Greta Thunberg

[Destination]

Africa has had billions in aid, the government's spend it mostly on weapons to kill their people, so maybe not the best solution.

Quite.
The problem is who is given the money, if you build schools and employ teachers, they'll find it very hard to skim that into weapons.

 

[Combat squirrel]

Africa has had billions in aid, the government's spend it mostly on weapons to kill their people, so maybe not the best solution.

When you find out who sells the worlds weapons, you're going to be livid.

It's almost as if giving away aid money was some sort of public PR stunt that led the money more or less directly back into the share holders pockets of modern western arms dealers.

 

[uber soldat]

When you find out who sells the worlds weapons, you're going to be livid.

It's almost as if giving away aid money was some sort of public PR stunt that led the money more or less directly back into the share holders pockets of modern western arms dealers.

In your world maybe they should source their arms from vegan arms dealers to make it a more ethical transaction.

 

[Diddums]

Quite.
The problem is who is given the money, if you build schools and employ teachers, they'll find it very hard to skim that into weapons.

Sadly this isn't really the case. Africa is an extremely complicated continent absolutely rife with corruption. The average joe on the street knows this, and have zero faith in their governments so will generally disregard anything the gov says or does and just forge their own way in life whilst their governments pilfer and skim everything they can.

Then you've got all the corrupt charities who are constantly sending "aid" to Africa in many forms, old computers, clothing, they'll build schools, water treatment plants, you name it. The money ends up being squirreled away by the many, many hands it has to pass through to get to the actual people who need it, whilst the western aid charities have now ticked their box and the resources have crossed the border so as far as they're concerned, their work is done. It's a topic that is very close to my heart and one I follow rather avidly as I absolutely detest the charities who milk peoples' kindness and generosity and then use every loophole in the book to skim as much as they can off the top.

Here's a few examples of what actually happens, compared to what the charities will tell you:

Computers "donated to schools":

Clothing that is "donated to the poor people of Africa":

Madonna's "school built for African girls":

https://face2faceafrica.com/article/madonna-s-abandoned-school-in-malawi-to-become-a-cemetery

I could find more but I'll leave it at those for now. One of the best ones was when someone built a well and water filtration facilities at various schools (think it was Kenya, can't remember) to help the locals with their sanitation systems and so they didn't have to walk a few miles a day to get water, but once that person left the wells were promptly either abandoned or stripped of anything useful and repurposed to build homes and stuff as the wells and filtration plant not only required filters at $500 a pop every month, but also kept breaking down.

The West's patronizing attitude towards Africa really irritates a lot of Africans, who are very proud people from long lines of ancestry who have fought in wars and decapitated their foes over the centuries. And now some western pop star comes and builds some wells for them in their Hugo Boss outfits and Rolex watches? It irritates the hell out of them, and it would me too. But very few people actually go there and say "what can we do to improve your lives?", they simply do whatever the most fashionable thing is at the moment, get their moment in the papers and move on with life, leaving these communities to clean up whatever patronizing crap they've left behind.

Don't get me wrong, a lot of charities are actually really good and know what they're doing, but it's an industry absolutely rife with fraudsters, con artists and thieves.

Another fun one on a slightly different topic is a charity who support the research of cancer. I won't say their name but it's fairly obvious. A local Ford dealership donated a few cars to them one year so they could use them to raise funds. What did the charity do? They kept the cars and raffled them off for staff in a Christmas raffle, and amazingly, none of the floor folks won a car, it was all the managers. How does that work then?

That's my little sermon for the day, tl;dr: do your research before giving to charity

 

[Malevolence]

Quite.
The problem is who is given the money, if you build schools and employ teachers, they'll find it very hard to skim that into weapons.

Yes, and that school will be torn down within weeks.

A friend of mine spent some time in Niger as part of his University degree. He and the company he was with set up a solar power system that powered water pumps & purifiers, charged phones, radios and torches and allowed other such simple devices to be used in villages that were literally in the middle of nowhere.

Two weeks later when they went to check how they were working out and to fix any problems that had arisen they found every one had been stripped down to it's components and either sold on or used as building materials or farming implements.

It's just how it is in that part of the World.

 

[Destination]

Yes, and that school will be torn down within weeks.

-edit
perhaps you are correct

 

[iamtheoneneo]

I'll insulate. I'll use less heating

But stop eating animals? No ****ing way, and I'll be breeding chickens to raise and slaughter if it comes to that. I may not need them, but I want to eat meat and a life without it would be grim and have even less enjoyment in it. Is this the plan, make everyone so miserable that they walk into the plastic and **** infested sea?

