Day 237: Human Misery Behind High Food Prices

http://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2012/11/world/high-food-price-stories/index.html?hpt=hp_c1

Who benefits from increased food and living costs? Certainly not the average consumer or family, certainly not the farmer and certainly not anyone who is not willing to squash their competition and rip off their customers. We are, after all, each one of us a customer and each one of us a service provider in one way or another. The way that our system is set up requires that there be outright abuse of customers in order for the service providers to be able to profit.

So if the majority of people do not benefit from increases in living costs, why do they continue to spiral upwards the world over? Why do we continue to live in a way that is not to our benefit collectively or individually (most of the time)? Yes, the weather has been influencing the production of food as it has been becoming more extreme, but this is only a small contributor. The cycle of economic collapse continues as more people struggle to get by, so they cut their expenses which impacts on the services and suppliers they normally would support, and then those service providers must cut costs which may include firing people - and so the cycle continues. Everyone is just trying to survive, but all that is happening is that we are falling deeper into the rabbit hole.

It has become a part of our accepted natures that we will only act to make a change when the outcome will affect us personally - so to what extent will we allow this "economic crisis" to continue before we decide to take action and put a stop to this insanity? The rules and moral codes we live by are a fallacy - any rule or code that allows us to see starvation as justifiable is inhumane. "If you don't have money then you can't eat" - why? Many public services are unable to adequately assist those people who are struggling. Clearly, this way of functioning does not work for our society - there is so much abuse accepted - but the illusion of freedom and opportunity is still believed too easily for us to want to make a change - because the problems don't affect us directly. Hearing the horror stories on the news is not enough - not even photo's or video documentaries are enough to spur us into action, no, we will not act unless we have to.

Consider those who start organisations and charities to promote awareness and/or provide support for "victims" of abuse or poverty (etc): in most cases, those who initiate these helping programmes only do so because they have, in one form or another, experienced that which they are campaigning about directly. Maybe their child suffered some accident or illness, or they worked with babies which led them to have an intense emotional experience, or something happened to them directly - in some way, these people were touched by an event so profoundly, that they willed themselves into action with the intention of minimising the amount of suffering that other people may experience in the same situation.

Unfortunately, it seems very likely that as much as 90% of the world population will begin to experience poverty and abuse first hand within the next decade or two. We are able to stop this from happening, by implementing a system in which we value life equally, above all else - so that money will never again be an excuse for a being's suffering.

This life was meant to be fun for everyone - in order to bring this into reality we will all be required to let go of our ideas that money is important.

www.equalmoney.org

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