When The Charities Collapse The Country Will Follow

During the long summer vacation many thousands of children across the United States go hungry. Summer feeding programs such as The Lunch Box, which is run from an old yellow school bus, say they are seeing unprecedented demand for free food.

In an interview with Sky News US volunteer driver Paul Beckner said:

“Oh yes the need is here – we have kids that come on and that say they don’t have any food in the house. We have other kids who come who, regardless of what we give them, eat every bite and are glad to get it – so the need is definitely here.”

The Lunch Box moves around the small town of Rogersville Tennessee and ever increasing numbers of children climb aboard to eat what is likely to be their only nutritious meal until the bus returns.

The Lunch Box is one of many such schemes that operate throughout the United States and supervisor Brett Trent said:

“This year more and more new faces have been turning up asking for good food – we’re working hard to serve more food to try and keep up. The saddest thing for me is that for the kids it’s just normal, they don’t know any different, it is normal for many of them to be hungry.”

The Feeding America organization which co-ordinates the countrywide network of food aid said:

“Proper nutrition is vital to the growth and development of children, particularly for low-income children. The nation’s economic growth depends on the well-being of our children. As such, the existence of child hunger in the United States threatens future American prosperity.” (source)

It’s not just the United States that has experienced an upsurge in food aid participants. The UK and Europe have all seen an unprecedented rise in the amount of people needing to rely on charity to get a decent meal. A high proportion of those going hungry are children.

There’s something disgusting that in the First World, in countries which spend millions of dollars on vacations for heads of state, kids are going hungry.

That countries which can spend billions on hosting sporting events such as the Olympic games have children who will not eat today, or maybe even tomorrow.

That countries which bow and scrape to the United Nations and give billions and billions of dollars to foreign aid programs cannot feed their own people.

The whole system stinks and it’s the most vulnerable in society that are paying the price of the political gamesmanship that is endemic throughout the so called First World countries.

While Obama, Cameron, Merkle and company enjoy their summer breaks, free from the confines of their day to day political activities do you think they will give a thought to the children of their countries who will go to bed hungry tonight?

I am all for charity but as long as charities continue to provide for these people the governments will do nothing. Why should they? If the people are eating and it’s not coming out of the government’s pockets the politicians  sleep happy.

Anything that can be passed off to charities will be, it stands to reason they are not going to pay to feed the hungry, or shelter the homeless if someone else is willing to do it.

The problem is austerity is biting. The public at large are struggling, they have less to give, less to donate to charities as they struggle to keep food on their own tables and the roof over their families heads.

Ultimately, as things get tighter and tighter, there will be nothing left to give and then what?

After decades of relying on charities to sort out the mess, they won’t be able to due to lack of donations. Those that rely on the food banks and feeding schemes will have nothing and people with hungry kids get desperate very quickly.

Think about it, your kids haven’t eaten for a couple of days…you’d do it, you’d beg, steal or borrow to get them a meal wouldn’t you? I know I would.

When that happens, when the charities can no longer cope either through overwhelming need or due to lack of charitable donations they will collapse. From that point on the only way the country is going is down.

People will steal from their neighbors, fights will break out, riots where food is the prize will become the norm. Shops and stores will be flash mobbed for food  they will be as likely a target as a designer outlet.

Malnutrition will spread amongst the least well off. Those who have no entitlements, regardless of the reason, will join the hungry swelling the numbers. Those who are having to pay the hidden taxes that governments are so fond of imposing will cut back further on food to meet their already heavy obligations to those governments.

Senior citizens who already have to seek out what’s left of the pensions that haven’t been stolen from them will have a choice between heat and eat when the winter comes. Rising energy costs will increase the misery for the elderly and families alike adding cold to the burden of hunger.

The death spiral will escalate and the country will collapse. The demise of charities, underestimated by most of us and relied upon by governments around the world will signal the beginning of the end.