In 2007, 36 million Americans required FOOD AID...
 

That is more then the entire Horn of Africa combined

Ethiopia (6 million)
Zimbabwe (4 Million)
Sudan (2 million)
Somalia (4 million)
Kenya (1 million)
Uganda (500,000)
Eritrea (500,000)

so someone explain to me how America is the land of plenty, because last time I checked, there are more Americans needing food assistance to live then in the Horn of Africa, which most Americans think of as the hungriest place on earth?

propaganda is a motherfucker... Americans and the world know how many hungry folks are elsewhere, but in their own country we are all ignorant of the massive hunger and needed food aid for Americans...

for shame too those who think that America is living any better than the rest of the world, it is the same place. There is more violence and killing than in most war zones, there is more poverty than there are people in most countries, and there are more people needing food aid than any other single place in the world, many places combined in fact!

Pray for us all!

bump for future consideration.

Thank you for not providing any links to support any of your claims. That would have just confused us all, really.

Ahem.

According to both the Chicago Manual on Style and also the Modern Language Association format, "You do not need to give sources for familiar proverbs, well-known quotations or commonknowledge."

But its like Lamar Burton said, You dont have to take my word for it..
Feeding America.org
Hunger and Poverty Statistics

Poverty[1]

• In 2007, 37.3 million people (12.5%) were in poverty.
• In 2007, 7.6 (9.8%) million families were in poverty.
• In 2007, 20.3 million (10.9%) of people aged 18-64 were in poverty.
• In 2007, 13.3 million (18%) children under the age of 18 were in poverty.
• In 2007, 3.6 million (9.7%) seniors 65 and older were in poverty.

Food Insecurity and Very Low Food Security[2]

• In 2007, 36.2 million Americans lived in food insecure households, 23.8 million adults and 12.4 million children.
• In 2007, 11.1 percent of households (13 million households) were food insecure, a statistically insignificant increase from 10.9 percent (12.6 million households) in 2006.
• In 2007, 4.1 percent of households (4.7 million households) experienced very low food security, a statistically insignificant increase from 4 percent in 2006.
• In 2007, households with children reported food insecurity at almost double the rate for those without children, 15.8 percent compared to 8.7 percent.
• In 2007, households that were more likely to experience food insecurity were households with children (15.8%), households with children headed by single women (30.2 percent) or single men (18 percent), households with incomes below the poverty line (37.7 percent), Black non-Hispanic households (22.2 percent) and Hispanic households (20.1 percent).
• In 2007, 6.5 percent of households with seniors (1.7 million households) were food insecure (low food security and very low food security), a statistically significant increase from 6 percent (1.5 million households) in 2006.

Use of Emergency Food Assistance and Federal Food Assistance Programs

• In 2007, 3.4 percent of all U.S. households (3.9 million households) accessed emergency food from a food pantry one or more times.2
• In 2007, food insecure (low food security or very low food security) households were 17 times more likely than food-secure households to have obtained food from a food pantry.2
• In 2007, food insecure (low food security or very low food security) households were 19 times more likely than food-secure households to have eaten a meal at an emergency kitchen.2
• In 2007, 53.9 percent of food-insecure households participated in at least one of the three major Federal food assistance programs – Food Stamp Program, The National School Lunch Program, and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children.2
• Feeding America provides emergency food assistance to an estimated 25 million low-income people annually, an 8 percent increase from 23 million since Hunger In America 2001.[3]
• Feeding America provides emergency food assistance to approximately 4.5 million different people in any given week.3
• Among members of Feeding America, 65 percent of pantries, 61 percent of kitchens, and 52 percent of shelters reported that there had been an increase since 2001 in the number of clients who come to their emergency food program sites.3

Top Eleven States in Prevalence of Food Insecurity, Average 2005-2007[4]


U.S. 11.0 percent
AR 14.4 percent
GA 13.0 percent
KS 13.0 percent
KY 12.7 percent
ME 13.3 percent
MO 12.9 percent
MS 17.4 percent
NM 15.0 percent
OK 13.0 percent
SC 13.1 percent
TX 14.8 percent
[1] U.S. Census Bureau. Carmen DeNavas-Walt, B. Proctor, C. Lee. Income, Poverty, and Heath Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2007.

[2] USDA. Mark Nord, M. Andrews, S. Carlson. Household Food Security in the United States, 2007.

[3] Rhoda Cohen, M. Kim, J. Ohls. Hunger In America 2006. Feeding America.

[4] USDA. Mark Nord, M. Andrews, S. Carlson. Household Food Security in the United States, 2007.

tbh i think the definitions of neediness and poor are all relative. So there may well be millions in need of food aid in the us, though i would doubt it is to the same extent. That it would not extend for the same length of time, that mortality rates are very different. Defining the us as a war zone seems pretty insulting to the many countries who haven't seen running water, sewerage, or electricity in years. Not to mention the "right to carry a gun" being very different to having constant gunfire all around you. Not that there is no need in first world countries, but its a very different context.

Ignoring the cities in America where there is at least one gun-related homicide a day is insulting to the many people who live in the absolute terror of the violence in America which kills tens of thousands of people a year. The people who kill each other with these guns were not walking around with them as some kind of right, in fact what they are doing is more a crime than it is to carry a gun in other countries.

I called it a warzone because it is a warzone. There are many shots fired in several neighborhoods here in Los Angeles as there are in going off in baghdad or mogadishu, the difference is there are not explosions, and that is because the police forces often have more boots on the ground than there are in many war-zone cities..

oh yeah, and there are also thousands of americans who themselves live without vital services such as running water or electricity, living in rural poverty.

the point of all this, is for Americans to remember their country is far from perfect, and those things which afflict the world which most Americans, and in fact many people across the world, do not realize occur in the same and even greater numbers in American than in so-called third world countries.

