Original post by Am I Really HereI'd have to disagree with living standards in poor countries being due to exploitation by westerners. What do you think living standards in Africa would be like if we Europeans had never interacted with it? No science, no medicine, no engineering, few clothes, terrible housing, no contraceptives, no famine or drought relief. If Africa had been cut off, Africans would still be living in conditions similar to those of their ancestors thousands of years ago. Living standards, life expectancies, literacy and education have all rocketed up because of western involvement. Has our involvement and interactions with Africa and Africans always benefited them? No, certainly not, and we should do more to help them improve, but the access Africa has gained and continues to gain to western advances and discoveries have benefited them greatly, and hopefully in not too many decades they will begin to make similar great achievements of their own.
Don't blame us for Africa or other similar areas with low standards of living. Without westerners and our achievements they would still be dying at 40 or under, having far too many children and losing many of them too soon.