No matter what issue you examine, you can doubtlessly find that somebody somewhere at sometime had it even worse. I think these kind of observations are usually unproductive though; taking this attitude to it's logical absurd conclusion would have you telling people to stop complaining because at least they're not in death camps.
This "somebody somewhere" comparison is callous and dismissive. These are billions of people that live under horrid conditions of tyranny and/or abject poverty.
Hundreds of millions of people lived through the Arab Spring - not "somebody somewhere". Many of them watched their country descend in unprecedented violence that cannot be compared to tear gas and pepper spray.
To them, those are indeed first world problems.
Protesters in Syria were slaughtered with machine gun and anti-aircraft fire. Protesters in Iraq were fired on with machine guns. Protesters in Egypt were killed by snipers from the roof tops, exploded in bombs, and then jailed and quietly executed. Protesters in Libya were massacred by the army - and then by terrorists. Protesters in Iran were shot, arrested, and disappear. AND THEN three of those countries fell into civil war.
As bad as things may seem in the US, they don't even compare to what happens in other countries. How many innocent black Americans were killed by police in any given year? 10? out of 300 million people? ....oh, and the police involved have been arrested and charged?
Please forgive the civilians in Syria who were bombed with nerve gas for not sympathizing - their civil war is still going on - almost 10 years now.
Either I have utterly failed to express myself effectively, or this is not a charitable response. I'm not sure which.
I'll try one more time: it should be possible to empathize with the plights of many people, not only the ones who are worst off. Obviously some people have it worse than others, I hope I've made my acknowledgement of that clear. What I don't find productive is telling some people you don't care about their problems because other people have it much worse.
> These are major HUGE segments of the world population that lived
If it was literally every other person in human history other than those in the present day United States...
...it still wouldn't have any bearing on discussion of the injustices in the United States. It's nothing more than an irrelevant distraction technique.
(And while it's a valid example of the general issue, no one before you raised immediate issues IN THE US.)
> Please forgive the civilians in Syria who were bombed with nerve gas for not sympathizing
Literally no one is asking for that. There is a difference between suggesting that, e.g., the Syrian experience you describe is irrelevant as a deflection in a discussion among people who are subject to, and responsible-as-citizens-for-their-governments-actions in the present problems in the US and suggesting that those American problems ought to be a concern for the victims of the violence in Syria.
I would suspect most people in the current American protest movement, while gratified by the support that has been shown in numerous other first world and even some developing nations, weren't looking for international attention and don't particularly think that it ought to be an urgent concern for people who are neither subject to nor responsible, even in the sense of the Democratic responsibility of citizens, for it.
> ...it still wouldn't have any bearing on discussion of the injustices in the United States.
Of course it would. Because our resources for charity and good will should not be solely given to Americans. There are far far more needy people outside America.
It’s not about who has it worse. That completely misses the point. It’s about accurately reflecting on your personal situation and not drawing absurd conclusions to justify a personal opinion. Let’s call this Dunning-Kruger for sympathy.
If you are trying to qualify who has it worse you aren’t focused on a materially objective outcome. For example many of the people protesting in the US in the past few weeks are trying to raise awareness of systemic racism and for police accountability (different issues, by the way). Most of those people aren’t asking for your sympathy because they are looking for impactful change which isn’t found in sympathy.
I think there may be a miscommunication here. I read "The same absurd comparisons also come up when entitled people people try to talk about poverty when it’s clear they have never seen poverty in the US, much less in an economy where people earn less than $5 per day working 5x harder." as meaning you have no sympathy for the plight of poor people in America because people in other countries experience even more severe poverty. Seeing poverty in America is as easy as going outside and opening your eyes.
> Seeing poverty in America is as easy as going outside and opening your eyes.
That so completely depends upon where you live. My big city of 900,000 people reported their highest measured homeless population ever in 2018 with a sizable jump to about 2000 people. That is tiny compared with many other similar sized cities.
Seeing homeless people, like stepping over a drunkard spilled out over a sidewalk, isn’t the same as diving into the research or getting into some of the personal stories.
A man is standing on a beach after a storm with the tide out, where there are thousands of starfish baking in the sun, slowly dying. The man is picking up the starfish one at a time, and throwing them into the ocean.
A bystander is walking by, and says, "Why are you doing that? There are thousands of starfish and it won't make a difference."
The man picks up another starfish and says, "To this one it matters," and throws it into the ocean.
I mean... there is more to poverty than homelessness. I don't believe that anybody in America has never had the opportunity to witness poverty in America.
