it suddenly occured to me that giving medical aid to indigenous people might not be the greatest thing after all. i mean, these people have lived their style of life for thousands of years, and they've been fine without our help. they've survived this long without being introduced to the glory of western medicine. they have their own gods, reasons and cures for illness. who are we to go blasting into their village and proclaim ourselves medical gods, to impose our way of life on them? that's essentially what we'd be doing, no? from their point of view, i guess i might be pretty annoyed that some punk-ass white people are trying to tell me what i've believed my entire life is wrong, cure me, then leave a trail of chaos in their wake. or i might just be happy and grateful to be helped. who knows...

i suppose it all comes down to priorities. what do we value the most? a person's health or the person's culture? oh boy, this sounds like it's running along the same lines as all the human rights issues. is this the same question we pose when we challenge genital mutilation in african countries? what about the death penalty here? do we value a person's life above our cultural belief that criminals should be punished? agh.