Natural Disasters, Political Implications
17th May 2008
Posted in: Impotence
Written by: James Grieves
You may have noticed a distinct absence of posts about the massive amount of death that occurred recently first in Burma and then in China. I can not speak for my companions but personally a sense of impotence overwhelmed me when considering these issues. Certainly, I had observations: that it was bizarre first one troubled land filled with Chinese tendrils being struck and then the source of the aforementioned. That the scale of the death was effectively beyond my comparison.
I suppose that the main reason that none of this manifested itself in a post here is that there are no real suggestions that can be done. Few disputes that can be made. Lives must be saved and the assistance my words can give is minimal.
All I can do is link you here and then beg you to donate. So here goes: the death toll for Burma alone just struck 78,000. I doubt any amount of money could prevent us reaching 80,000 but who knows, if you bittorrent a few CDs instead of buying them or wear the same pair of jeans instead of buying new ones or temporarily abandon whatever the fuck it is you do that wastes your money on anything less important than human life then please, at least consider donating so perhaps we don’t have to reach 85,000.
Personally I would contribute but currently all my money is either gone already on funding the mortgage or increasingly diminishing on family food. Just in case you were considering blaming my rather combative writing style upon this then please consider that when we were mildly more well-off I was downright misanthropic and then reconsider.
Politically I hope that this dislodges a pair of otherwise seemingly implacable and entirely ethics-devoid regimes. China has acted decisively and swiftly {according to state media} which James Fallows argues is largely in response of past failure to handle vast natural crises. Burma, meanwhile, seems to have spent more attention on rigging the referendum than helping the people.
Irrespective of their handling of this for a plethora of past failings both of these regimes deserve destruction and if these immense events of epic destruction help bring out their end then at least some good has come of these inevitable atrocities.
