Money help: How does one live each day to the next with complete disregard for our environment and overall state of existance. - Help.com

Kudos, my friend, kudos. I completely agree. We are a VIRUS.

Your choice. Your choice?

I almost agree but I don’t think that the earth will be uninhabitable in ten years.
Let’s be honest though a world community (not world government or financial system etc. but COMMUNITY) is not going to happen.
All you can do is find a little niche in life for yourself and stick your head in the sand.

what?

What didn’t make sence?

The greater purpose by which we live is the purpose by which God created us for. The most important thing we can do now especially in the times we are living is to make sure the Gospel of Jesus Christ goes out to every corner of the world. Without the hope of eternal life then yes I can see how it would be hard to even get out of bed my friend.

Please don’t patronise us. Your belief is you own and you’re welcome to hold it but either help with the question or start your own thread if you want to debate somthing different.

I did try to help I think your missing something but thats ok I wasn’t trying to patronise. Let it sink in a bit and I think you’ll see what I mean.

Your efforts are appreciated if misplaced. I can assure you I’m not missing your point. Trying to imply that a depressing world outlook is a result of my faith (or anyone’s or even anyone’s lack thereof) being inferior to yours is patronising. Please also read the terms of service, they clearly state that while religious discussion is allowed it should not be shoehorned into a conversation where the original poster has not asked for a religious solution to their problem. If you want to debate Christianity please start an alternate post, join one or the many thousands of posts devoted to discussing this or feel free to sign up and shout me. I don’t hate religious discussion and am happy to debate but there’s a time and place.

Man_with_a_mop wrote:
What didn’t make sence?

This part:

disregard for our environment and overall state of existance.
Humans have evolved into a money hungry, materialistic community of talkers and not doers. I’m finding it increasingly difficult to get out of bed in the morning when I see no real purpose or hope for our race. How someone can even consider reproducing and bringing children into a world after knowing what it’s state will be when they reach 10, 20 and 30. This world will be near inhabital…..my faith in humanity is lost as each day these lives are lived for themselves and not for a greater purpose. If we can become a world community and think of others more than ourselves then perhaps getting out of bed won’t be so difficult.

This open post was written 1 hour, 15 minutes

You know, the truth is this world will not see world peace. There are some things in this world that you just don’t complain about and just do just because. In this case don’t think about something like this and just go on with your life not thinking about the extreme cases.

what

Da-11, basicaly some of us just don’t understand our existance. We exist, that is a given however what we have done with this remains a mystery to some. We grow up being told that we live in a democracy (we don’t, most of us live in a pseudo-representative democracies) and that everything our governments do is for the greater good. In fact if you look at our world a small group of people are living in luxury while some of us live lives in mere comfort and many more live lives of abject poverty.
Humanity has the resources to feed the world, end many major fatal diseases and in doing so build a better world for all. However we do not. Hiding behind our capitalist ‘freedom’ drug companies exploit the poor by servicing only the rich and agricultural producers destroy grain rather than feed the poor to keep food prices stable. These are just two examples (out of many hundreds) of reasons why people die, but since it is legal the average man considers it just.
If you look at the way our societies are structured they have little to do with justice or fair play. Although I obviously cannot speak for the annonymous poster I took this post to be questioning our life outlook as a whole. Often we claim to be utilitarian but we are not.

We grow up being told that we live in a democracy (we don’t, most of us live in a pseudo-representative democracies

Who told you this while you where growing up? It sounds as if they where simply uneducated on the matter. However even the most basic high school US history class should have corrected this matter for you. If not I would go back to the school you attended and inquire as to why you where not properly educated on such a mundane and easy to understand subject. This might not help you directly, but it may help current and future students of your high school who may also be improperly educated.

and that everything our governments do is for the greater good. In fact if you look at our world a small group of people are living in luxury while some of us live lives in mere comfort and many more live lives of abject poverty.
Humanity has the resources to feed the world, end many major fatal diseases and in doing so build a better world for all. However we do not. Hiding behind our capitalist ‘freedom’ drug companies exploit the poor by servicing only the rich and agricultural producers destroy grain rather than feed the poor to keep food prices stable. These are just two examples (out of many hundreds) of reasons why people die, but since it is legal the average man considers it just.
If you look at the way our societies are structured they have little to do with justice or fair play.

I assume you live in a western first world country; and so I hope you count your self as one of those who lives in luxury while it is people out side of your country who live in mere comfort and many more who live lives of abject poverty. Even the most pore in our country would be hard pressed to make a compelling argument why they should not be considered as living a life of luxury as compared to the rest of the world.

So my question to you is, as a person who is living in luxury at the expense of the rest of the world what have you done to correct this problem? If a good number of people who live in luxury like you do where to give up that luxury you would free up a lot of resources for the rest of humanity. For example why are you wasting energy and money on a computer and internet access to par take in entertainment such as Help.com? When that energy and money could be better used else where?

What have you eaten or will eat today? I assume it has been a lot more then an entire family in Ethiopia. Why not forgo eating as much and instead donate the remainder to a family who could use it more then you can?

Often we claim to be utilitarian but we are not.

This I most certainly understand; most of the time instead we simply like to talk about how utilitarian the world should be but then never do anything about it. Its often seen as a problem that other people are causing one which we are removed from doe to our good intentions and so we fail to see the truth that we are the problem.

Regarding your first point. Officialy both of us live under what could be termed as ‘democratic’ systems of government. You live in a federal republic, and I live under a parliamentary system which is in turn under a constitutional monarchy. The differences between the many different types of government are often not as blatant as that & both politicians and the media often refer to all these related systems as ‘democracy’ since they tend to cater for the lowest common denominator who do not understand the appropriate terminology or the subtle differences between the various systems. Hence the common usage of the word ‘democracy’ as a catch all term by many people (regardless of whether they understand what a democracy is or not.) How my education (or sometimes notable lack thereof) is related to this debate still escapes me.

The three groups of people I mentioned (living in luxury; comfort -the ‘mere’ was ironic- & poverty) they are statisticaly broken down as follows: The richest 1% of the worlds population own approx 40% of the worlds wealth, in the middle band 49% of the worlds population own approx 59% of the worlds wealth & the remaining 50% of the population own approx 1% of the worlds wealth. This of course (again) a brief and therefore inaccurate overview of a very complex subject. A man who earned the average working class wage in, say, India would not even be able to rent the small room I call home. By contrast the wage I just about prop myself up on would happily support a comfortable, yet modestly living family in a reasonably sized house in a nice area in this hypothetical man’s locale. The problem with comparing dollar for dollar on paper is that I appear obscenely rich next to a man living an identical life in a less economicaly developed country. I was, in fact, amused to note that I am acctually (by the standards set in this survey) in the bottom 50% since I have no assets, that said I undoubtedly have a better standard of living than most people in the world due to living in a highly developed society. Anyway that was a rambling digression, what I set out to write regarding your second point is that I have no intention of making either a groveling confession, a whinging justification or a ‘legitimate’ (if there is one) answer to your questions as to my lifestyle.

They are exceptionally good questions which everyone should take seriously (including myself - and believe me I do) and I don’t think you are wrong in saying that we live at the expence of the rest of the world, many people regrettably are not so bold. That said my life lifestyle is my own and while it would be entertaining to spill it all to the world I think I’ll resist the temptation - remember I didn’t ask for all this I simply rephrased (from my point of view - I can’t say how my feelings compare to the original poster) the sentiments of the first post at your request.

Finally you end with another good challenge, we should be more utilitarian not talk more utilitarian and most importantly we should know ourselves and the consequences of our existance not just our actions. I couldn’t agree more.