It is estimated that the rebuilding efforts in Haiti will cost $1 billion USD. And, separately reported, the movie Avatar has already made $1.4 billion USD worldwide.
Ms.Lala, in reference to your comment about adoption: I know several couples who have adopted babies from foreign countries, one of them from China. The reason being that they weren’t able to find Canadian children to adopt within a reasonable timeline. Adoption is a very long and incredibly expensive process, even in the best circumstances, and as it was, the couples I know were on waiting lists for 2-4 years. From what I understand, the wait for Canadian babies was even longer than that.
Some people only have the ability to write cheques. Not everyone can just up and head on down to Haiti to help out with the relief effort. That’s why we have the Red Cross and a military. Donating money to the organizations that know how to spend it best is not a shallow contribution.
OP, have you not noticed what’s become of the infrastructure of Haiti? It’s rubble… as in… the food bank fell down! NO CANADIAN is suffering in this way. Not here anyway. We do what we can when we can. It’s always better than nothing, No Canadian shelters or food banks are closing in order to support Haiti relief efforts. Just what exactly is your problem? You live in the CREAM of the world! No, it’s not perfect but it’s so far from what Haitians face today you must be blind to think to compare Canadian poverty rates to a pile a rubble and over 100k dead, more dying, more still buried in fallen buildings… I’d say the only “selfglorifying hypocrites” around here, OP, are you and Broc… and he’s an asshat on a good day!
talk to harper about having his ead up the butt. he is the dude responsible for just about all our woes to date, then go back to the libbers, they had a big hand in it too.
Actually, Canada has had a significant hand in helping Haiti, especially in the past 10 years or so:
http://www.ploughshares.ca/libraries/monit…
We did peace keeping (for better or worse) and Haiti over the past few years is the #1 foreign aid recipient from our coffers. The impoverished in Canada at least have a home, safe water, and food.
I’m on the fence about OP’s post re: the new and sudden “humanitarians” out there. While I’m not against helping others in need who truely need it, I’m skeptical about some of the means donations are being collected and how quickly people are to give.
Also, Fever, I’m on the fence with your post too. Not knocking it by any means, but the relationship between Canada and Haiti is a bit strained and we Canucks do not get a fair view of what really happened the past 10 years. What we do know is that the RCMP trained Haitian police forces and that those same police forces are very trigger happy and advocate a shoot-to-kill-then-ask-questions policy.
Don’t get me wrong NGF, I don’t defend what we did back in ’04 with Aristide. Also, the Canadian media has done everything in it’s power to muddy the waters, by making it seem we’re the White Knight of Haiti. We’re not, I know. But we contributed something like $550 mil in 2008 alone to Haiti and we at least sent police forces to train the non-existent police force that was there before.
$550-million?! Wow, I wasn’t aware of that.
Just curious, have you ever watched Myth for Profit? Its a documentary about Canada’s involvement in the international scene regarding aid, money and peace keeping. Some very interesting information about Lester B. in the film also. Its only about an hour long and was quite an eye opener.
I do applaud the efforts in Haiti this year, though. Much more compared to, say, the response in Cyprus and Lebanon in 2006.
Really liked the White Knight analogy also =)
I’ll have to check that out NGF. By the way, the world fucked the dog on the whole Cyprus/Lebanon thing back in ’06.
I heard somewhere that Haiti is “Canada’s Iraq”, which is fairly accurate, but it’s less about setting up a military presence for future expansion into Caribbean.
I’ve heard that reference before also and also believe it. You’re right, it may not necessarily be about military presence and consolidation of a particular area and certainly not about stealing natural resources. Then again I’m unsure of any of Haiti’s available natural resources.
C’mon OP…get your head out of your arse. If we were hit with the mass devastation that Haiti has suffered, would you want the world to help or just leave you and your loved ones to die? Would you prefer your gangrenous amputation performed with anesthetic or without? The Haitians have no choice. There is no anesthetic. There is no pain medication to get them through the healing after their limbs have been cut off. There is no food and there is no water. There are no hospitals, they have collapsed. Imagine your dead loved ones being bulldozed into mass graves. Imagine if no one had come to the poor Haligonians aid after the Halifax Explosion devasted our lovely city and the people who lived here. There’s a reason why the province sends a Christmas tree to Boston every year.
“Haiti’s available natural resources” become exposed when a natural disaster forces the natives to flee from lands they’ve lived on (in poverty) for generations. Haiti’s available “natural resources” consist of beach front property for building resorts once the pesky natives are finally “relocated”. Just ask their government who sell the lands for (American) commercial use before the bulldozers even arrive to clear the dead and the debris from their shitty little homes. Sick, isn’t it?
I can’t beleive I am saying this, but I agree with Kay’s first post. The poor in Canada have it way better then the poor in Haiti. The average salary in Haiti is 1-2 dollars a day. Christ even on the lowest of the social assistance in Canada, one can get 10 dollars a day. And even then they have free basic health care, food banks and other services. Now don’t get me wrong, I wish it was not like this in Canada. =
On top of that, there is plenty of work here. I just took a second job because I am trying to save some money. It wasn’t that hard, and I notice lots of jobs available everyday. I know they don’t pay 50k, but you have to take things into perspecitve and realize that we have it so much better here.
We need to appreciate what we have and stop griping about taxes and the cost of living. At least we can afford to live.
shaking up the herd one SHEEP at a time.
I’ll agree Bitch, Please!, though, I think she misread Broc’s post. (not that i’ve ever done that.)
Truthfully, while I too am disaspointed with the fact that there are a lot of canadians living in poverty here in Canada, I am very proud of my country when it stands up and sends help out to the people who really need itl. I think alot of us still need to learn to be thankful for the resources we do have here in this country…they don’t have that in Haiti…and whatever they did have is gone now. And by helping them we are helping our people. There are people here that are CANADIAN but are from Haiti…I can only imagine what goes through thier minds. While I too would love to see no poverty anywhere ever, it is not a reality. And those who have, should give to those who have none. And the people of Haiti have nothing. We should help, it’s the Canadian way.
While I think it’s sad that it takes a natural disaster to wake people up to the pain and destruction that’s going on around the world, I would be much sadder if we watched the news and refused to help in some way because we need to help our fellow Canadians. Here’s a thought: don’t take your lifestyle for granted, make a point of donating part of every paycheque to a charity. It doesn’t matter which one, just support what ever one or ones you feel are deserving. You won’t miss the money when it’s spread out over a year. Then when something extreme like an earthquake happens, you’ll still be able to dig a little deeper and donate something more in a pinch. No matter how crappy your life seems at any given moment, there’s someone who’s in a worse position who deserves better.
Spot on, hollah!