Of course I mean that, great that is one example, but most of the bigger EA organizations are packed with western talent, I will let go off of the 10 top schools point. Have you seen anyone that graduated at Addis Ababa or Trinidad or Cluj, I have not, I have interacted with primarily EU-western oriented people, the closest to diversity is that one random Ethiopian intern.
My point was, easterners are either discriminated against or EA is such an echo-chamber that you unconsciously discriminate against easterners.
NobodyInteresting
Thank you for the clarification, first off you pegged me as a bilingual, I guess it’s a good wild guess when I hate on westerners and diversity or lack there of.
I’ll make a post about my combative tone, I guess our backgrounds are different, for me being combative is good, it’s similar to passionate, it’s simply who I am at this point. Maybe not the best for casual conversations and civil discussions.
Everyone can afford roses and bread, the western world just is not ready for that because then you would actually need to pay the fair price for your garments/goods/services and everything else we do for you.
My opinion on this is, do charity in systemic solutions, rather than providing anti-virals for malaria and that’s all, help the affected regions drain their wetlands, eliminate the populations of mosquitos, help them with spraying equipment and pesticides, introduce predators etc.
Food-insecure places should get food yes, but help their agriculture as well, give them mechanization and the know-how, help them out with money. A tractor costs the same everywhere, but a farmer earning 10-15k$ per year will never afford a 20-30k$ tractor, therefore he will be stuck doing manual labor on a small field with small inputs and very underperforming outputs.
Poverty is a cycle, and to break cycles we need to do big changes in infrastructure, education and personal engagement.
Another field that is gatekept by westerners is knowledge, we really can’t afford your libraries of published articles, hell I live on an income that would pay for 10 articles from Elsevier, god forbid if I have to buy everything (Thank you Alexandra Elbakyan).
THE GENTRIFIED EA ORGS DOWNVOTED ME, seriosly tho, have you seen someone that is not top 10 attendee in an EA organization? Or someone really heavy on the volunteering experiences?
Also if you disagree with me, and downvote me, come in the comments, call me a dumbass, I don’t bite, I just like being provocative, I get the people going.
Get Vincent Rachaniello on that podcast, maybe some other contributors from MicrobeTV as well.
1: Become a farmer.
2: Lack of funds to be a farmer.
(If anyone want’s to support my farmer journey, hit me up in the DM’s, we can draft some sort of a payback program)
I feel like EA organizations have become a gentrified refined versions of what they wanted to be. I look around and see close to no diversity, everyone is from a top 10 university, padded backgrounds and middle-upper western class. Where are the poor people? Do the poors not care about EA?
Is there a lack of talent? No.
It’s simply the bias of hiring the most padded resume, with the gazillion volunteer roles and internships, that the average Joe can’t afford because Joe is a poor.
NobodyInteresting’s Quick takes
This year I donated my time, next year probably my money as well?
The thing is I value my sentience above everything else, so I would experience all the pain you can offer for being alive for 50 years even if those 50 were pure misery. So 10. As long as I have my sentience and memories I can make through, and enjoy the sentience.
I have experienced severe nerve pain, and I would still choose the 10. I love being sentient.