Hungry?

The food crisis is being talked about and talked about and talked about. Climate change advocates have been talking about it for awhile - hotter temperatures, more floods, more droughts - all lead to it being more difficult to provide enough food for the world. Increasingly, people talk about the amount of grain it takes to feed animals we eat as meat. The exploding middle class - which is good, in the sense that fewer people are living in poverty - means that more people are eating more food, and more meat at that. The minimum thresholds for biofuel are increasing demand and competition for food. 

So while a major proportion of the population starves and while food riots are becoming commonplace in increasing parts of the world, what we do in North America is consume more calories in junk food and desserts and fancy coffees every day than the rest of the world eats period. We consume and consume and consume at the expense of those with the least and never stop to think about it. 

There is hunger everywhere.  The obvious contrast between the have and the have-nots, between obesity and starvation is growing, and so much more can be done to stop and reverse it. The solution lies in redistribution: closing the gap from the top to the bottom by cutting excess at the top and making it available to those without enough. Less food consumption here in Canada - say, reducing junk food or expensive coffee - would mean more money for food in places where it is a luxury.  It would also save food packaging, empty calories and all the health problems that come from processed food - not only obesity, but illness that is caused by the preservatives and substitutes that are used. Seems like a win-win situation. And all it takes is a little of self-discipline and some political willpower.

For Brains that Never Stop

It's often hard for me to tell my brain to stop thinking about structural oppression and injustice, feminism, racism, income inequality, the heterosexual assumption, media misrepresentation, war, hate, social constructs, homelessness, development, international aid and relief, inaccessibility of  and other social justice issues.  When should these things in everyday life be pointed out - and when should they be accepted, however grudgingly?  For instance, the often-cited example of spending $5 on a coffee when so much of the world lives on much less than that every day. Messages sent in music, advertising and popular television? I don't know the answer - but I do know that I'm not prepared to remain ignorant to these issues and the host of other injustices I have yet to even begin to understand. 

The reason I stop thinking is because not to stop thinking would change everything.  Being able to 'stop thinking' further perpetuates all that I think about in so many ways.  I understand why many people just don't think about these things - and don't like it when others point them out - allowing yourself to go there is messy.  What can I live with accepting, and where do I draw the line?  When do you settle? 

Society is constructed by all of us - by everyone who buys in and everyone who doesn't. As much as being one person is overwhelming and hard and I continually question what it actually does - it is what I can do, right now in this moment. And I hereby resolve to be that one person.  To spend less money on Starbucks and use it to give someone else the basics. To reduce my carbon footprint. To challenge and question, to listen and learn. To not eat meat for a number of reasons (half the world's harvest is fed to farm animals; 800 million people go hungry.) Yes, that means cows and pigs - which we then kill to eat - are better fed than humans. (Check out www.eatlessmeat.org for more).  Even a 50% reduction in meat consumption by 2020 could mean 3.6 million fewer starving children.  To not eat junk food - which is related to income inequality, food insecurity, obesity and Western excess. And poor health. To never use plastic bags.

Some people don't look: "Today what might be unpleasant or personally demanding, but is not actually seen, is often ignored" (Chambers, Rural poverty unperceived). I am choosing to look, and not to blink. And move the line further from where it is now,  and to accept less of what is going on, and to challenge our politicians and world  leaders to do the same.  We have reached a point where many movie stars and other celebrities (Stephen Spielberg is personally boycotting Bejing because of the Chinese government's complicity in Darfur and refusal to recognize its domestic human rights violations) are doing more to fix this stuff than so called "world leaders".  Darfur is going to be our Holocaust - if future generations are less racist than this one anyways - and instead of leaders who stepped up, our legacy will be leaders who stepped down, or turned their heads, or said our military was busy. There are more ways than guns to make a difference. Stephen Spielberg figured that out ahead of the rest of the world.

Some of these things are easier than others, and all of them are easier said than done. My life won't change overnight; Rome wasn't built in a day. But I am one person. And I am one person with the power to make choices every day to make things better, to buy into systems of inequality - or not. And making one more choice to do one less thing that makes this world a better place is what I can - and will - do.

Modern Day Robin Hood

Most of us are familiar with the story of Robin Hood, whether it be the Disney adaptation with foxes and snakes or the classic: Robin Hood steals from the rich and gives to the poor, making friends and impressing the lovely Maid Marion in the process. 

In a society where income inequality, the gap between the rich and the poor, is growing domestically and globally at unprecedented levels, what we need is Robin Hood. And it is easier than it seems.  Modern day Robin Hood would merely increase the wages of the world's lowest paid workers to a level at which they could sustain their families above the poverty line. Since most of the work in developing countries - where the lowest paid workers live - is linked to the multinational companies, which are also the world's richest companies, with the highest paid CEOs, the wage increase would carry through all the partners in the distribution chain and, assuming companies would not pass the full increase on to consumers, which granted is a huge assumption, result in lower profits at multinational companies.  Now, you may be asking what kind of person would voluntarily take a pay cut just to improve the situation of people half a world away? The answer is Robin Hood - someone concerned with with justice and fairness and who believes in the power of one person to make a difference. Someone who isn't afraid to face the Sheriff of Nottingham - modern day shareholders, business owners, partners, or someone who is afraid, but in true Robin Hood style, doesn't let the fear paralyze him.   

The best part of the whole thing is that most people high enough up in a multinational corporation to make this type of decision are usually in a financially secure position which would allow them to continue to experience a very high quality of life (domestically and globally) even if they chose to make such a radical change. Whoever would make such a choice would probably be in a position to make up the profit he or she chose to forgo by writing an inspirational book and becoming a inspirational speaker. And if that person was really Robin Hood, the money would go straight back to the people who need it most. Think about it.