Social Issues

There are so many problems.

There's AIDS, cancer, poverty, disease, hunger, homelessness, child abuse, domestic abuse, drug and alcohol abuse, corrupt businessmen and politicians, media conglomerates, sexual harassment, rape, women getting paid 83 cents to every mans dollar, discrimination, Iraq, religious conflicts, on and on.

The sheer magnitude of all the things going wrong makes it hard for anyone to decide what needs the most attention. Being bombarded with everything that is going downhill not just in our own country but the entire world is depressing, to say the least. But what is there for any of us to do? Can one person really make a difference?

As for myself and a lot of people I know, we remain apathetic. Considering all the problems we are faced with every day, it's raises the question how we can be apathetic? Is it because unless it affects us, we just don't care? Or because we are inundated with issues so we just tune them out at this point.

The new product RED campaign now gives some of the money you spend on red products (Motorola cell phones, Gap t-shirts, Ipods) to help AIDS in Africa. Although one of my professors criticizes this campaign for it's ability to reward America's addiction to consumption, I can't believe it took this long to get started. The majority of American's may not make time to fix world problems, but we always have time to shop. Now you can save lives just by buying that new Razor phone.

Anyway, I suppose there can be several reasons why people just don't seem to care. Maybe we all feel we're too small to ever really make a difference, so we never even try. Plenty of people have excuses, we don't have time, we're too busy, we don't have money to give. But they're just excuses. Can it be that maybe we just don't care?