Oxfam sex debacle

[FoxEye]

Yes, and others are awful too: Barnardos, for example, is a joke with amount of money it wastes - and I'm not talking about paying high-flyers well in return for excellent services. For example, one fairly minor (and utterly useless) manager with them is paid nearly £150,000 per year. It genuinely sickens me and I will never give to big charities again.

Look at AgeUK as well. They have hundreds of "CEOs" for each small unit of the business Like a CEO for "AgeUK Birmingham".

And each of these gets £50-£100k+. There muse be more CEOs in AgeUK than any other organisation I've ever seen.

The needy in this country can go **** themselves IMO, no excuses. We've got free education, free healthcare and social security. If you're poor here then get over it and do something about it - it is mostly only 'relative poverty' anyway... if you're really desperate then there are food banks and emergency funds/accommodation etc.. available too.


The people I want to give my money to are people in the third world who don't even have say a simple net to protect them from malaria, or don't even have safe drinking water. That's where donations can really make a difference. I've got no time for any citizen or permanent resident of a first world country, I've already paid plenty in taxes to subsidise their existence.

The stuff that really irritates me are the go fund me campaigns to help some individual from an ordinary background who could be helped by loans or family rather than donations. Like a friend on Facebook posting about some other idiot friend who went backpacking in Thailand without travel insurance and got injured... they needed money for a parent to fly to him and to pay for treatment... a credit card or loan could cover that. Ditto to some hippy chick whose uninsure houseboat sank - she had the audacity to essentially beg for money on social media to buy a new one. The amount of money raised in either case (in the thousands) could save actual lives in Africa but instead goes to some infividual/family who ought to be able to sort themselves out or rely on loans from a bank/credit card or someone close to them.

You know that many of those so-called 3rd world countries have a huge middle-class these days? That they have more than enough money to sort out their own poor - if they chose to.

Take India. It has a space program and a massive middle class/elite class population. And you know what? Some Indians think of their poor in the same way you just described the Western poor - **** them. Just proves that humans are no different here to anywhere else. Once you lift a few out of poverty, they stop caring about the ones left behind. You create a middle-class and elite class just as uncaring as those of the West.

Poor in the West are soon to be in the same position as the poor anywhere. The global elite have the money now, and the global elite don't really care about nationalism or any of that crap. The rich/poor divide in the West and elsewhere will grow until the Western poor live in the same conditions as the Indian poor. Sure they have some way to come up, but the West's poor can look forward to ever-worsening conditions as well. This is the true face of globalisation.

 

[MikeTheNative]

Doesn't the UK give India loads of aid? A country which has it's own space program and has spent £100s of millions on military jets.

 

[foster grant]

Doesn't the UK give India loads of aid? A country which has it's own space program and has spent £100s of millions on military jets.

Yes .

And I think they are able ( the might have already ) to make a nuclear weapon

 

[Hades]

Doesn't the UK give India loads of aid? A country which has it's own space program and has spent £100s of millions on military jets.

Yes. Great isn't it.

 

[KingOfTheDaves]

Yes .

And I think they are able ( the might have already ) to make a nuclear weapon

India has had nukes since the 70's

 

[LabR@t]

Sickens me the corruption in big charities,I only support local charities.

 

[Irish_Tom]

The needy in this country can go **** themselves IMO, no excuses.

Wow.

Poor in the West are soon to be in the same position as the poor anywhere. The global elite have the money now, and the global elite don't really care about nationalism or any of that crap. The rich/poor divide in the West and elsewhere will grow until the Western poor live in the same conditions as the Indian poor. Sure they have some way to come up, but the West's poor can look forward to ever-worsening conditions as well.

I find myself agreeing with FoxEye for once!

 

[dowie]

While there are some genuine cases where people slip through the cracks and some real issues with the system to be fair - saw one recently where someone was complaining about their benefits being stopped but the more you read into the background of it the more it was obvious they expected the system to just work without them having to take any personal responsibility combined with just ignoring when things went wrong and doing nothing to avoid potential problems due to those things going wrong causing more things to go wrong in the future.

Some of these sob stories the BBC covers which often results in them being handed accommodation and a job on a plate, etc. - google the person 6 months later and they are back in the same state and its always someone else's fault.

