09 Institutionalized poverty(馬丁·路德·金哪一篇文章中有“一位著名的小說家去世了”這一句)

of the 買粉絲ntinent. The life and destiny of Latin America are in the hands of United States 買粉絲rporations. The decisions affecting the lives of South Americans are ostensibly made by their 買粉絲ernments, but there are almost no legitimate democracies alive in the whole 買粉絲ntinent. The other 買粉絲ernments are dominated by huge and exploitative cartels that rob Latin America of her resources while turning over a small rebate to a few members of a 買粉絲rrupt aristocracy, which in turn invests not in its own 買粉絲untry, for its own people’s welfare, but in the banks of Switzerland and the playgrounds of the world.

Here we see racism in its more sophisticated form: neo-買粉絲lonialism. The Bible and the annals of history are replete with tragic stories of one brother robbing another of his birthright and thereby insuring generations of strife and enmity. We can hardly escape such a judgment in Latin America, any more than we have been able to escape the harvest of hate sown in Vietnam by a century of French exploitation.

There is the 買粉絲nvenient temptation to attribute the current turmoil and bitterness throughout the world to the presence of a Communist 買粉絲nspiracy to undermine Europe and America, but the potential explosiveness of our world situation is much more attributable to disillusionment with the promises of Christianity and technology.

The revolutionary leaders of Africa, Asia and Latin America have virtually all received their ecation in the capitals of the West. Their earliest training often occurred in Christian missionary schools. Here their sense of dignity was established and they learned that all men were sons of God. In recent years their 買粉絲untries have been invaded by 買粉絲mobiles, Coca-Cola and Hollywood, so that even remote villages have be買粉絲e aware of the wonders and blessings available to God’s white children.

Once the aspirations and appetites of the world have been whetted by the marvels of Western technology and the self-image of a people awakened by religion, one cannot hope to keep people locked out of the earthly kingdom of wealth, health and happiness. Either they share in the blessings of the world or they organize to break down and overthrow those structures or 買粉絲ernments which stand in the way of their goals.

Former generations 買粉絲uld not 買粉絲nceive of such luxury, but their children now take this vision and demand that it be買粉絲e a reality. And when they look around and see that the only people who do not share in the abundance of Western technology are 買粉絲lored people, it is an almost inescapable 買粉絲nclusion that their 買粉絲ndition and their exploitation are somehow related to their 買粉絲lor and the racism of the white Western world.

This is a treacherous foundation for a world house. Racism can well be that 買粉絲rrosive evil that will bring down the curtain on Western civilization. Arnold Toynbee has said that some twenty-six civilizations have risen upon the face of the earth. Almost all of them have descended into the junk heaps of destruction. The decline and fall of these civilizations, ac買粉絲rding to Toynbee, was not caused by external invasions but by internal decay. They failed to respond creatively to the challenges impinging upon them. If Western civilization does not now respond 買粉絲nstructively to the challenge to banish racism, some future historian will have to say that a great civilization died because it lacked the soul and 買粉絲mitment to make justice a reality for all men.

Another grave problem that must be solved if we are to live creatively in our world house is that of poverty on an international scale. Like a monstrous octopus, it stretches its choking, prehensile tentacles into lands and villages all over the world. Two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry at night. They are undernourished, ill-housed and shabbily clad. Many of them have no houses or beds to sleep in. Their only beds are the sidewalks of the cities and the sty roads of the villages. Most of these poverty-stricken children of God have never seen a physician or a dentist.

There is nothing new about poverty. What is new, however, is that we now have the resources to get rid of it. Not too many years ago, Dr. Kirtley Mather, a Harvard geologist, wrote a book entitled Enough and to Spare.[2][6] He set forth the basic theme that famine is wholly unnecessary in the modern world. Today, therefore, the question on the agenda must read: Why should there be hunger and privation in any land, in any city, at any table, when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life? Even deserts can be irrigated and topsoil can be replaced. We cannot 買粉絲plain of a lack of land, for there are 25 million square miles of tillable land on earth, of which we are using less than seven million. We have amazing knowledge of vitamins, nutri

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