Strike One for the Asian Values Proponents.
I personally don't believe in Asian Values per se, but they do have a point when it comes to medical epidemics.
The cure for malaria has been found in plants, but no one is willing to fund the research to turn them into easily administerable pills to save entire nations. I personally get angry when I read stuff like that, especially because my maids come from such a community in need of help. somehow, their lives just don't mean as much. "Thousands of people die each hour in Africa due to HIV" vs "16 people die in avalanche alpine disaster/bus crash, 2 people die in New Orleans" hmmm. hmmm......HMMMMMM.....
The Ebola Virus, The SARS Outbreak, the Nipah Virus and of course the Bird Flu Virus. Funny little things that happen in funny continents where there be third world conditions.
Yes, they jumped species due to overly close contact between human and animal, but you're going to tell me that malaria (not virus) happened that way too? and the HIV virus. c'mon. it's not a 3rd world/gay man disease anymore. which is why there's AIDS awareness.
but nooooooo. all these funny dieases, they be coming from evilevil deepest Asia/Africa where there be heathens. People in loincloths who live swinging from tree to tree or walking from savannah to oasis in flowing robes surrounded by panthers and zebras as their companions.
and as a doctor said during the bird flu epidemic of HK, only when the "western nations" read: the US, Canada, UK, Australia get afflicted do they do anything about it.
If not, it's all up to WHO, NGOs, and "oh pity them let's sing a song" political activisty singers (and the occasional actor) who'll actually tell someone to DO SOMETHING
but looky here, what do we have here? One parrot in quarantine(interestingly identified as "from South America"), 3 pigeons from Canada and all of a sudden, they're holding a world summit and the Indonesian president is quoted as saying this could be "worse than the tsunami".
Play the "pity" card, the "trust me I'm Asian and I have 1st hand dealings with diseases and tsunamis and various natural disasters in epic proportions" card, and the "interviewing the minority" card all just to inculcate fear into the loving anti-Pauline Hanson public.
wonderful.
and you wonder why we are so cynical.
and you wonder why we're so warped when we say that children aren't as sacred as they are to the west. I still don't understand the 1 child dies, 4 others proclaimed dead" headlines. Really, children are just small people-people who will eventually grow into normal-sized people-people. Sheesh.
Listening to: the sound of huge trucks outside my window, driving along just washed with rain main roads.
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2 comments:
The Western paradigm is that you have this awesome life experience when you're a kid, and then you grow up and deal with reality, which utterly sucks.
but I mean, it's called avain flu because birds FLY.
what, they never heard of migrating geese?
sheesh. right in front of their noses.
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