Oh yes and I am childless and mortgage free lol.

I probably won't be debt free for long however... lol.

@Thucy - my sweet little niece turned into a soul sucking vampire after just two years in DC. She went with all the same intentions when she left OSU. The Congressman who gave me my appointment to West Point and my nomination to New London (Coast Guard academy) was one of those who discovered just how harsh Washington and politics can be when he decided to try and return to the House. See Tom Kindness - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Kindness

Thucydides, I think going to Africa will be more rewarding for you than going to DC. You have to realize that while you will be helping the people there, your purpose there is a selfish one, that is, you are gaining experience, knowledge, and perspective for yourself. The money that is spent sending you over there and keeping you well fed and sheltered could have easily gone to an NGO to hire two or three locals to do the same job, depending on what you'd be going to do. If you're helping to build a school, the money used to send you could easily be used to hire more qualified locals, if you're teaching English, perhaps not as easily.

That doesn't make it a bad idea, because it is important for more priveleged people to expose themselves to a different perspective and reality. However, I think it's still important to keep in mind that your trip will not be selfless. I think you'd contribute more to western Africa if you didn't go to work a manual labour project like building a well for a village but rather used your educational advantage to offer them something less substitutable for local labour.

You raise a good point Chris, but your mistake is in assuming that I intend to go back in forth a lot, and that intend to live a "comfortable life."

You must also keep in the mind that the money I do earn while living there... which by the way is where I intend to live forever if I choose this path, will go into the local economy. I would be an immigrant.

The "taking jobs" theory is relevant still, though, to be sure.

However it is my understanding that there is simply not enough manpower. Not enough "qualified locals," as you say. There can be, but they must first become "qualified." I would argue that this is where I come in.

For instance, imagine if every child in Togo had a school to go to. That in itself would be a miracle, but each of those schools needs teachers. As it stands there are not enough qualified locals to do those jobs. Expand this to other areas besides education, and you will begin to realize that I am not taking anyone's job. Every local who can work in those fields already is, or else they are overseas.... just like me. So look at it this way: my moving to Africa is essentially canceling out on African from the same place with similar skills who decides to move to America for a better life.

Obviously I do not dispute that this is also selfish for me, I do not intend to sound like some selfless martyr. I will be the first to contend that every single action any human ever undertakes is inherently selfish. However in this case my selfishness is not in that I am only there to gain experience, knowledge, and perspective for myself, because this implies I will be there temporarily. Though it is true I will gain those things, I will apply them in Africa, not elsewhere. I intend to remain there once I arrive, you see. So it's not as though I intend to use this experience as a bullet point on my resume for an UN office job. That's why I'm hesitant to agree that I can "just switch from one path to the other whenever." Perhaps so, but I do not know if I am willing to do so.

Additionally, do you not think that my direct and permanent involvement in Africa would cause my friends and family, who otherwise may have contributed nothing, to contribute some money?

And beyond that, you seem to advocate an approach whereby the West merely sends money to Africans. With the corruption that is prevalent there, it is difficult to see how that is a good idea. Of course, there are Africans who are not corrupt just as there are plenty of Westerners who *are* corrupt, but giving money with no "boots on the ground" does not seem like a winning combination to me.

Oh, I misunderstood. I didn't know you were choosing the rest of your life! I thought it would just be for a year or so. If it's for the rest of your life, why do you have to pick between the two? Are they mutually exclusive?

Then become a doctor or engineer and joint he "without borders" programs. We have a civil engineer at our church who has made it his fulltime job to develop water purification and transportation systems in order to get clean water to all kinds of places around the world.

Lol Draug I would.. I just don't have the math skills for it. I think I'm more likely to be in a managerial position or doing grunt work physical labor type stuff. But those kinds of people are absolutely essential, so it's great to hear about them choosing that type of work.

And I don't know Chris... maybe they aren't mutually exclusive. Maybe I'll just wait and see. At the moment, I am strongly leaning toward the direct approach though. It seems like much more a sure thing. There are a lot of "wait and sees" in my rest-of-life plan, but isn't it so with many people?

Anyway thanks for the help. It's definitely not urgent but it's nice to start planning a little bit more ahead... it's also nice to be able to answer the question "so what are you going to do with your degree?"

"it's also nice to be able to answer the question "so what are you going to do with your degree?""

I still haven't found an answer to that question... and I've been out of college for 9 years now. :-O

"rlumley, with respect, that is a load of fucking bullshit. I refuse to believe that and refuse to go through my privileged life blithely while people no better or worse than me suffer horrors too awful for any of us to understand. I will not give up on Africa, not now, not ever. I'd sooner die."

Good. And if everyone were that knee-jerk emotional, we would all die of starvation - you'd get your wish.

"Don't lecture me about Africans and condoms and witch doctors. I know all about what you're talking about... remember... I study it. I spend all my time on it. This is their culture. It is, in this case, detrimental to their health, but this does not mean that they are out of reach of our help or that their culture should be destroyed. It has been bastardized enough by our influence, to do so more would be a crime."

A. You're going there to teach them English. I love the irony in that.
B. I'm the one who doesn't want to interfere - I want their mystical and irrational ways to reach the natural conclusion of attempting to exist illogically - death. I want them to be faced with a choice - reason or death, the same choice that faced every single member of our species when we lived as savages. But now, by the grace of those who are able to produce in this world, not everyone is faced with that choice. Some are able to continue to act irrationally and mystically, while the logical people in the world provide for them. They are, simply put, a leech. And that's what most of Africa is.

