>>They don't need sympathy nor charity, they need healthcare, education, jobs.
>
>HAHAHHAHHAhAHAHA.

You forgot the bw prefix.

>If someone can't get an education or job on their own, and we help them get it, that's not charity? That's not sympathy?

That's solidarity and teaching them to fish so they can fend for themselves. Which most would do. Then the remaining ones are either so by reason of being truly unable (undiagnosed mental illness or whatever) or by their own free will - not by guilt of society.

The difference between charity and solidarity is profound. I've come to understand that it goes quite deep, to the foundations of a culture. In short, solidarity happens between equals. Charity flows down - it requires the existence of the high and the low. The wealth has to go up first before it goes down.

>Get real.

In this reality of yours, I may be willing to help with something substantial (and you don't really know whether I'm already doing that or not, and that really isn't important). But symbolic acts, designed to increase awareness etc - c'mon, there are thousands of them. You can spend every second of your day just becoming aware of all the things you need to be aware of.

>You're smarter than that.

Let's say that I just want to level the playing field, not to duck for a day so we could look shoulder to shoulder at the guys across the field.

>>What will a day of fasting do?
>
>Excellent question.
>
>When was the last time you went a day or two without eating?

No idea. I figure that even in December of 1993 we still had some bread and bacon around the house, and maybe an odd bag of macaroni, so even in those months when our real income was around $10/month on a family of five, we still ate every day... not much, not too diverse, but ate.

That's what Orthodox Christian religious nuts do to get themselves into proper religious fervor. Remember old man Zosima from the Karamazovs? Stuff like that was real, and there probably are guys like that even nowadays. Third day, they're probably believing pretty much anything.

I don't see how fasting helps anything but getting into a different state of mind. You can achieve different state of mind by hyperventilating, or by just going to sleep. I prefer my mind staying in working condition, got code to write and a family to feed.