The Growing Chasm Between Our Worlds

By Jim Hubbard | October 19, 2006

“If you’re a political junkie (especially one from Hollywood) this was almost as good as Oscar night,” a reporter stated in the Calendar section, normally reserved for entertainment and arts, of the Los Angeles Times in a story about the party in New York where the attendees doled out $15,000 a piece to attend Bill Clinton’s Global Initiative and mix with some of the world’s most rich and powerful.

There is a chasm as deep and wide as the Pacific Ocean between that party and the grim reality of millions of humans living in unbelievably wretched conditions.

It is without question a lot more comfortable and fun to attend a posh event with people like Bill Gates and Bill Clinton than it is to put oneself in a situation to observe firsthand hundreds of thousands of children who have lost both parents to HIV/Aids, raising their siblings in shacks without running water and electricity.

It would be naive to think that some of the world’s richest would open their large wallets to address the world’s woes without access to mix and mingle with global celebrities, and the sums of money privately raised to stem some of the world’s gravest ills is phenomenal and unprecedented. Of course, while the checks being written are large it balances with the enormous wealth of the donors.

I can’t help but think that the message is distorted and confusing. The lack of understanding and knowledge between our lives in the U.S. and those in Africa and other Third World nations minimizes the sacrifices we may all have to make to ameliorate the world’s dramatic inequities.

Photographs that we sometimes see in the media certainly symbolize some conditions, but seeing a picture does not convey the eyewitness experience of smelling burning and dying flesh, seeing people without life’s most basic necessities, hunger, or pain from the loss of loved ones. Most observers, be they journalists, aid workers or curious travelers, usually shed tears from what they witness. I wish the story about Clinton’s event had talked about the tears shed for the world’s suffering.

Even photographs, though, can be compelling, raise awareness, and build compassion for the world’s least privileged. However, in the American media, social documentary photography that historically depicts human suffering has all but disappeared in our media outlets and been replaced by images of entertainment, advertising, sports and other popular lifestyle images we enjoy.

True, it was a feel good event and raised funds to help the distressed of the world. Let me caution, however, based on my global travels, there isn’t much to feel good about once you are aware of the enormity of human suffering that exists on our planet — no matter the size of your check.