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Funny to see you people discussing petty caviar-allowance inequality so fervently within your own arbitrary Western borders yet never giving much mindshare to the rampant "developing" country exploitation that is the very source of your general prosperity.

I'm a citizen of third-world country that is being sucked dry by the West for its resources and getting its people shackled to the ground by direct support for the ruling dictatorial regime.

I don't even know why I'm writing this..

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I see what you mean and it is bad. Until we have nations merge however, there's nothing we can do even when the system is working at it's theoretical perfection. Our people live in demarcated areas with separate rule sets.

When it comes to the rich vs poor in Western society we are ostensibly equal and many people are upset because reality doesn't reflect that. When it comes to the US vs say Burkino Faso, what would the correct course of action be? There's exploitative actions being taken by individuals and companies against developing nations that could stop, but then what happens? I don't think sweatshops are good but no western company is going to source goods from them if they aren't cheap as the quality isn't the same. We could try to help other nations get to the same quality of life, but many have made it explicitly clear that they don't want interference from foreign powers.

Do we act paternalistic and do what we think is right for other people which removes their autonomy? Do we avoid that and avoid exploiting them, but leave them in the dust because they have nothing we want or need if they are using regulation and price arbitrage to gain business? Do we continue as we currently do which sends money into these countries which should help them develop, but tends to be spread unevenly and causes a lot of human despair?

I can't tell what the right answer is, I can't tell if there even is a right answer

1. Exploitative actions taken by individuals and companies are nothing compared to the ones taken by your governments. Europe is running cheap education improvement programs here as we speak, and other such show-tell crap, but they also sign exploitative deals and house corrupt blood money of my dictator in your banking systems - giving him free-pass to do as he likes, as long as the deals are signed and people are silenced. It's realpolitik all the way down.

2. We do want interference, interference against your current interference.

3. Just let us establish our own instutitions, stop helping and making deals with criminals, stop putting on the mask of being humanitarian and then exploiting the living shit out of us.

4. Work visas - please make them available for the skilled and offer us some channel for escape. We are majorly landlocked because our passports don't even grant us a tourist visas to anywhere other than bumhole Somalia or Afghanistan.

I could go on for ages but you people have so vastly different view on these issues I don't even feel like it would be worth my time.

I'm European and, like almost all, don't want my government making deals with dictators. If there's some press coverage about the things you say at least we can make enough noise that it gets the attention of politicians.

Regarding 4, I'm curious why it's in this list with the others. It certainly makes life better for the individual, but doesn't losing all its top talent to foreign countries hurt developing countries?

As I said, vastly different views, to the point of being annoying.

We, as a country, are not in the business of "country-building" but rather survival and that of avoiding pain. Our government doesn't need talented individuals - they just need brainwashed populace and stability for their power. Thinkers are direct infraction to the system and usually are not tolareted.

Also, what do you expect disarray of talented individuals with no power to concentrate power to do alone in a society that doesn't recognize nor like them?

So you solution (highlighted in point 4) is to move to a Western country and become part of the problem?

I think the "casual game theory" of (4) is, if you want to improve those places, let them have work visas. There are people in certain countries who can be empowered through work visas to pursue their calling (pastors in churches, teaching mathematics in universities, sizing contact lenses of the rich and idle or whatever). Those who choose not to apply for the visas will maybe try something at home, knowing they can get that work visa if what they try doesn't work. And maybe in the trying they will find a different calling than they thought. In succeeding at the things they try at home they might lower the need for work visas.

Yea, you shouldn't be writing it. It's generalized criticism of an entire part of the world.

Your preposterous, jingoistic, anti-Western sentiment has no place in intelligent discussions. You don't even identify what country you are from or if you were even born/raised there.

And also, from your other comments - you live in the West. The very prosperity you are enjoying you are condemning that others have it around you. You are a hypocrite and reading further statements from you is useless.

@leashless has a very good talk about this. His thesis is basically that even when Westerners talk about economic collapse they are talking about living in the same conditions that the people that grow your coffee currently live in, and refers to "militarized islands of prosperity" that came out colonialism, etc. A great talk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkQCy-UrLYw

You're absolutely right. I'm sorry. What can I do?

What resources are being sucked at what price per unit resource, and what amount of that price is kept in-country for investment and for paying the laborers?

Is your argument that "the West" isn't paying enough? Or that the money being paid isn't making its ways into the right pockets, or, ... what?

EDIT: To be clear ... I simply don't understand your summary of the complex phenomenon of "being sucked by the West".

What makes you think the conditions in your country don't exist here?

Just a question: How many countries have you visited?

In asking this, I'm assuming that since you say "here", your PoV is the United States. If that is incorrect, I apologize.

I've visited about a dozen countries. Some of them "third world." The US has pockets of communities that are as impoverished as anywhere.

I'd hate to call them "as impoverished as anywhere", but there are some pretty rough spots in the US to be sure.

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