Quote:
Originally Posted by Guinevere  The things I really love (mostly related to Art, one way or another) seem unimportant compared to hunger, poverty, health issues, etc... But what I've been thinking lately is that maybe I could be confusing urgent with important. |
I think you're certainly right. I think that this is a spin on the "Well, a million Protestants can't be wrong": that is to say, hunger and poverty affects lots of people, and thus are the most important things. I think that's the wrong perspective. (I also think I start too many sentences with "I think".)
Hunger is not an issue because millions of people die from starvation. It's an issue because individuals are dying from starvation; to make a dent in it doesn't make it less important.
Two things to think about
: (1) six degrees of separation + pay it forward. Everyone's connected, and anything for anyone can eventually help everyone. I'm not imaginative enough to come up with a tiny story to illustrate this, but perhaps someone else can. Being able to smile at the right person at the right time could easily be like a butterfly in China, flapping its wings. (2) Say all of such massive problems were magically solved in one fell swoop: art, spirituality, etc. would still be just as important. Some things are temporal, and can be solved; other things are permanent, and it doesn't matter what state the world is in for them to be important.