OKAY
So you know what pisses me off? When my country goes and invades another country despite my extreme disapproval and protest, and spends billions of dollars invading that country, killing lord only know how many innocent people, including children, oh, and then locking people up only to torture and rape them — and then, AND THEN, I find out that people are asking me to send in school supplies to the children of the country we spent billions and billions of dollars invading, because oops, we had enough money to kill their friends, or their neighbors, or their parents, but not to build schools!!! Even better, I’m supposed to feel good about being such a noble American who sends school supplies to the children whose families my country killed. Sending these school supplies is a “nice thing.”
Are you fucking kidding me?
Look. These kids need school supplies. Obviously. So if you want to send them, go ahead and send them. It’s not a noble gesture to say “fuck you kid, because my government should already be paying for this.” But I just also happen to not find it particularly noble when we invade a country, fail to rebuild their infastructure, and then pat ourselves on the back because we mailed some pencils.
Furthermore, I happen to not find it particularly noble that this is people’s response as Good Americans rather than protesting outside of their damn congressional representative’s office to ensure that this shit is actually paid for as it should be, and that whether or not it’s paid for isn’t based on how many people decide to retweet and put together a package. I’d consider it a hell of a lot more noble if we actually cared enough about these kids whose country we invaded to bother guaranteeing their education rather than leaving it up to charity. Because I bet those people “nice” enough to bother putting together a package with a spiral notebook wouldn’t let their child’s access to any form of education rest on such similar “kindness” of strangers. Especially when those same strangers blew up their country.
Send your damn package. But right after you do? You need to get out your own paper and pen, and sit down and write a damn letter to your congressional representative telling him or her what you just did, and telling them how fucking ashamed you are that you had to, and demanding better. Then you won’t have done “one nice thing,” you’ll have done one bare minimum right thing.
Beautifully put.
