"I must do something" always solves more problems than "Something must be done."
~Author Unknown
Where do you live? Of what larger entity are you a part? Of what place are you a citizen? I, personally, am a citizen of Pensacola, FL, Escambia County, the state of Florida and the United States of America. Each of those levels of citizenship comes with its own set of responsibilities. However, the citizenship that is the most meaningful to me is being a citizen of the world. Moreover, I want to be known as a responsible citizen of the world.
This means many things to many people, but to me there are two things of primary importance in being a responsible citizen of the world community.
#1: Support equality for all people. All people should have the right to live their lives free from the fear of being injured, raped, assaulted, abused, or even murdered by other people. All people should have the right to be respected as humans. All people should have the right to fair competition for jobs, houses, and other privileges.
There are numerous sets of anti-discrimination laws at various levels of government both in the United Stated and around the world. These are vital to prevent any one person or group of people from limiting the basic rights of any other person or group of people based solely on irrelevant, and often superficial, standards such as age or gender or race or religious beliefs.
I believe that all people are born with the right to equal freedom. While some people break laws, in effect forfeiting those rights and freedoms, most people who lose their rights do so as a result of the greed or corruption of others.
#2: Help as many as you can as much as you can, whenever you can, and wherever you can. Unfortunately, most of us do not have the resources to give to everyone in need. Many of us, if we had unlimited resources, would make a genuine effort to devote a great quantity of those resources to helping those less fortunate than ourselves. I hope that all of my friends would be that way. I want to believe that people who would be selfish, even with unlimited resources at hand, are in the minority.
But most of us, as I said, cannot help all the people who need help. Most of us cannot even help many of the people who need help. However, if you can help at all, in any way, in any amount, do it! Any small amount of assistance is better than receiving no assistance at all. In particular, if you want to direct your assistance in one particular direction, my personal suggestion is to direct your resources toward those who are unable to help themselves: children, elderly, disabled, and disadvantaged.
Note: If you're a Pensacola resident looking for a worthy cause, check out Father Nathan Monk and his efforts to help the homeless in our area.
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Responsibility Series, January 2012
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