I love capitalism, and I want to scream it from a mountain top, because while living in a third world country for the past month, I have been screaming it from a toilet seat.
Never before would I have rooted for a system that produces evil men like Dick Cheney, Karl Rove and Kenneth Lay, but then again I have never had to seal my lips shut in the shower because the water was so contaminated each drop is more dangerous than nitro-glycerin gloves on a chimp’s clapping hands.
One smiling hotel owner tried to ease my apprehensions of drinking the shower water, and told me they used desalinized ocean water and not contaminated well water – I learned “desalinized” means pumping freezing sea water that still tastes like a wet salt lick directly into your shower. A cheap beer taste lingered in my mouth one morning, and washing it out in the salty shower made me gag, and then pray to Microsoft and Pfizer for deliverance back to my wonderfully capitalistic country.
If Moses had 10 commandments burned into stone for his people, I was given two commandments carved into bathroom walls by former sick travelers: Don’t drink the water, and don’t eat unpeeled fruits and vegetables!
Sara Brickner, a student on our summer trip, constantly drooled over tomatoes while she skinned them, not even trusting the fanciest of restaurants, and her Facebook status read “excited to eat a big fat spinach salad” a few days before heading home to Eugene.
Another student in the summer program, who calls himself Andrew Kelley, but whom I believe is really the bastard child of Johnny Cash and Ponyboy Curtis from “The Outsiders,” said his most memorable day came from setting a new personal record for the number of times he was attacked by tainted food-induced Montezuma’s revenge – 12.
Karl Marx once said, “The capitalist would sell you the rope with which you intended to hang him.”
He was dumb.
Capitalism uses the same rope it produced to lasso comfort, cleanliness and progress, and then with sanitized hands the capitalist hauls in those amenities and brings them home for his or her family to enjoy. The often-recited hippy/socialist mantra of “capitalism is the scourge of the Earth and exploits the local indigenous people,” should be replaced with the more appropriate, “perhaps we are all spoiled rotten here, but at least our fruit isn’t.”
Dirty water and unsanitized produce may be pervasive in the under-developed world, but are no more pervasive than corrupt governments, children on street corners or devastated economies.
How can one expect a country like Ecuador to succeed when it has had eight presidents in the last 10 years, and in the last 15 years only one president has served his full term? The newest one, Rafael Correa, openly supports Hugo Chavez’s communist regime, destroyed the nation’s constitution, and scared off any and all foreign investors – not bad for six months in office.
What we tourists see as romantic, sand or dirt streets and children kicking balled up T-shirts around, is depressing and problematic to many developing-country citizens. They want paved roads and a Nike soccer ball, and to get them, millions are leaving home and coming here. The U.S. government says 10 to 11 million illegal immigrants currently reside in the U.S., but many believe there are 15 to 30 million that have successfully made the northern migration here.
I dream of winning the lottery and what I’ll do with all that cash, even though I never play, which I believe may be counterproductive. In the third world, many dream of winning the green card lottery and what they’ll do with all that capitalistic freedom – 8.7 million entries were received last year, and an estimated 14 million will apply next year.
One taxi driver told me he applied for a visa to work in the U.S., and George Bush rejected his application. “I hope he gets in my cab some day so I can ask him why he said no when he has never even met me,” he said.
What often remains is a lack of care and respect for the indigenous culture by the local people and not by some evil-horned system of international government. To preserve the cultures and histories, and to combat such disastrous problems of disease and poverty, the funding often comes from corporations, philanthropists and the ever-increasing number of foreign aid programs. The museums, culture centers, support programs and information signs educate people that epidemic levels of disease are a product of capitalism.
In 2005, Americans donated $95.2 billion to the developing world, including the U.S. government spending $27.6 billion in official foreign aid. $73 – that’s what every American gives to under-developed nations each year.
While capitalism may have its problems, at least I can stretch out on my comfortable couch, in an air-conditioned room, with a full belly that isn’t busy punching my throat and colon to immediately get out any tainted food, and think about how I can help solve those problems because the economic system I live under is currently the best there is.
Capitalism in one hand, diarrhea in the other
Daily Emerald
August 1, 2007
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