What's the Difference?

Jacquielynn Floyd wrote a column about the Haiti earthquake. She brought up that Royal Caribbean Cruise Line, only a week or so after the disaster, had resumed bringing its passengers to its beach on the northern side of the island. "How do you snooze in a rope hammock while, on the far side of those emerald mountains, tens of thousands of desperate human beings are still trying to extract their dead from wreckage?"

I have a bit of a different take on it. Are those people snoozing in hammocks in Haiti any less heartless than she for snoozing comfortably in front of her warm fireplace? Would they be better people if they stayed on the ship? And what about those Haitians who work on that beach? They make a fair amount of money from these heartless tourists. Why should we make their suffering worse by drying up their source of income? It appears to me that these tourists are helping in some small way by taking their business there.

It's like this -- unless you've made some great sacrifice to help the Haitians, don't judge other people for what they've done or not done for them.

"Cruise ship stops in Haiti bring bad PR, good deeds." The Dallas Morning News; January 22, 1010; p. 1A.