My husband works with a woman who told him last week that she is against bringing people over to America from Haiti (the Red Cross is specifically thinking about Florida) who have no place to live because we need to “take care of our own country first.”

The next day she lost her very old dog to an illness from which it had been suffering, despite months of expensive acupuncture treatments and veterinary visits. She was crying at work all week about it, and trying to figure out what type of costly burial to have for the dog.

In short: this person has more compassion for a dead dog than live human beings. She was willing to spend money keeping a dog that was ready to die alive for longer than it wanted to be here on the planet, but not on living people who want to survive. And now that the dog is no longer with us, she wants to pay a lot of money to dispose of the body her vet would have taken care of for less than $20. But she thinks those people in Haiti, those people that are still alive and in need, can just stay there and rot, because we need to take care of our own country.

And I’m sure she’s doing SO much to take care of our own country.

“I have running water and a roof over my head and my family wasn’t just killed in a horrible earthquake, but you know, what am I going to do with the dog carcass? I think I need to take the rest of the day off work to mourn.”

Okay, so she didn’t say the first part of that sentence, but you get my point. Fucking ridiculous.

We should never, ever forget how lucky we are. Gratitude is essential. And compassion is a part of gratitude. I really don’t think you can feel one without the other.

My husband was so disgusted he officially requested she not talk to him about anything political at work ever again.

I keep seeing status updates on Facebook that say things like “Let’s take care of our own people before we help Haiti” and “I wish we could get telethons for people HERE that need help” and other such bitter, vitriolic rubbish.

This attitude is so mean-spirited that it is breaking my heart every time I encounter it. And confusing me. I don’t understand why there is a cap on compassion and a limit to love for some people. Why some people think that by helping one person in need we are taking something away from another person in need. I don’t get this at all.

To see people all over the world rallying to help another country in need and to only think, “Why aren’t we helping our own country this way?” seems so small-minded and selfish.

Why can’t we just be happy that someone hurting is getting assistance and that people are being inspired to help others in any way possible? We live in a harsh, sometimes very dark world, and one person lighting the way doesn’t have to equal others in the dark.

Why can’t we simply see any and every good deed as more light in the world?

My point: One less person dealing with horrible conditions and pain is still one less person dealing with horrible conditions and pain, no matter what is happening in our country. This is always a good thing.

I want to ask the people saying things like “Why don’t we take care of our own country first?” what they are doing for our country. To which of their superior American causes do they donate?

And I want to say to these negative people: maybe instead of griping about American dollars going to Haitians, as if they are lesser human beings simply because they weren’t born on American soil, you could have some compassion and realize that we are all connected, no matter where we were born. We all feel pain. We all have hopes and dreams. Some of us are lucky enough to have homes and families. We all bleed the same blood. We cry the same tears. We all have hearts.

Well, most of us.

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