Wealth and Poverty

Maybe it's because I just read A Tale of Two Cities...which I still need to post about...Maybe it's because I'm thinking about the responsibility we'll have to society once Ben is a doctor.

For whatever reason, I decided to pick up the Readings for Inventive Writers book the other night and read two opposing essays about wealth and poverty. Both disturbing.

The first is called "Lifeboat Ethics: The Case Against Helping the Poor". It was written by an American ecologist in 1974 and published in Psychology Today. Read if you dare. And by the way, he's serious. I had to look up his bio to see if he was known for being a satirical writer. Unfortunately, no.

The other essay is just as strong in the opposing opinion. It is called, "Socioeconomic Inequality: The Haves and the Have-Nots". It was written by a BYU Sociology professor in 1990 and published in BYU Today. It is not in response to the other article, only in stark contrast to it.

If you're going to read one, read "Socioeconomic Inequality".

The BYU professor's point disturbed me in realizing he's kind of painfully right. Or even definitely painfully right. Right about the prevalent attitude toward the poor and needy. And also that it is not just a problem to society but to our spiritual standing before God. That's strong stuff. Read it and see what you think.

A few of its zingers and good questions:

LDS scriptures state clearly that the obligation to assist the poor remains intact whether or not the poor are judged to be deserving. Second, how can one reasonably view the growing millions of poor children as blameworthy, no matter what one thinks of their parents?

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A major point from the widow’s mite seems to be that the moral judgement over the use of money is based not on how much we give, but on how much we keep for ourselves.

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Indeed, throughout history only a relative few have been afforded the “opportunity” to engage in selfish political or economic oppression. Now, for the first time, the test seems to be underway on a truly massive scale. There may even be more people alive today exercising substantial political and economic agency—facing real choices between personal luxury and Christian charity—than in all previous centuries combined. How will they handle their “opportunity” to engage in direct or indirect oppression, their choice to hoard or to share? How are we handling ours?

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It becomes a difficult moral and financial dilemma that each of us must work out individually. How much are we justified in keeping to meet our needs, and how much are we keeping selfishly to satisfy our wants?

It reminds me of how I felt after watching and reading about Gandhi. It's not easy to read or think about because it's asking you to change the way you think and live somehow. I'm still on the thinking part.