8. I would hope that truly giving educational opportunities for all would empower people and marginalized groups to solve their own problems.
Here’s what I mean by that. We have a lot of problems in the world that we have not yet been able to solve. Perhaps this is linked to the same kinds of people having the same kind of access to education.
If a community is dealing with lack of access to water, healthcare, infant mortality, genital mutilation, poverty, bigotry, etc… isn’t the best hope for that community, itself, to rise up in education and skill and provide their own solution to their problem?
I think, for example, of how Americans donate their used clothes to organizations that donate them to poor villages in Africa (I don’t know the ins and outs of how/where that works). This may seem helpful, at face value. However, a major unintended consequence is that local tailors, seamstresses, weavers and other artisans lose business. Ultimately, this hurts their local economy and they may even lose the local skill of sewing clothes if the need for that service gets eliminated.
This happens over and over in so many different ways. We try to swoop in and provide assistance instead of providing education and resources and empowering individuals and communities to create solutions.
In my opinion, education would solve the other issues.