I eagerly submitted my (admittedly brilliant) idea secure in the knowledge that this great company would recognize the necessity for long term change management and implementation. The 5 top choices where due to be released in Feb 09. It was then pushed out till March. And then… nothing. I sadly gave up the experience to a rather gifted and original thinking scammer.

And then last week – with no bells and whistles (not surprisingly) the results where in. I won’t bother with relaying their choices (see them here) as they are to disappointing to repeat. Let me quickly say something; every cause deserves its recognition, funding and support as we all know there is a lot wrong with our world – but really!

Where is the vision? Where is the bigger picture understanding? Where is the original ‘up yours’ Google ethos? Was the entire exercise merely a way to donate an large amount of money to existing charities? If Google REALLY wanted to create impact that 10 million could have gone a long way. Small projects dotted here and there all over the globe will achieve nothing!

If they would – all the existing projects would have already acheived their goals

They haven’t

We have to work with the cause and not the symptom

So here is my take: I am beginning to think in the world power/Illuminati/ secret order theories because – there is no other explanation! If a company like Google can’t find the balls to tackle our issues then I can’t think of other companies that will. There is obviously a vested interest in maintaining poverty, ignorance and devastation.

I’m about to get into a serious scathing session here so I’d better stop because guaranteed there is a Google Geek monitoring me right now and accessing all my purchase choices, political affiliations, social habits and sleeping schedules. Bloody hell.

Bring back Aristotle, Socrates, Michael Angelo, Einstein – where have all the great thinkers gone?

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Words can’t express the experience. To witness the courage of these girls to openly speak about their situations, some of which brought tears to the entire hall. To show them that they are not alone in their suffering when before they believed they were. To hear them stand up and thank us for bringing them hope and a way to face the things that they have no power to change. I am completely grateful for the honor.

The school was a government one, which means these kids have parents or some adult who can somewhat afford to send them to school and feed them. Despite this  middle class appearing situation, these atrocities are still going on, and believe me some of the home lives are atrocious. Imagine then the situations found in shanty towns and poorer areas?

How dare we create a world where children have to face these circumstances? How dare we turn a blind eye when children are being beaten, and raped and kicked out until the mother has finished selling her body and sobered up enough to remember her child? It is unacceptable.

If we do nothing we condone it. If we don’t stand up, reach out – help, we condone it. This abuse is happening behind the doors of over 85% of South African homes.

My god. How can we ignore this epidemic? Our very existence rests on the shoulders of how we raise our young. When did we collectively stop taking responsibility for all children? When did we loose the capacity to love outside of ourselves? How can we not recognise the root cause of our global problems?

If you are reading this then I ask you please; do just one thing to help. There are so many ways and I know that you already know of one. This pandemic must be stopped.

Contact me if you would like to sponsor a program in another school and help children to cope queries@iamchangingtheworld.org.za

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I recently learnt about a water project that meets the needs of inadequate drinking water in Africa by installing pumps in various rural communities. All very well and good, poor water contributes towards more deaths than AIDS and the conditions really are appalling. So meeting this need is admirable and produces great impact.

But.

What about the repercussions of the solution? What about the environmental studies of the impact of boring for water in that area? What about educating the community so that the new water source does not also become polluted? What about the greater impact of weather and ecological ramifications?

I’ve dedicated my life to being one of the people who actively work towards making our world a better place and so I am in no means critising any contribution that is made. I am fully aware of the difficulties that we collectively face and how changing them is a massive undertaking. But these questions should be raised.

I can’t help thinking that we are still unable to project our minds and vision outside of our own lifespan to truly understand the bigger picture. I suppose that would require the true release of ego and attachment. Because if we were working on projects that would only bare fruit in a time past our deaths we would not have the satisfaction, pride or even participation of the completion thereof.

So in working tirelessly and altruistically in creating change, are we not in actuality delusioning ourselves? Are we not in truth still being the selfish and shortsighted human beings that got us into this mess in the first place?

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What kind of atrocities and depravity and total submission of self must a person go through to kneel on hard tar, literally begging for any kind of support, money, food… hope. As he knelt there, holding up his cardboard plea I was filled with such a sense of… actually I can’t describe the feeling. It was not sadness, it was not pity, it was closer to peace.

In a strange way by witnessing this scene it stripped away from me the layers of my life and of my self that mean nothing but that I give so much attention to. Needless purchases, pointless arguments, worries so out of sync with reality they should be farcical. All these components of modern society that we cloak ourselves in, that work towards keeping us separated from the suffering of our fellow humans and the suffering of our planet.

I admit it is a constant subject of debate within me. Individual survival versus collective survival. My reality so far removed from that of the beggar. Realistically speaking the world must carry on, people must continue to strive, humanity must continue to develop technology and explore and live.

There are groups who advocate the total collapse of life as we know it; oil production, natural resource consumption, monopolies, corporate empires… this of course is ridiculous as the ensuing chaos would create the kind of devastation we only envisage in our worst nightmares.

But at the same time, the modern world is out of touch with purity. Love, respect and compassion for your fellow human beings and animals as well as the planet itself. I do not have to give up my ambition, my love of good food or thrilling adventures or pursuits that the modern world provides so that others may prosper. But if we could close the gap between basic survival and wanton unconsciousness I do believe our world would be vastly improved.

“Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight” this quote sums it up perfectly. Do people focus on fashion and power and prestige and drinking and all the other total useless pursuits so that they may not have to witness the layer of suffering living just a fraction away from them?

Or are people genuinely not equipped to identify with this aspect of human life, perhaps due to their inability to have compassion for that which they themselves have not experienced?

I don’t know. I do know that I am grateful for these experiences, it keeps my soul alive, it removes the stress of striving for something that is worthless and the joy I feel when I am privelaged to share in anothers pure joy because I opened my handbag and gave a piece of paper that enables that one person to eat a meal and to have hope.

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Now tell me – with all the power of Google / Yahoo / AOL / how is it possible that these sites even exist? Is it a money issue? Apathy? But here’s the other question: if these internet giants were to shut them down would that be worse by forcing these issues underground? Or by having this open forum and freedom that pedophiles currently have – does this promote it?

Tough questions but they need to be asked.

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