First Image:
Proximity
Barriers
Behavioral Change
If youve come here to help me, youre wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine then let us work together.
quote attributed to Lilla Watson, an aboriginal activist.
- Watson makes the radical assertion that while many communities certainly need development, outside assistance, and liberation, they may not be the only ones who need help. Those who come to serve and help also need liberation of an altogether different sort.
It seems that the wealthy are poor in a way that is a mirror image of the poverty of the poor. Having too much is as bad for us as having too little. Too little food makes us weak and at risk of disease; too much food makes us overweight and prone to heart disease and diabetes. Water in the Third World is dirty and bad for our health; water in wealthy nations is sometimes bad because it gets polluted with chemicals from our progress. The poor have unfit housing; the wealthy are often slaves to their house payments. A poet, Octavio Paz, said that the rich have too few fiestas and are poor, while the poor have too many fiestas and are also poor.
References
Freire, P. (2003). Pedagogy of Hope: Reliving Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum. Myers, B. (1999). Walking with the Poor. New York: Orbis Books. Pew Research Center (2011). Median Net Worth of Households, 2005 and 2009. Retrieved July 6, 2013 from http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-recordhighs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/ [Untitled Feeding Yellowstone Bears] Retrieved July 6, 2013 from http://the-causeand-effect.blogspot.com/ [Untitled Jane Goodall with Chimps] Retrieved July 6, 2013 from http://rheaharmsen.com/2012/03/24/womens-history-month-pioneerprimatologist-jane-goodall-one-of-the-paradigm-shifters-of-science/ Watson, L. [If you have come] Retrieved July 6, 2013 from http://www.solidarityawareness.org/