Fair point, but consider what proportion of the world is experiencing relative poverty and even extreme poverty. What would the world be like if even 5% of them stole. These people have to make extremely tough decisions everyday that test their characters. How they stay straight is amazing (perhaps faith, philosophy, upbringing, fear).Originally Posted by joebloggs
pride will not feed your kids, neither will the gov of the phils..
my point was and is, its easy for us to sit here in 7th richest country in the world, when many or all of us have no idea what poverty is.
as for poverty in the phils. well ask my misses about how many babies and kids she has seen been taken out of hospital because the parents couldn't pay for the medicine or medical bills, knowing that they wouldn't live long, and how many times her and her interns have sat taking it in turns using hand operated ventilator in their own time to keep babies alive because the parents couldn't afford to pay for the automatic one
We, living in the West certainly don't have to make decisions/choices in the same way. But, as much as we cannot comprehend their situations, we must acknowledge that very very few of the people in those situations resort to theft for many reasons. If someone stole some money because their baby was about to die and they needed drugs to save her, I can understand that but would still not condone it, even if I myself would do the same.
I met a lady in the coffee shop opposite the Manila Shangri La. She was crying so I sat down to ask her if she was ok.
She told me her brother-in-law had been diagnosed with a heart condition 5 years earlier and had just died. The family had saved for years to raise the money to enable him to have life-saving surgery. They were unable to so he died, leaving 4 young kids and a wife. They were both professional Veterinarians - the cost of the surgery, $5,000. They never resorted to stealing.
Did the uncle steal to save a life or some other pseudo-nble cause? I don't suspect not.
T