More Americans were killed by gun violence in America this year than in Afghanistan and Iraq combined, probably ten times that number!

Again I say, pray for us all.

Good to see that in your follow up post you provided percentages rather than raw numbers

tell me about !

The statistics may be skewed because there are things that can be tracked in the USA that aren't tracked in other countries as efficiently. I know that there is poverty in the USA, I see it every day - but I'm sure that there are millions of people in other countries that you don't read about simply because they can't walk down the street with their ID and apply for food assistance.

THEN STOP BREAKING THE LAW!!!

fuck the law.

yes but actually that tends to work in reverse. often the statistics for so-called third world countries are grossly exagerated for fundraising purposes.. and American statistics are minimalized in order to reduce the appearance of problems in America..

( laughing silently , can't find an appropriate smiley! )

Dude, come on, watch it now. Do you want to go to prison? I just gotta make one call buddy, one call.

I think it stings the most that it seems as though you're suggesting it's a worse place to exist in poverty, than anywhere else in the world.

which is wrong by a very long margin.

..they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to face the authorities.
20They brought them before the magistrates and said, "These men are Jews, and are throwing our city into an uproar
21by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans to accept or practice."
22The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten.
23After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully.
24Upon receiving such orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.
25About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them..

god they needed all that food aid yet they are all so fat. what a world we live in.

No, my intention is to point out the fact that in the United States there are MILLIONS of people, who if not for handouts, would face a crisis and a disaster, just as there are millions in Africa who face a similar fate. A hungry belly is a hungry belly, regardless of the neighborhood it lives in, and if anything, the fact that hunger exists in such an opulent country as America is frightening to me.

I expect there to be food shortages in underdeveloped countries, but in a nation so extraordinarily wealthy it is scary, that some could sit with SO MUCH while their very neighbors and countrymen are so broke they have to beg for food from the government or the food bank or send their kids to school just to get a free lunch. it is fucking ridiculous.
I do believe it is MUCH worse to live with such morally bankrupt individuals around.. I would rather break bread with the poor and starving then hob nob with the selfish, apathetic bastards.

go work at a soup kitchen or a food bank and find out how great america is for americans..

tl;dr

Seriously, your ideals and opinions are so backwards and contradictory.

HERE and AFRICA are two different things. HERE, anyone has the opportunity to go out, get a job, and live on their own (for the most part... obviously not, in the current economy) (but that's beside the point). In Africa, people have NO CHOICE. They live in camps, waiting for the day they die - hunger, dehydration, being slaughtered by their own government or someone else's, and as far as I'm concerned, THAT is much worse than the whole capitalist idea of "needy". Our own country could use a LOT of work, sure, but obviously we're a lot better off than you'd like to think we are. You probably don't even know what it's like to be homeless, or starving. Imagine living that for your entire life.

how is possession of a substance a crime?

I think the point of the poster's argument is to bring to light the MASSIVE gap between the rich and the poor in this country. Despite the fact that the United States is the richest country in the world, it still faces issues that some of the poorest countries face, even though there is plenty of money within the economy to fix it. Instead of that money circulating fairly throughout the nation, it is concentrated in the upper echelons, leaving some in dire conditions that are nearly impossible to get out of. A "shut up and be happy" attitude is exactly why these problems aren't being fixed. It really comes down to whether you want to be realistic and put food and people's bellies, or cling to the American dream.

I am very aware of the realisticness of the gap of classes here. I've lived in both the middle and lower classes. It's not fun being poor. But I can also tell you there are a lot of ways to put food on the table, whether you earned it on your own or not. There's food drives, soup kitchens, and lots and lots of churches that give away food for free. Me and my mom hit up all of them on the weekend. But I can also agree with you here when you say the economy and the government has a BIG part to play in these things. I hope to jeebus that Obama fixes the gaps and holes in the currenty economy before it gets worse and we hit another great depression... sucks that we're already on the road to such a thing.

i agree with TC. there is a gap in classes but there is a difference between
this


and this


in other words, it might suck t be poor in the states but i highly doubt that there is anyone in the states that suffers a lifetime of malnutrition like they do in africa

my point of that was to say that I could not be afraid of jail, plenty of folks have been to jail before me, and plenty of folks will be to jail after me. This was not to justify the putting anyone in jail, but regardless of the morality of it, jail is jail and even the apostle paul was in it once or twice, and who am I compared to the apostle paul?

a) I don't imagine africans, I am a part of their communities. Some of my good friends here were once starving in those refugee camps you speak of, so don't think I don't understand the situations in Africa.

b) you seriously do not understand hunger in america. It almost sounds like you are blaming the hungry by saying shit like," anyone has the opportunity to go out, get a job, and live on their own"

are you implying that all the people who get food stamps, get free lunches at school, or get food assistance from shelters and food banks are just lazy? Sounds like reaganomics to me! watch out with that mentality, it is bullshit!

People that get food assistance in America are as desperate as many in Africa. Did you know that millions of people in Africa who receive food aid are not scrambling in refugee camps and dying in the bush, but are living in cities and go to work, just like many of the americans who receive similar aid?

The reality of food assistance is that is is provided for people who by circumstance can not afford to feed themselves. You should not judge the morality of the circumstance, just the fucked up situation that for whatever reason, people are forced to beg and receive hand outs for food.

If it is because there is no food in war or famine, that is one thing. But often whether in Africa or America, it is simply a question of rent or food, and most people have to pay the rent.