Ramadan 2023 Reflection #5: contribution & collaboration

This piece a follow up on a previous post on the true believer framework that you can read here.

In the name of God, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate.

contribution

Around 2017/2018, I became really interested in effective altruism (pre-Sam Bankman-Fried's FTX scandal). I even went for coffee in Whitechapel with the community leader of the London division, anticipating some career guidance that could align with my new found vigor for the concept.

I read Doing Good Better by William Macaskill, and with my classical economist hat on, his argument for maximising the impact of "good" deeds by systematically calculating where it would have the most utilitarian bang for buck made rational sense. At risk of unfairly caricaturising his views (oversimplification is a given), he claims that we need to remove the emotion-driven, uncritical tendencies of our good nature and let cold, hard data inform our charitable giving, and even our career choices. Though the book's call to action appeals to rationality, it is wholly idealistic due to the fact that, as we seem to often forget, we are not purely rational beings and human history has never indicated otherwise. But this isn't a book review or critique. I bring it up because there is something to be said about giving intelligently that the Effective Altruism (EA) movement is right about and I'm concerned that I'm missing the mark.

The globally-minded, utilitarian thinking promoted by Macaskill doesn't come naturally to us, and whilst anyone with any sense of observed humanity would reject brutal self-interest as the primary mechanism for behaviour, it is undeniably the case that we don't value things, or causes, or people, equally. To use an extreme example - if forced, I suspect that many kind, morally upright people would willingly sacrifice the lives of multiple people to spare the life of just one of their children. Keeping human life as the metric, one may wholeheartedly affirm the equality of life in theory but privilege the life of the person up the road over the person on the other side of the world. The concept of objective, comparable decision-making is strained. Everything boils down to a value judgement. Accepting this is an important step in establishing where we as individuals can focus our efforts and resources. Necessarily, it takes a balance of subjectivity to establish vision and values, as well as some measure of objective evaluation to discern how to effectively work towards their fruition.

As a Muslim, this subjectivity is cushioned within the bounds of revelation, but is  universally broadened by the Islamic worldview that humans are the Divine's vicegerents on earth. Matters facing the enviroment, animals, poverty, education, exploitation etc. are all under the remit of concerns for believers and this is something that is easily missed when charitable giving is relegated to overt acts of religiousity like building mosques abroad, as necessary as they may be. TheTrue Believer Framework (I talked about last week), in line with the Qur'anic injunction of spending in God's cause, progresses the familiar, perhaps self-evident notion that charity starts at home. We are held to a higher account for the welfare and dignity of those closest to us: parents, relatives, the needy and destitute in our locality, and then causes further afield.

To this end, I have a few resolutions to produce some structure in how I "do good better":

1. Reflect on my vision for the world and my community. What causes deeply move me?
2. Research what charities, initatives and organisations are doing good work in these areas and are underfunded. Determine a framework for evaluating effectiveness: EA suggests scoring against 1. scalability, 2. how neglected and 3. trackability
3. Determine a set amount that I can contribute for each cause, prioritising locality and vision alignment
4. Reflect on what non-financial support I can offer e.g. skills

collaboration

I've often heard the claim that religion is the world's biggest cause of conflict. At one point in my life I was convinced by this claim, but then I think about the innumerable secular dividers we employ and it's clear that this is a universally human tendency. How quickly do we strip people of their humanity once they are identifiable as being at odds with our in-group?

O humanity! Indeed, We created you from a male and a female, and made you into peoples and tribes so that you may ˹get to˺ know one another. Surely the most noble of you in the sight of Allah is the most righteous among you. Allah is truly All-Knowing, All-Aware.

Surah Al-Hujurat (49:13)

Our propensity towards tribal identities often nudges us into combatative divides; but this is a corruption that detracts from the beauty and collaborative potential that diversity - as divinely decreed and manifest in the world - was designed to bring forth.

The oft-repeated wisdom in the personal development space of "finding your tribe" has an increased sense of urgency when I look at the juncture of life I'm currently inhabiting. Change facilitiates a culling of relationships that can arrive unexpectedly, even painfully. Lock down, marriage and fatherhood in successive steps in as intensifier of this effect, not due to lack of wanting, but a reshuffle in priorities, and a reduction in the efforts expendable to maintain ties. It exposes , perhaps, how many of these relationships were legacy projects, rooted in nostalgia and familiarity, and which were deeply grounded in a reality that superceds ego and transcient life circumstance.

I suspect that the most enduring allies that one can have are those whom you share an ideal with. You may be at different stations, travelling at different speeds; at times even treading diverging paths, but with the same general destination in mind. I'm at a stage where friendships that fall short of this start to feel superficial at best and destructive at its extremes.

So what to do?

1. Practice radical honesty: speak my true felings, or at the least refusing to knowingly lie. This is the most effective filter in learning who is for you and who you may share a unity of purpose with. The extension of your genuine views and personality when broadcasted authentically will naturally attract people who are similarly aligned
2. Unlearn "beg friend" mentality - depending where and how you grew up you might have a deeply entrenched distaste or a learned behaviour of reaching out to people, particularly strangers, to show admiration or communicate appreciation. It may even extend to not seeking advice, support or simple conversation from people
3. More closely observe how I feel around people and trusting my observations. Do they bring out the best of me? Do I bring out the best in them?

As the end of Ramadan nears, I'm more resolved to welcome new and depart from habits of stagnation; to widen my sphere of travelling allies whilst narrowing my focus on curating - borrowing a phrase from Charles Eisenstein - the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible.

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