First, I'd like to extend my congratulations to Mr. Belinsky for showing up to Concert for a Cause. I am glad he enjoyed the music. Concert for a Cause attempted to raise money for Doctors Without Borders to support their medical mission in the Sudan.
After I read Belinsky's op-ed ("Change the World," Aug. 2), I realized what it was that Concert for a Cause truly combats -- ignorance. This article perfectly articulates my greatest fear -- that some will not get the point.
No one on this campus believes that a concert will stop a genocide. T-shirts won't do it either. However, not only will raising money for great causes such as Doctors Without Borders alleviate suffering, raising awareness will also break the blissful bubble of American life within which Mr. Belinsky currently resides.
I am glad that he lives in a town like Roswell, Ga., and, though I fear that he is also missing domestic abuse, sexual abuse, alcoholism and other social problems in his assessment of his own hometown, it would be nice if the rest of the world were so perfectly calm.
But let's not lie to ourselves -- the Sudan is nothing like his little piece of suburbia. There are more areas of the world like the Sudan than like the United States -- Democratic Republic of Congo, Nepal, Columbia and many others.
To ignore pandemic problems like genocide, torture and rape is not to explore the world, but to see the world precisely as you want to see it, not as it is, as he says. He is missing his own point by using this phrase.
When parents came up to me at the Darfur benefit concert this weekend and asked what was going on in the Sudan to warrant such alarm, I understood why these kind of events are so essential.
It was not only to raise money for a great organization (one which, for the record, has had the most success and has the greatest prospects for continued improvement of conditions in the Sudan), but also to make people realize that the world outside of Hanover, N.H., is not quite as peaceful.
Incidentally, this concert raised $1,037.25, all of which is going to Doctors Without Borders to continue their work in the Sudan. Not bad for two hours.
Upon my matriculation at Dartmouth, I heard many inspiring speeches from inspiring people. I may have thought to myself, "actions speak louder than words" and ignored them at the time.
Unfortunately, after learning about the world through my coursework, I discovered that inaction speaks louder than everything else.
Perhaps we are not combating the genocide by going to Darfur and beating up the bad guys. Maybe we're not doing enough trying to raise money for causes and trying to make people aware that there is evil in this world -- evil that is bigger than the professor that assigned the paper due Thursday morning, preventing us from raging Wednesday night.
Even if this is true, these things are accomplishing so much more than writing opinion articles that manufacture more ignorance and provincial thinking.
In conclusion, I would just like to encourage Mr. Belinsky to send his parents or financial provider a check for about $152,000 -- the cost of four terms at Dartmouth. My parents sent me to college to try and find a way to make my world better, to make a difference, even if it is in a small way.
If his parents expect him to do the same and this is the way he approaches it, then he is simply wasting his own and everyone else's time and money. If he is interested, he may make the check out to Doctors Without Borders, U.S.A.
