Success is From Within

              Once again, this week, I will be talking about something different from the normal, yet very relevant to this "campaign". During the first semester of my first year of college (it is still my first year), I watched a video in INST 150 which was a Faith, Reason and Justice class. The video was about Camden; the poverty and violence that has taken over the city. In the beginning of the video, the presenter, Diane Sawyer, said something that touched my heart so much. She said that success is measured from within.

              This touched my heart so much because what she was implying in this case was that, in order for a country to get a correct measure of how successful it is and how achieving it has been, it must first look within it self. It must asses the lives of its people- whether mostly good or mostly bad, the nature of its law systems- whether it is beneficial enough to it people, prevents the oppression of the poor, and most of all, if it brings justice. It must also asses the medical system, the educational system, and many others in order to feel accomplished.
       
               However, what I have observed in this country is the opposite.The United States rather measures its success based what other nations have and do not have. Some people in the United States look at the entire African continent and assume that because the African continent lacks certain things, the United States is way way way way better.  They then assume that we all (Africans) are poor because some parts of a few some countries in the Africa do not have schools that are conducive enough or water that is portable, and that the government is not doing anything about it. Because of this, the United States, which is one country, is better than an entire continent made up of over 50 countries.
       
              It is these same few people with this idea who forget that not all schools in the United States have environments conducive enough to support education for all student. These same people forget that there are so many things lacking in the United States as much as they are lacking in countries in Ghana, Nigeria, Congo, Niger, Tanzania, Madagascar, and all the other countries. Similarly, all countries lack something valuable and necessary. Therefore technically, no one who compares African to America or any other developed country in the world, is morally right.