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Celebrity Generosity: A Bad Idea?

I was thinking that there are a bunch of rich people out there who could possibly make a difference by giving most of their funds to efficient, useful causes and organizations.

But then I imagined a negative version of the scenario. Negative and perhaps common sense.

Say Angelina Jolie decides to be good to mankind, and give away everything she owns, all her millions of dollars, in an effort to start and spread a campaign under which every rich person does the same.

This isn't just giving money to people who'll waste it. It's the systematic reorganization of monetary funds in a way that will hopefully benefit all of us. The groups that are working to solve problems and producing results will get the most funding.

So Jolie becomes poor, in the hopes that other rich people will help like she did.

But they don't. They don't believe it will work, and in thinking that way, cause her program to fail. She becomes a regular person, and people treat her rudely.

Bleak. I could go into more detail, but I get the feeling that doing so would serve no purpose other than painting a poorer picture of humanity.

Or would it be accurate?

No, I have faith in people. We can work together, it just takes certain circumstances.

Big Oil And Deforestation Make Sense

In a certain frame of mind.

I was wondering about the really rich guys high up in the food chain with million/billion dollar stakes in the Oil industry.

I realized that if you're living in a selfish mindset, then it makes perfect sense to extend the reign of oil and pollution as long as possible.

Similarly, it makes sense to slice and dice the rain forests for whatever profit they're worth.

What about the world? Isn't there the risk of doing damage?

Yes, but someone high up is probably wealthy enough to pay for the creation of their own little world. Pay for irrigation, air conditioning, generators... Who cares about everyone else? Let them go sit in the air conditioned movie theaters.

Like I said, the selfish mindset seems to justify those types of actions.

But what doesn't make sense to me is why all the wealthy people don't become philanthropists. I thought it was a generally consistent part of human nature that once you reach a certain level of success, you can stop worrying about yourself, and start helping others.

For some people, you don't even need to have money to operate that way...