Dear Yabby,

You have no way of knowing what any of us have
done to help. However if you wish to contribute
in any way - seeing
as you said you judge people by their actions -
put your money where your mouth is. You can
donate here:

http://www.unicef.org.au/Discover/News/072011/Horn-of-Africa-drought.aspx

Houellie,

Of course, the object of your articulate buffoonery is, no doubt, to rile us, however, it's more like we're bemused by the class clown who never grew up, who persists with the erroneous notion that he is scintillatingly entertaining, witty and clever.
It's like engaging with a perpetual schoolboy who believes the behaviour that impressed his pimply mates still cuts it - well it does with the likes of Yabby, but that's understandable.
In fact, I've always given you the benefit of the doubt for your style on OLO, even chucked a bit of praise your way...but the reality is that any grown-up who thinks it's superlative to pepper his posts with hahaha's every ten lines should really be contributing to a teen skateboarding mag...just the place for you Houellie. I'm sure you'll impress them there.

Actually Lexi, evolutionary psychology is pretty good at predicting
what you will donate. Enough to trigger the feel good endorphins
which come into play with altruism, but not enough to interfere
with your cushy lifestyle. Besides, we haven't heard of you
selling the house or cancelling the holiday.

I would never donate to Unicef. That will only perpetuate the Africa
problem, not work towards a solution. Their US CEO earns around
450K$ dollars a year, even senior Australian admin staff earn
200k$ a year, far more then I earn. So they really don't need my
money in the first place.

What I have given in the past has gone to small organisations to protect
the great apes in Africa. They are down to their last few thousand
as the ever growing human population eats the last of them. Silly
me thinks that they deserve a spot on this planet too, not just
wall to wall humans. These groups need funds far more then the UN.

The only fund that I would donate to for African human aid, would be
one which provides family planning services for women who can't
otherwise afford them.

Dear Yabby,

My life style is far from "cushy."
When you have a young family, children,
elderly family members that require
high care (24/7). It not only keeps you
employed, takes its toll physically,
and financially as well. As for cancelling
a holiday? Done that too many times to count.

However I am delighted to hear that you have
donated to the Great Apes of Africa funds.
The Great Apes were being wiped out by hunting,
commercial trade in their meat and by the spread
of diseases such as the Ebola virus. As I wrote
on my "Species Extinction," thread - I've been
a financial supporter of IFAW (International Fund For
Animal Welfare) for many years. Over the years their
campaigns have grown to embrace the Great Apes, Elephants,
Rhinos, Bears, Tigers, Whales and many other animals
under threat.

One final thing - if you're really interested in
donating to Family Planning Services for Women in
Third World countries you can contact -
"Medecins Sans Frontieres," (Doctors Without Borders)
at:

http://www.msf.org.au/donate.html

BTW: Our family has been a financial supporter for years.

Lexi:"Our family has been a financial supporter for years."

That sounds a lot like "look at me, I'm virtuous" as Houellebecq suggested. Has anybody in your family missed a meal so that some starving African child might get a bite to eat? Thought not. As I said earlier, our children and our lifestyles are far more important to us than the suffering of some other person in some other land. If it wasn't for TV we wouldn't know or care about it and I'm damned sure that if the tables were turned, they would gladly ignore us just as hard.

Then there are all the disadvantaged people here in our own country. There are lots of very poor Aboriginal communities less than a day's drive from your place Lexi. When was the last time you and the family went off to volunteer to assist those people to get somewhere? Perhaps a day or so of looking after kids so Mum gets a chance to have a break? Perhaps a bit of using your degree to assist people to learn proper English? All a bit dirty and smelly for you? And there's people sitting around drunk! The horror!

You're right, you're much better off giving some spare change to a group of people who will at least use a little of it to go to the dirty, nasty places and do something. It would just be too much to expect anyone in your family to get their hands dirty...

As for me, I'll happily spend my money on my own family.

This one's not particularly relevant to the situation in Somalia but if the geography is not important.

http://www.filterpurefilters.org/

I have a US based friend who has a good friend who's working with them at the moment which gives me some confidence that it's legitimate.

R0bert