I dont eat meat but I also don't get the point about eating less of it as last time I checked we were 1-2 years away from lab grown meat being publicly available which will solve a lot of environmental issues raised with meat farming and keep meat eaters happy.

 

[GIBURROWS]

Sadly this isn't really the case. Africa is an extremely complicated continent absolutely rife with corruption. The average joe on the street knows this, and have zero faith in their governments so will generally disregard anything the gov says or does and just forge their own way in life whilst their governments pilfer and skim everything they can.

Then you've got all the corrupt charities who are constantly sending "aid" to Africa in many forms, old computers, clothing, they'll build schools, water treatment plants, you name it. The money ends up being squirreled away by the many, many hands it has to pass through to get to the actual people who need it, whilst the western aid charities have now ticked their box and the resources have crossed the border so as far as they're concerned, their work is done. It's a topic that is very close to my heart and one I follow rather avidly as I absolutely detest the charities who milk peoples' kindness and generosity and then use every loophole in the book to skim as much as they can off the top.

Here's a few examples of what actually happens, compared to what the charities will tell you:

Computers "donated to schools":

Clothing that is "donated to the poor people of Africa":

Madonna's "school built for African girls":

https://face2faceafrica.com/article/madonna-s-abandoned-school-in-malawi-to-become-a-cemetery

I could find more but I'll leave it at those for now. One of the best ones was when someone built a well and water filtration facilities at various schools (think it was Kenya, can't remember) to help the locals with their sanitation systems and so they didn't have to walk a few miles a day to get water, but once that person left the wells were promptly either abandoned or stripped of anything useful and repurposed to build homes and stuff as the wells and filtration plant not only required filters at $500 a pop every month, but also kept breaking down.

The West's patronizing attitude towards Africa really irritates a lot of Africans, who are very proud people from long lines of ancestry who have fought in wars and decapitated their foes over the centuries. And now some western pop star comes and builds some wells for them in their Hugo Boss outfits and Rolex watches? It irritates the hell out of them, and it would me too. But very few people actually go there and say "what can we do to improve your lives?", they simply do whatever the most fashionable thing is at the moment, get their moment in the papers and move on with life, leaving these communities to clean up whatever patronizing crap they've left behind.

Don't get me wrong, a lot of charities are actually really good and know what they're doing, but it's an industry absolutely rife with fraudsters, con artists and thieves.

Another fun one on a slightly different topic is a charity who support the research of cancer. I won't say their name but it's fairly obvious. A local Ford dealership donated a few cars to them one year so they could use them to raise funds. What did the charity do? They kept the cars and raffled them off for staff in a Christmas raffle, and amazingly, none of the floor folks won a car, it was all the managers. How does that work then?

That's my little sermon for the day, tl;dr: do your research before giving to charity

I worked at a charity and I will NEVER give to any charity anymore, overpaid incompetent staff(office types) awful CEOs who have no shame or common sense but happy to take 100k from the charity as a wage, people now deciding their own job titles to weasel out more money from the charity, theft of donations from staff is a really big deal that never gets brought up and so much more it could fill a damn book oh all the while getting 3.7 million a year from the NHS!

 

[robgmun]

Sadly this isn't really the case. Africa is an extremely complicated continent absolutely rife with corruption. The average joe on the street knows this, and have zero faith in their governments so will generally disregard anything the gov says or does and just forge their own way in life whilst their governments pilfer and skim everything they can.

Then you've got all the corrupt charities who are constantly sending "aid" to Africa in many forms, old computers, clothing, they'll build schools, water treatment plants, you name it. The money ends up being squirreled away by the many, many hands it has to pass through to get to the actual people who need it, whilst the western aid charities have now ticked their box and the resources have crossed the border so as far as they're concerned, their work is done. It's a topic that is very close to my heart and one I follow rather avidly as I absolutely detest the charities who milk peoples' kindness and generosity and then use every loophole in the book to skim as much as they can off the top.

Here's a few examples of what actually happens, compared to what the charities will tell you:

That's my little sermon for the day, tl;dr: do your research before giving to charity

It's sub-Saharan Africa. A friend of mine spent some time in Niger as part of his University degree. He and the company he was with set up a solar power system that powered water pumps & purifiers, charged phones, radios and torches and allowed other such simple devices to be used in villages that were literally in the middle of nowhere.

