Children are dying of hunger in Yemen right now

[27pounds17]

www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/nov/02/end-war-yemen-children-conflict-escalates-around-hodeidah-hospital

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/02/children-dying-war-zones-targeted-impunity

AIBU to wonder how in this day and age this is still happening? What is the UK doing and are we selling arms to the region? It's absolutely heart breaking, what can we do?

From the article

Words cannot do justice to the moral depravity on display. Children are deliberately targeted for killing, abduction, rape and recruitment into armed groups. Others are treated as “collateral damage” in attacks on civilian infrastructure. Schools – and schoolchildren – are regarded as legitimate military targets. They are bombed in their classrooms or, especially if they are girls, assaulted for the crime of attending school. Obstructing humanitarian aid is now a standard military tactic, depriving children of access to food and medical aid

How can we help those in Yemen? At the moment there is little point giving to charities that provide food as the food cannot get to the intended people as the Saudis have bombed the ports so that the food cannot be unloaded in Yemen.

This article is from last year but it does show which organisations are able to work in Yemen and how they’re helping. If you want to see what different charities are actually doing month by month they will sometimes publish situation reports which gives the facts and figures around what they’ve done that month and over the previous month. It really helps you understand just how complex the situation is and how much support is actually needed: www.pri.org/stories/2017-11-29/heres-how-you-can-send-help-people-trapped-worlds-worst-humanitarian-crisis

But there is definitely a point in donating to a charity working in Yemen, because they ARE able to reach the people who need help.

It's clear to me that the topic is way above my head. However, if the British government supports inhumane regimes such as SA, the British public is in part to blame for the suffering of starving children in Yemen and elsewhere because of how we voted. This thread is not about faux compassion but about my realisation of my own ignorance and complacency. I simply don't feel informed enough to talk about this or help in any meaningful way. The only thing I do believe, despite my obvious ignorance, is that Survival is a hard, hard environment is not a natural law and that we all contribute to making this world more inhumane than necessary.

Can we really not do better?

I will donate to MSF UK.

Survival is a hard, hard environment is not a natural law

That is where you are allowing your compassion to over rule reality. Think about what you typed. You effectively said that nature is not natural. That is your heart ruling your head. I know how that feels, that is why Live Aid was initially so powerful!

Yes, we can do better. But we, the individual, cannot do a lot. We have to choose the little thing we can do. For me that has been twofold:

I lobby my local MP and get them to at least consider what they can do when presented with options in their every day round

I choose to support very specific charities, ones that provide long term, sustainable input. I choose to make a small change that I know will positively impact a small geographical area.

I am not sure about MSF, as they don't do much/anything to support local staff. I understand that that is not their remit but, knowing someone who went and was incredibly frustrated by this lack. It becomes apparent why this is a problem when they have to leave places like Nauru. But they do seem to be proactive when they have staff accused of sexual abuse.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/28/the-nauru-paradox-why-help-patients-regain-hope-when-it-is-dashed-systematically