"guaranteed medical care" - of what quality, with what results? And the value of medical care being covered is that it doesn't destroy the rest of your life. It's actually kind of pointless to help someone just get to the point of surviving, and then leave them to fend for themself.
I just don't know how to respond to the idea that there's minimal value in removing infected bone fragments from a child's femur, and so I'm not going to pretend that there's a useful discussion you and I can have about this.
Not the situation I was insinuating. That child will not be left on their own, presumably they have a family who will care for them and help them get past it. In a situation where the person is just left to basic care, and has no other future care options is what I was referring to. I should have been more clear.
To me, it's plainly obvious that people in those other countries need our help more than people in the United States. What other concern is there? "I'd like to help people in MY country" is just a vaguely nationalistic bigotry.
It is not so obvious. There's a lot of suffering going on in your country too.
Charity comes from the heart, and where you should direct your love is your own choice. If you feel the people in your country are closer to you, there's no shame in helping them before others. We are human after all.
There are some ways that I preferentially give to local people because it's easier. I've helped more street beggars in my neighborhood than in Port au Prince because I don't walk down the streets of Port au Prince.
But when it comes to paying for perfect strangers to receive medical treatment, and I'm choosing between someone in the US, whose medical treatment costs more, and who will receive the medical treatment anyway at the risk of personal bankruptcy, vs. someone who wouldn't receive the treatment at all in Port au Prince, you can't make an argument that I should give to the American. The American will get the treatment with or without my help. He might just end up bankrupt, but being bankrupt in America is not that bad. In fact, there's a good chance there will be no bankruptcy and the American will just have to go on a payment plan for the next few years. The Haitian won't receive the treatment at all. In fact, even after the treatment, the Haitian will still have to live in Haiti, which is probably a materially poorer existence than being bankrupt or having to make a payment plan in America.
Providing less help to someone who is in lesser need of it at greater expense, just because you share a nationality with them, is bigotry, and you've said nothing to refute that.
Well you can downvote me all you like, but it's just not bigotry. Merriam-Webster defines bigotry as the state of mind of "one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance".
This is just not the case, so first of all you are wrong.
And second of all, that you think one should spend his charity with maximum (perceived) efficiency is just _your_ ethical view.
I give charity to the Dutch cancer battle fund. I don't do this to save anyone I love, they are either already dying of cancer and won't be helped because of my donation or have already died.
A majority of people will never live to die of cancer. It is a disease that kills rich healthy people. Yet I give as much to them as I give to unicef. It is because the disease hits close to home.
Anyway, that might make me an egoist. But not a nationalist bigot. And frankly I think it was hateful of you to introduce those slurs into this conversation.
What's hateful is criticizing Watsi for not letting you donate money to people who don't need the money as badly on the basis that you'd rather help people in your own country.
The question is does giving your money directly to a street person help them more than giving it to a shelter so there are more places for people to sleep at night, and healthy food for them - or is it just faster and stronger gratification / reward for you? Not saying this as a put-down.
I agree with all you said, but here is one additional point: per dollar, you can fund a lot more outside of the US than you can inside. Those $1000 surgeries in Cambodia would cost far more here. You have to decide if you want to use your $5000 to help 5 people in poorer nations or 1/2 of a person in the US.
> If you feel the people in your country are closer to you
That's the nationalistic bigotry I was talking about. That's like saying if there was a charity that only helped white people, maybe I should contribute to that because I feel that people of European descent are "closer to me".
If you did that it could mean you're racist, the act of donating to such a cause doesn't make the act itself bigotry though IMHO. The intent behind a charity is what would be a determining factor for me - not in the end who it ends up helping, though that likely plays a role in most people's decisions.
It is not bigotry, you are misinformed. Black people contributing to http://blackcharities.net/ are not bigots, they merely support those whose fate they identify with.
Sure, people are more likely to help those they identify with. That means they're more likely to ignore the plight of people they don't identify with. And that is bigotry. And criticizing a charity for not enabling that is also bigotry.
There are millions and millions of people, tens of millions in North America, that aren't taken care of well or properly. Fixing people when they're bad enough to absolutely need help or they'll die, otherwise letting them suffer, isn't a great attitude to have; Not saying that is your attitude, though it's what our culture currently has in place.
Except it isn't. That's the whole problem--people have natural ingroup/outgroup biases where the suffering and death of people in groups they identify with is given more weight. Wars are criticized, not on the basis of the hundreds or thousands of foreign civilian casualties, but on the basis of thousands of military casualties suffered by our own side. National law is reevaluated on the basis of American children dying in a shooting, but Middle Eastern children dying in a drone strike go ignored. People would rather donate money to save an American from financial hardship than to save a Haitian from death or lifelong crippling, implicitly leaving the Haitian to suffer and die.
To some extent this is just human nature. But it's a problem that people think this way, and I would prefer to solve this problem than exacerbate it.