Two weeks later when they went to check how they were working out and to fix any problems that had arisen they found every one had been stripped down to it's components and either sold on or used as building materials or farming implements.

It's just how it is in that part of the World.

I have suspected this was the case since I was very young. Sorry to say this i've always felt aid to Africa is a lost cause.

 

[Diddums]

Africa is a lost cause.

Africa needs to be left alone for a few decades, it'll sort itself out eventually. But the constant pilfering by the Chinese is only making it worse.

 

[robgmun]

Africa needs to be left alone for a few decades, it'll sort itself out eventually. But the constant pilfering by the Chinese is only making it worse.

And even they see it!

 

[200sols]

I dont eat meat but I also don't get the point about eating less of it as last time I checked we were 1-2 years away from lab grown meat being publicly available which will solve a lot of environmental issues raised with meat farming and keep meat eaters happy.

It'll be many years before lab grown meat replaces the proper stuff on the scale that is needed. It sounded like minced insects were going to.be the saviour a few years back but that seems to have petered out to nothing.

 

[GIBURROWS]

It'll be many years before lab grown meat replaces the proper stuff on the scale that is needed. It sounded like minced insects were going to.be the saviour a few years back but that seems to have petered out to nothing.

Is meat the biggest issue?

Why not start with clean energy, population control, travel etc?

 

[200sols]

Is meat the biggest issue?

Why not start with clean energy, population control, travel etc?

It's pretty bad, beef is the main culprit.... but I'm waiting to hear your idea for population control.

 

[Malevolence]

And even they see it!

Empire of Dust is a must watch.

 

[Freakbro]

Is meat the biggest issue?

Why not start with clean energy, population control, travel etc?

It is a surprisingly big issue yea. The whole agricultural sector accounts for ~24% of emissions, which equates to energy & heat at 25%. But meat and dairy accounts for 14.5% of that 24% alone., all other foodstuffs accounting for only 9.5% It also takes up a hell of a lot of land and uses more resources like water.

Travel is 14%. But it's not about starting with one sector or another, we need to tackle all of them at the same time. Though tbh, changing our diet and taking out meat and dairy as a major part would have a large effect fairly quickly and easily. Far quicker and easier than developing fusion or building more nuclear power stations.

But as well as fighting against the political and economic ramifications that culling the meat industry would cause (pun intended ) you're also fighting against the general attitude of people who don't want to change. Like this

Each to their own but i am never giving up meat.

Roasted pork with crackling and apple sauce

 

[Greebo]

Another fun one on a slightly different topic is a charity who support the research of cancer. I won't say their name but it's fairly obvious. A local Ford dealership donated a few cars to them one year so they could use them to raise funds. What did the charity do? They kept the cars and raffled them off for staff in a Christmas raffle, and amazingly, none of the floor folks won a car, it was all the managers. How does that work then?

That's my little sermon for the day, tl;dr: do your research before giving to charity

Could just be bad luck. Years ago my work organised a charity do and there was a charity raffle with prizes donated including holidays, big screen tvs etc from our suupliers. My boss instructed all managers attending had to buy at least £30 of raffle tickets but we weren't allowed to keep the prizes if any of us won. The raffle was done on the first winning ticket got first pick, the second the next pick etc. I was drawn out 1st, 2nd and 4th picks . If looks could kill from my boss. I could see his face going purple with anger.

I kept the prizes as well. I had paid for the tickets fair and square just like everybody else there. Although I did tell them to draw another ticket when I came out 4th. Even I felt a bit guilty with my luck by then

 

[Bassmansam]

Had a lovely tomahawk steak yesterday and have the left overs today, nom nom.

 

[200sols]

My boss instructed all managers attending had to buy at least £30 of raffle tickets but we weren't allowed to keep the prizes if any of us won.

Sounds like a few middle managers I know..

 

[Meddling-Monk]

In a nutshell, all animals basically require the same things we need to survive, so if you someone says you 'need' meat to survive, thats not true

Unfortunately, this statement is not 100% true.

G6PD male and G6PD elderly female sufferer, representing here. Meat is what primarily helps sustains us here, and you know what? God/Mother Nature/Evolution made us the way we are, and we represent a non-insignificant portion of the Human population. We could live off plant only, but we'd also be killing ourselves too in the process due to various reasons associated with having G6PD, or being an elderly female with G6PD (which is basically any Female, since young eventually becomes old after all). So clearly that's not an option, and since it's not an option, the statement quoted above, is clearly wrong.