I have no sympathy for the homeless in the inner cities, well not as much sympathy as I once had. I live in Johannesburg South Africa a few hundred kilometres from Harare a once thriving African metropolis, the streets are now rivers of waste with children, their bellies distended from hunger, fleeing across the South African border. Many of these children as young as 8 or 9 and just as many of them travelling without their parents. Their lives are at stake and it's easier for a child to find their way over the border than a family.
The West would have us believe that poverty is an event that happens weekly on network television specials hosted by presenters wearing a five thousand dollar suit and a hundred dollars of make-up. Poverty is a parent watching a child die of hunger and being powerless to stop it. Poverty is an African reality, which has no pause button and is far too hard to watch from our comfortable chairs.
It has always been the case that the sensational makes the front pages. Stories of bravery or tragedy, rising stars and fallen heroes, these are the stories that lead. The plight of a 8 year old girl farming the land to feed her younger brother, since their parents passed away, two more victims of the AIDS pandemic never get told.
The conditions of abject poverty that are the norm throughout this continent will clearly not be an important news story any time in the near future. I tried explaining the underlying problem to a good friend mine in the U.K last week. Hard as I tried I cannot justify nor forgive the apathy of the West. I'm agnostic, my friend is an Anglican, and as it happens the language of his religion encapsulates the problem perfectly. If only the West treated others as they would be treated themselves.
The functional blindness the press and society have developed toward poverty could never exist in a world where we saw all people as equal. We place less value on the life of the poor than we do on the rich and yet more value on the life of westerners than we do Africans.
If anything good has come from the collapse of the world's market it has been a change in the global mindset. Suddenly countries have realised how fragile their national wealth is. Much of the world's largest economies have been built on the sand of consumer credit. As jobs are downsized and as families default on loans governments are having to think about the poor within their borders for the first time in ages.
What needs to happen for poverty to make the headlines? Recent evidence is clear. Make sure the poor in question are registered voters or get a huge rock star to champion your cause. Both of these things seem to greatly improve your chance of getting poverty onto the front page. Sadly though, these stories tend to focus on the personalities and not the issues. These become stories about Bono and the poor people or the politician and the poor people rather than about the tragedy of the poverty stricken.
The stories that transcend and grip the imagination in respect of poverty are clearly the ones that allow the reader to internalize the suffering. Sadly, too many editors choose not to do run these articles. It's distasteful for the average reader to have to deal with along with their morning coffee. Guilt does not sell.
I am of the opinion that the crusaders of the poor are doing themselves an injustice trying to leverage traditional media to highlight the plight of the poor. The only thing that captures the imagination of the West seems to be lights cameras and action. I suspect that most Americans wouldn't be able to pick Somalia on a map, I struggle and I'm African, but the Somalis still need our help. Our ignorance won't make them disappear. Their children still cry when they've gone 36 hours without food. We should give up engaging the press on poverty and hand over to entertainment. Detail the efforts of volunteer workers as a reality television show. Showcase the crafts of the truly poor on home shopping networks. Use the mighty commercial arm where the news has failed. Do something, anything.
I have no doubt that if we could just a put a face to the pain of poverty, tell the stories of the lives ruined and give a voice to doomed we would find the world a better place tomorrow.