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The parity of charity
@
Gongalegodaya — last week you said “collecting a few old
clothes and some foodstuff cannot compensate for the
terrible situation that IDPs have been subjected to in
the Wanni.” Instead you called for unspecified work on
other core issues. I agree with your broad goals, but I
feel you are too quick to dismiss charity. We cannot get
to the core if we don’t even scratch the surface.For too
long civil society has offered big words like
transparency, accountability, devolution and human
rights while neglecting people’s immediate needs. People
don’t understand these words and, worse, they now
associate them with inaction and impotence. These words
need to be tied to action and immediate results to
actually inspire and change people.
Democracy in action
Last
week civilians delivered enough medical supplies for
Vavuniya and Padaviya Hospitals to operate better for a
month. They also delivered amenities and even toys to
the children. Every day there are airlifts and trucks
sent to the north.
Gongalegodaya says these actions devalue the government,
but I believe they revalue our democracy.Democracy is
not something our government gives us. It’s what we do.
Criticising and calling for this or that is important,
but at some point it has to translate into action. Right
now Sri Lankans are injured, they are hungry, they are
tired and they are alone. If all our noble ideals can’t
help them at a time like this then they are neither
noble nor ideal.
Dignity in relief
For
too long we have been told what’s wrong with this
country but not what we can do about it. Today it is
quite simple. You can open the newspaper or turn on the
TV to learn about relief efforts. You can ask at home,
work, school or place of worship. You can visit
savevanni.blogspot.com. Citizens of all stripe and hue
are getting together to help our fellow citizens in the
north and anyone can pitch in.Does this in any way
compensate for being kept hostage by a terrorist group
and then bombed by your own government? No, but what
can? This is not about compensating for the past, which
is impossible. It’s about building a better future,
which is.
Incremental change
Most
importantly, action can break the apathy that chokes our
politics. Instead of big insurmountable words like
‘accountability’ and ‘fundamental rights’ we have
actionable words like ‘glucose’ or ‘sarong’ or ‘lorry.’
These don’t change our country overnight, but they show
that incremental change is possible. They show that the
bigger words can deliver results.And we can start small.
We can change ourselves, our family and the people
around us. We can start where we are, with old clothes
and foodstuffs even. These incremental changes have
already delivered better lives for thousands of people,
and hope for thousands more.
Hope
In the
end, that’s the real problem. We want better lives, and
we need hope to make that possible. We can blame
politicians or terrorists or the war, we can trace it
back to the Soulbury Constitution or 1983, but at the
end of the day the only people who can change our lives
is us.Quite frankly, even the powerful can’t do much
about the big problems in the world. But people working
together can. We can help the people displaced and
injured by war. We can call our MPs or provincial
councilors and demand protection of our civilians. We
can condemn the LTTE and their supporters abroad. We can
clean up the garbage on our streets and help the
children and elderly in our lives. There are a million
things we can do, even on a Sunday afternoon.The task
ahead of us is daunting, but it is possible with hope.
And hope is possible with action. Right now, through
tragedy, thousands of Sri Lankans are taking action to
help each other.
Parity
The
power of charity is that it gives to both sides. For
every person that gets a place to sleep, there’s another
that gets a chance to wake up. For every biscuit
delivered there is one more connection between very
different lives. This is not the better life we deserve,
but it does develop the better people we need to make
that life possible.
Be it
through health or hope, both sides get to live.Right now
the country needs us to be all we can be, no matter how
small or insignificant. Because this country isn’t big
words or documents or even laws. It’s us, and we have to
be the change we want to see.
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