Yup some genuine cases might well do but even then they still have access to food banks, soup kitchens, emergency accommodation, free healthcare, social security and a path to get back on track - albeit it requires them to make an effort too.

You know that many of those so-called 3rd world countries have a huge middle-class these days? That they have more than enough money to sort out their own poor - if they chose to.

Take India. It has a space program and a massive middle class/elite class population. And you know what? Some Indians think of their poor in the same way you just described the Western poor - **** them. Just proves that humans are no different here to anywhere else. Once you lift a few out of poverty, they stop caring about the ones left behind. You create a middle-class and elite class just as uncaring as those of the West.

The fact is there are people in this world who don't have access to clean water or basic things like mosquito nets and you seem to want to pretend it is someone else's problem. Some people don't even have those extremely basic things in say Africa but you want to argue against that by pointing out that India has some middle class people?

Poor in the West are soon to be in the same position as the poor anywhere. The global elite have the money now, and the global elite don't really care about nationalism or any of that crap. The rich/poor divide in the West and elsewhere will grow until the Western poor live in the same conditions as the Indian poor. Sure they have some way to come up, but the West's poor can look forward to ever-worsening conditions as well. This is the true face of globalisation.

No they're not, it isn't even remotely compatible... if you think that then you have no idea just how privileged you are living in this country.

I find myself agreeing with FoxEye for once!

Well perhaps you're also delusional about how lucky you are if you want to make a comparison between people who can't even access clean water and people who've failed at life and had to claim benefits or use food banks in a first world country.

 

[FoxEye]

The fact is there are people in this world who don't have access to clean water or basic things like mosquito nets and you seem to want to pretend it is someone else's problem. Some people don't even have those extremely basic things in say Africa but you want to argue against that by pointing out that India has some middle class people?

You've seen too many begging adverts on Sky TV

India has a massive middle class and elite class now. So does Africa. About 1/3 of the population is now "middle class" (relatively speaking). This doesn't mean they have western levels of luxury quite yet but they are getting there, thanks to globalisation. It does mean that they're buying private healthcare, shopping in modern supermarkets, etc.

https://www.reuters.com/article/ozatp-africa-consumers-20110506-idAFJOE7450A920110506

They are also very resource-rich nation with massive economic potential.

The poverty of their lower classes is no longer due to being poor, helpless "3rd world" countries. Now it is a problem of their own governments, and a lack of care in their own society.

We need to move on from blaming the West for everything. Actually we will continue to help spread wealth globally, through the simple fact that our western companies are always looking for opportunities overseas, where growth potential is larger than here. If these nations governments can resist the backhanders in return for screwing their own countries out of a fair share of the wealth, they will (and do) find western money (and Chinese) flooding into their countries. Remember outsourcing?

Globalisation has a levelling effect, like or it not. Pretend it doesn't happen but in a few decades Africa's poor and our poor will look very similar.

The rich/poor divide isn't going anywhere. It's just going to look more global than regional in nature in the future. This is simply a fact.

Well perhaps you're also delusional about how lucky you are if you want to make a comparison between people who can't even access clean water and people who've failed at life and had to claim benefits or use food banks in a first world country.

I seem to remember you're one of the BTL landlords this forum is blessed with, yes? Correct me if I'm wrong. It would put your comments in a certain light if I was remembering correctly...

 

[Irish_Tom]

Well perhaps you're also delusional about how lucky you are if you want to make a comparison between people who can't even access clean water and people who've failed at life and had to claim benefits or use food banks in a first world country.

Jesus you’re grumpy today.

Why does it have to be one or the other?

Why can’t we say it’s unacceptable that there are people in Africa or India without access to clean water and mosquito nets and also say that it’s unacceptable that there are people in this country who are homeless and depend on food banks?

It’s not a competition of “who’s more ****ed” — both should be helped.

 

[terley]

Your bias is showing, not everything in life follows the plotline to poor quality porn.

Exactly can be same for either side, it is more likely that it is somewhere between each..

Do you really believe all prostitutes are helpless victims of circumstance?

