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October 1, 2008
Exclusive: Jellybism? The Case against Bono’s Telescopic Philanthropy
I confess. Bono reminds me of Mrs. Jellyby. Does the name ring a bell?
Do laugh. In The Politically Incorrect Guide to Western Civilization Anthony Esolen writes (268):
[Charles] Dickens is savage in his satire against the liberal penchant for “helping” a faraway and disincarnate Mankind. In Bleakhouse, the tireless solicitor of charitable contributions, Mrs. Jellyby, pesters her fellow citizens to pledge money to assist the natives of Borioboola-Gha, as place as wild as its name, somewhere in the heart of Africa. What are the citizens paying for, you may ask? Why, “the general cultivation of the coffee berry – and the natives – and the happy settlement, on the banks of the African rivers, of our superabundant home population.”
…And more: the scheme will remove a surplus. Not only does Mrs. Jellyby want the Borioboolans to stay in Africa; she’d be happy to send extra Englishmen there, too. Dickens calls it “telescopic philanthropy.” That pattern serves well for our intra-imperialists in the social service and poverty industry.
More about Mrs. Jellyby later.
In 2008, poverty activists – and Bono is not alone here – are pestering us to ignore Christ’s realism. Instead, they say, we must “make poverty history” through their grandiose schemes. And, we must stop “global warming” by adopting international treaties, as snow flakes coat Australia’s mountains.
The poor you will always have with you, and their patronizing enablers?
In ancient times, at least the early Christians, had the good sense to live with the poor they were ministering too. Back then there were no fly-in-fly-out diplomats, no anti-poverty concerts with lavish gifts for pop princesses, no sermons from poll-dancing ethicists, and, certainly no “organic fair trade” coffee hysterics, with backroom agendas. Bono’s Christianity, to be sure, resembles a “telescopic philanthropy” with a smile.
More and more, the cult of Mrs. Jellyby asks us to ignore real terrorist state threats, because the earth is either warming or cooling. Sometimes it is widening! Socialists pester us too “make poverty history” through politically correct “debt relief” programs. Dictators can wash their bloody hands clean, start anew, and borrow more tomorrow! Ohio’s worker ants can relieve their debts next week, if they have factories to return to.
It’s a question of commonsense too. Bono, for example, praises Al Gore, on the pages of Time (07/01/08). “Is he Noah or King Canute? Are we prepared to make the difficult choices? We cannot let the children of the developing world become canaries in the coal mine.”
It’s embarrassing. Yes, “the children.” Bono lectures us on rising tides (“by 3. feet”), so-called climate refugees (perhaps “100 million”), and how Gore’s “great, global spiritual revival” can counteract the “global-warming crisis.”
Or take account of this revealing sentence: “With the poor as partners we can slow overpopulation – as we must, because overpopulation means more pollution.” Are there too many of “them”? One can imagine Mrs. Jellyby parroting similar lines. Alas, pop stars can afford to praise green evangelists. Can dead Africans?
Professor William Easterly, the author of The White Man’s Burden sighs (page 7): “The Planners have the rhetorical advantage of promising great things: the end of poverty. The only thing the Planners have against them is that they gave us the second tragedy of the world’s poor.” He adds: “Poor people die not only because of the world’s indifference to their poverty, but also because of ineffective efforts by those who do care.”
How many “carbon credit eaters” are in Al Gore’s family, by the way? Bono’s? When will Hollywood organize a Make Dictators History campaign? Where are the Make Dichloro- Diphenyl-Trichlorethane Available to the Poor concerts? When are we going to see some Make Jellybism History gigs? What motivates the Jellbyists to ignore the impacts of Isalmofacism on fragile communities? Why this piercing silence? No wonder anti-democratic Jellybists are keen to close debates. They offer no real answers.
Yet, on the up side, Dickens gives us a little hope. Sure, there is Mrs. Jellyby, but there is also one Esther Summerson. Esolen explains:
What’s lacking is a direct, incarnate confrontation of one human being with another. People are patronized, reduced to ‘cases,’ handled according to rule.
…The results are at best temporary, and the victims of the assistance are rendered moral children or idiots. Dickens shows us instead what is to be done, not by giving us an alternate Program, but by embodying charity in the person of his politically incorrect heroine, Esther Summerson. She reveals, by her diligence and patience and winsome cheer, that in the truest sense an economy really is the law of the household. Governments and philanthropists fail where Esther succeeds, because she dispenses with the telescope. She sees wickedness and despair and wretchedness for what they are.
Humbleness speaks louder than pop music.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Ben-Peter Terpstra, an Australian-European satirist, is a contributor to a number of websites, from On Line Opinion (Australia's e-journal of social and political debate) to American Thinker. His pieces are also posted on his blog, Pizza Trays and Beer Bottles.
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