141–150 of 213 posts
This is heartbreaking. Is there a place where I can donate? Will it help in anyway? Edit: Thank you for your responses. Ended up donating to Doctors without borders. Hope it reaches someone. I was going to say humans are really just wild animals but then i thought that would be a disrespect to wild animals.
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Even donations to organisations such as UNICEF often end up in the wrong hands. Lets go for the optimistic scenario in which UNICEF will only take a very small portion for the "processing" and really deliver lets say food and medical supplies to the region. Those warloard will simply come and take it away from those citizens and provide to their armies. Theres nothing those citizens can do against it. Do i wish it wo…
I'm a member of an organization that collects money for Sudanese soup kitchens and hospitals in affected areas ( https://sound-of-sudan.org/ ) , and I know a few other organizations that indirectly support such campaigns (e.g. https://sudfa-media.com/ ). Being personally acquainted with people, who spend much of their time, energy and last-but-not-least their own money on such activities, your claim makes me slightly…
When I referred to "such regions," I was personally referring to a combination of factors: infrastructure, supply chain consistency, reliability, and the general political situation. In this case, I would argue that poor infrastructure impacts transport and storage control when it comes to shipments. Supply chain consistency (even with organizations like UNICEF) is often not guaranteed; local partners change frequently, often influenced by the local situation, making it nearly impossible in some regions to maintain trusted chains. Reliability suffers because of these factors—when it is hard to maintain trusted partners, the problem persists. As for the political situation, I don’t believe I need to elaborate further.
So, when I say "such regions," I mean areas that fit this basic pattern. While not a perfect comparison, a notable example of this is when food supplies sent for civilians are intercepted by local armed groups. The supplies might reach the target location, but they do not always feed the people they were intended for. As you work in this area, you likely know this is not an isolated occurrence.
I am also not from the US, and I cannot speak specifically to the Sudanese American Medical Association. If they are truly creating change, that is a great thing, and everyone is free to donate to them. You will not see me advocating against donating to them.
Regarding your question on why I think you would send aid even if diversion was likely: I don't believe you would willingly fund "warlords." Rather, I believe that in high-risk regions, the intent of the donor doesn't always control the reality on the ground. My skepticism isn't a critique of your virtue or your specific organization, but a reaction to a historical pattern of aid diversion in volatile zones. You do this work because you believe the collected money will reach its destination and will not be abused, and I respect that you follow your beliefs for the "greater good."
You seem to be a good person doing important work, and to do that, you need to believe in the efficacy of your mission.
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What made the Israel-Palestine conflict profitable for influencers (initially on both sides, I’d guess mostly on the pro-Palestinian side now) before the Iran War that doesn’t apply to Sudan?
What are you even talking about. There was and still is much more money to be made on the pro-Israel side. Which media magnates have ever sided with Palestinians again? Virtually all the propaganda money goes to defending the actions of Israel in the Middle East. And the thing that motivated so much grassroot support for Palestinians was the West's total material and moral support to the Zionist project, while the ge…
Has anyone actually measured this? If I were to create two sock-puppet AI-content accounts and let them loose on social media, I'd guess I'd be monetising at a multiple with the pro-Palestinian one. It's just the more-mainstream position in today's media environment across the aisle.
I feel like I have seen better analysis of this elsewhere. In a nutshell, it is not simply a civil war. Regional actors are involved as a proxy war: Saudi Arabia against the UAE, for example (who are also having a proxy war in Yemen). And Egypt against Ethiopia. The wikipedia article covers some of the complexity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudanese_civil_war_(2023%E2%80... EDIT: This is what I am thinking of: htt…
There is a section of the article covering precisely this, headed "The external actors: arms to both sides"
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So work for free? Who would invest in facilities, develop workforces, etc, without a payoff?
I would. I regularly do. One of the underpinning core beliefs of anarchist theory is "wellbeing for all". Every human deserves the best conditions we can collectively give each other, and we should all be working not for our individual enrichment, but for the enrichment of us all. Some people genuinely believe that helping others get bigger quality of life is more important than helping themselves get rich. It's not…
You can have pockets of like minded individuals who understand the give and take, happy communes (which also seem to inevitably collapse, but I digress), however it is comically naive and foolish to think that it can scale to a societal default. Unless you start killing all the detractors and dead weights. Which is where it often goes...I'll stick with an economic democracy based system (people independently vote with their dollars for what they like/want).
This is heartbreaking. Is there a place where I can donate? Will it help in anyway? Edit: Thank you for your responses. Ended up donating to Doctors without borders. Hope it reaches someone. I was going to say humans are really just wild animals but then i thought that would be a disrespect to wild animals.
Dont wanne be the devils advocate here, but reality is that even if you find something "looking legit" in terms of donation, especially in such regions the most money will be "lost" halfway, and even if some will reach the destination it is more than rare that it will even help to benefit those suffering, and not land in the pockets of a few "in power" or just used to buy more weapons to kill more people..... Yes hel…
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I do not know who it is "we", but Trump is certainly NOT trying to stop sending soldiers abroad. Instead, it is using them to attack Venezuela, Iran, Cuba, boats on the see cause killing is fun and to threaten Greenland. Iran is completely pointless and expensive war in particular. Also, pressuring Ukraine to give up more territory then Russia took is NOT "stopping to mess in other peoples affairs" either. Also, what…
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Also the tariffs that Trump imposed are just laughable and have no connection to reality. Do you honestly believe that the EU was imposing tariffs to the US to the tune of 39%?!
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Are you under the impression that Sudan was not under British colonial rule for ~50-60 years? This completely wrecked their economy and political structures, with the British intentionally causing divides between ethnic groups in Sudan and Egypt. And are you seriously claiming that this was a good thing? Is this some crazy new neo-conservative take about the West being the only block that can be "civilized"?
Sudan was under British rule and Cyprus was under British rule at the same time. Outcome is vastly different. The Brits brought civilisation and made Cyprus what it is, enabling its current prosperity (only difference between Cyprus and Greece is that Cyprus was a British colony and Greece wasn't). Somehow it didn't happen in Sudan. And no it's not because they handled locals differently. They didn't care about local…
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America hands out military aid to Israel. Coupons that can be redeemed for weapons with American manufacturers. It’s a subsidy to Israel and to American military primes. This comes to billions each year. That’s one government though. I can’t think of any other western government funding Israel in a similar way.
Germany, Great Britain, Finland, many other European partners. They are purchasing military equipment from Israel, funding their development. Many European institutions also have investments in Israel. And arms used in the Palestinian genocide are being produced in European countries.
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And you will be held as responsible for exploiting the country if you do actually manage to end the conflict and bring about positive economic change. People don't understand that it takes generations to train a populace to work in a functioning economy. Sudan would probably need 25 years of colonization before you had competent Sudanese to run all parts of a modern economy. You can't just go in, stop the fighting, a…
You can develop a country without extracting its wealth.
So if the people of Sudan wanted to buy "country rebuilding service", the only way they could finance the loan to pay for that would be by offering their resources to skilled foreign enterprises to convert to usable resources. Then run the risk numbers and you get a crazy interest rate, that will last decades.
If all goes well, Sudan gets a functioning society with a skilled workforce, the foreign players get a nice ROI and made whole for the service they performed, and everyone comes away happy.
The problem is, that places like this are so chronically unstable, and the people so in tune with living in unstable, that it is practically guaranteed to go sideways.