 

[Efour]

Well I completely and utterly ignore all charity's except a local cat rescue society.
Literally/figuratively, every penny/kronor I have is better in my pocket.
This country has a very solid social security network.
I don't want to see a cure for cancer or other diseases that actually keep a small check on human overpopulation. My mum is actually a cancer survivor so ... Wtf mate....(at least not for another hundred years or major limitless power technological breakthrough)
Screw pretty much everyone living in the 3rd world that frankly shouldn't even really be alive.
There's a reason God sends famines and droughts. Having families with 16 children to support you in later life should win you state execution.
Any contributor to a state should be provided and protected but outside of that state there needs to be a damn good reason better than Christian moral bs.

None of this" lazy cricket and the ants "story book that my dad used to thrash the hell out of me with when I was just a boy. I always knew which stories were important by the depth of the paper cuts and bruses.

 

[terley]

Well I completely and utterly ignore all charity's except a local cat rescue society.
Literally/figuratively, every penny/kronor I have is better in my pocket.
This country has a very solid social security network.
I don't want to see a cure for cancer or other diseases that actually keep a small check on human overpopulation. My mum is actually a cancer survivor so ... Wtf mate....(at least not for another hundred years or major limitless power technological breakthrough)
Screw pretty much everyone living in the 3rd world that frankly shouldn't even really be alive.
There's a reason God sends famines and droughts. Having families with 16 children to support you in later life should win you state execution.
Any contributor to a state should be provided and protected but outside of that state there needs to be a damn good reason better than Christian moral bs.

None of this" lazy cricket and the ants "story book that my dad used to thrash the hell out of me with when I was just a boy. I always knew which stories were important by the depth of the paper cuts and bruses.

50% of what you say is logical.

If your mother had died from cancer like my dad did, perhaps your opinion may be different.

Also there is no evidence to suggest that a god exists.

 

[Efour]

God exists and she is very disappointed with your lack of faith.

 

[antijoke]

Surely they are doing good work supporting the local economy?

 

[Efour]

Surely they are doing good work supporting the local economy?

Lol I actually thought this first time I heard it on R4. I bet it's like a boom time for whores and bars when herds of self-righteous NGO employees descend on a disaster stricken nation.

 

[FoxEye]

Surely they are doing good work supporting the local economy?

It's OK. I'm sure there will be a happy ending for all involved

 

[KingOfTheDaves]

Exactly can be same for either side, it is more likely that it is somewhere between each..

Do you really believe all prostitutes are helpless victims of circumstance?

You do realise that the same director and staff had exactly the same allegations made against them whilst they were operating in Chad. They then went to Haiti and did exactly the same thing.

But oh no it's the poor, innocent Oxfam workers that are the victims here. Their brave struggle against the wily, seductive ways of the evil prostitutes, who organised an international conspiracy across continents to entrap them.

I hear Brad Pitt is playing the Oxfam director in the movie!


I am not, however claiming that
'all prostitutes are helpless victims of circumstance'.

Sure some choose prostitution, but the men involved still have a choice. In this particular incidence, given that it happened in more than 1 country involving the same people, I put the blame on the Oxfam workers.

 

[terley]

You do realise that the same director and staff had exactly the same allegations made against them whilst they were operating in Chad. They then went to Haiti and did exactly the same thing.

But oh no it's the poor, innocent Oxfam workers that are the victims here. Their brave struggle against the wily, seductive ways of the evil prostitutes, who organised an international conspiracy across continents to entrap them.

I hear Brad Pitt is playing the Oxfam director in the movie!


I am not, however claiming that
'all prostitutes are helpless victims of circumstance'.

Sure some choose prostitution, but the men involved still have a choice. In this particular incidence, given that it happened in more than 1 country involving the same people, I put the blame on the Oxfam workers.

I'm not saying "poor oxfam workers"


What exactly are you blaming the Oxfam workers for? Prostitution is the oldest profession known to man.. we don't know the circumstances of the incident, and jumping to the conclusion that these Oxfam workers are doing something wrong is a big ludicrous..

 

[jonessa]

It's 2018 and some people in the world still don't have access to clean water or education. This in itself seems ridiculous.

Sadly, charities won't ever be able to completely eradicate this due to corruption at the very top (even the top of charities).

Oxfam workers using prostitutes doesn't exactly look good does it? Regardless of the legalities or circumstances, it's still pretty stupid.