I have no problem helping a man stand up when he falls. I have a problem helping a man up, who, upon seeing a banana peel, intentionally steps on it, and repeatedly falls.

Oh, and Re: That first quote:

If you didn't get it from the above, my entire point is that they ARE worse than you.

Are you serious? To be clear you are one step shy of advocating allowing all Africans to die. You have got to be kidding me. How callous can you be?

You fucking racist. They're worse than me? Because of their culture? They are better than just about any fat-ass citizen of an industrialized nation at surviving in the Darwinian sense... I'd like to see how long your racist ass lasts in Africa without the amenities which are bestowed on you by your "superior culture."

Try listening to what I'm saying also... I am not by any means "going to teach them English," that was an example. And I am not "knee-jerk emotional," I just happen to have morals which I deem worthy to be acted on rather than merely discussed. But you don't even have the morals to begin with. You're nothing but a racist.

I don't want to kill them. I want to let them kill themselves. There is a huge difference.

I love that, by calling me racist, you imply that all Africans are of the irrational type I describe. (I realize now that, although I remembered at the time, I forgot to mention that I am obviously generalizing)

At any rate, I'm done having an intellectual discussion with you, because you're obviously not interested in doing anything but reacting emotionally and spewing profanity. If you want to grow up and deal with me as an adult, I'd be more than happy to discuss things further.

Thucy, you don't understand that I AM acting on my morals. I think it's immoral for someone to help someone else live irrationally.

I can cut the profanity if you want, to me those words are no different than other words, that is, they convey meaning.

Pardon my over-emotional response but it is a bit difficult to remain rational with someone who sounds like King Leopold II.

And it is rather convenient that only now after I accuse you of racism do you "clarify" that you never meant all Africans. Fine. So you only mean half of Africa.

No big deal. Just a couple hundred million human beings. You know, whatever. Just let them die. Not like I give a toss about those irrational mystics anyway. Let them starve.

"Thucy, you don't understand that I AM acting on my morals. I think it's immoral for someone to help someone else live irrationally"

So you would prefer they die? I never said I want their irrationality to be sustained forever. In fact I said that the only aspects of their culture I would change (through education) would be those that are detriments to themselves.

"Not like I give a toss about those irrational mystics anyway. Let them starve."

I don't.

And I don't think they would starve in mass. I think when people are genuinely faced with a choice between starvation and logic, I think many will chose logic. Maybe it's the optimist in me.

Although I can sympathize with some of Rlumley's arguments, I have to say that there are no bad or stupid people, uneducated people. Education results in culture.

My point is more that education has been tried and it hasn't worked. If education were successful in getting them to change their ways, I'd be fine with it. But from my own experience in working in inner-city schools (You REALLY don't know that much about me Thucy) generally people aren't interested in learning - and I think years of failure in Africa shows us the same thing.

@ Hellalt: I was hoping you would chime it. You're the only other one on this forum who would actually have the guts to admit to a position like mine. :-)

It's a false dichotomy. Those irrational mystics are only starving because of the rest of the cultured world's demand for cash crops from them. The land is altered, and they begin to starve. They subsisted for millennia before that without the starvation you now see. And yes I agree there is more out there than just subsistence, but to allow these people to starve when they can be helped is... unconscionable.

"But from my own experience in working in inner-city schoo"

Inner city school != Africa.

Also education really has not been tried. It has been merely introduced. What education there has been has been successful in that it has fostered what development there is.

"I can cut the profanity if you want, to me those words are no different than other words, that is, they convey meaning."

I agree completely, but I don't necessarily see what the word "fucking" implies in "You fucking racist", that couldn't be better communicated by other words.

"Also education really has not been tried. It has been merely introduced. What education there has been has been successful in that it has fostered what development there is."

I'm sure you know a lot more about it than I do, since it's apparently what you study. If it is truly successful, as you say, I'd support it. I know people who have gone however, and have said it wasn't productive.

No, I meant what I said. When one makes a statement about a whole people group, saying that (at least some of them) are inherently irrational and doomed by Darwinism to be "weeded out.".... then I think you qualify as a racist. The "fucking" expressed the anger I feel toward racists.

Of course it is not always productive, it must be done in the right way, in the right environment, with the right support, the list goes on.

The point is that there *is* a way to help these people. So doing anything but trying to find and implement it is bad. Again, call me emotional, but this is just me applying what you could call utilitarian morals.

Let me take a stab at rlumley's argument. To date, the African culture you want to give your life to go help is a miserable failure. They die in numbers it is hard to comprehend and do not/will not do certain things to save themselves. There tends to be a great deal of violence and sexual behavior that spreads disease and death. I believe what rlumley is saying is that if you go these lands and simply help these people survive without them fundamentally changing who they are you are commiting an immoral act. If I'm an alcoholic and you give me a bottle of booze, you are an asshole. If you give a starving African a loaf of bread but don't teach him to: 1. Stop killing each other, 2. stop having kids you can't support 3. stop killing each other 4. find some clean water and keep it clean 5. stop killing each other 6. grow some damned food for yourselves already 7. stop killing each other 7. then MOVE someplace where the damned food will grow 8. stop having unprotected sex and spreading aids ....If you are going to teach them English and help hthem build a better mud hut while they continue to not feed themselves and...then you are perpetuating a broken, corrupt, ignorant culture that ought to die off is the argument.

Funny that you say they are so good from a Darwinian sense...and yet you feel you have to go over there to help them survive. that's kind of a stupid argument....