[alexashka]

Oh Bill, oh Melinda...

There is so much wrong with their thinking it's sad. Here's one example:

"If you’re an American, three out of four moms at your school have a job. Your father probably does at least some cooking. There’s a 35 percent chance you live with one parent"

She mentions these things in passing and goes on to claim how women do more 'unpaid' work and that that needs to change.

Really Melinda?

You think 'equality' is more important than not having the choice to stay at home and raise your children?

You think 'equality' is more important than the alarming number of single parents?

How many Americans are obese? Are they really happy with themselves? Not for long if they are. Where is that in your letter?

When you can't get the 'best country in the world' to stop eating itself to death, have failed marriages and constant fear of unemployment which causes financial ruin, not to mention absence of free education and health care - do you really think the priority is 'unpaid work' between men and women?

Unbelievable. Who raised these people? Rich people are so out of touch, even when they try to 'help', it's simply insulting to your average brethren.

[cwal37]

I see marriage failures or catastrophic divorce rates bandied about a lot in these types of societal decay rants, and it bothers me. The divorce rate has been dropping for decades[1]. A proposed reason for that actually has to do with more equitable opportunities in career, in that women are more free to pursue a career of their choice, and so value systems have realigned to where marriages could be based more on couples being partners, with similar interests and ambitions.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/04/upshot/how-we-know-the-div...

[alexashka]

You must be confusing me with somebody else - I'm not pointing out decay so much as abysmal state of affairs.

Whether things are decaying or not - you can look up how much the prices for the basic human necessities like housing and food have gone up in relation to wages. From what I recall there's no question the middle and lower classes are getting screwed right?

Anyhow one can be wrong with 1 instance out of 10, the overall picture remains the same.

What you're doing is referred to as nitpicking :)

[prawn]

How did you so thoroughly miss their point and intent?

[alexashka]

Passive aggressive rhetorical questions huh...

On forums and in real life, it is best to avoid inviting a punch to the face. You must have grown up without getting hurt, like Bill and Melinda Gates :)

See how perhaps it is you missing my point but thinking I am missing theirs?

Now one way to settle this is for you to tell me what you think their point and intent is, that way we can move past me explaining your privileged arrogance and lack of manners.

[dang]

Personal attacks will get your account banned on HN, so please don't do this again.

prawn's comment wasn't helpful, but the whole sorry subthread was started by a rant that you shouldn't have posted here in the first place. HN is for civil, substantive conversation, not overwrought outbursts. Please don't post those either.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

[prawn]

I gave you a rhetorical question assuming that it might help you re-read both the link and your comment to see why you were being downvoted. If you read what they wrote and instead raise obese Americans, I'm not sure how I can encourage you to see the point.

For one thing, Melinda was talking a lot about technology and even just proximity to clean water as being a huge opportunity for people in Africa to save time and spend it on education or health.

I'll leave this conversation there. Not sure that comments about punching people in the face having any place on Hacker News.

[alexashka]

Please skim this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum

The way it relates to you is you think I'm wrong, see that 2 more people think so too, and make an arrogant remark that questions my reading comprehension. Many people thinking the same thing does not make it so.

Melinda was not talking about technology a lot - please re-read what she wrote.

Furthermore, even if she did focus on technology (it was actually Bill who did) - technology is not the solution to human happiness, as is shown by the obesity statistics in the USA.

Does that clear it up? If the goal of humanity is human happiness, technology has failed in the USA - the answer lies elsewhere clearly.

I don't see that elsewhere, whatever they think it may be, addressed anywhere. Melinda addresses feminist notions - is that going to fix obesity and the myriad of problems USA citizens face? I don't think so.

So where is the answer?

You'll say 'they're focusing on something else right now', to which I'll say before you go and mess with another country's infrastructure and economy by introducing foreign aid - maybe make sure a third of your own people are not miserable first.

Priorities are important - leaving your own citizens obese with no free health care while helping those half across the world is wrong. Do you see why?