We get a lot of flak for our materialism in America. A lot of it — probably 95% of it — is justified.
Most of that materialistic crap benefits absolutely nothing and no one, for every $5,000 Birkin bag, there’s also a product like (RED). As annoyed as I am by Bono and his pompousness, the reality is that those sanctimonious t-shirts actually do benefit people suffering from a deadly disease.
The man standing behind this license plate paid $14 million dollars for it in a charity auction. This man may not flaunt his money with his appearance (though that may be a worldwide sign of the difference between rich and wealthy), but the despicably smug look on his face says it all. This man is 25 years old and he spent more money on a license plate than the majority of Arabs (or Americans, for that matter) will earn in their lifetime.
Well, at least it was for a charitable cause, right? Was it for women’s rights? HIV education? Reparations to Alexandre Robert or a legal fund for the tourist with a speck of marijuana on his shoe?
No. It goes toward victims of traffic accidents.
In general, I think it’s pretty much a waste of time to compare one person’s suffering to another’s, but I’m going to make an exception for this. There are a lot of tangible ways that $14 million dollars could benefit Arabs throughout the Emirates and the Gulf. It could save lives. Instead, Saeed Abdel Ghaffar Khouri decided to spend it on a $14 million dollar hunk of plastic with a number painted on it. And I would bet $14 million from my money tree that it’s for just one of his many cars. In a lot of ways, this makes me angrier than hearing about women who are harassed if they don’t wear hijab. There’s no cultural relativism here; this is just the good old fashioned lifestyle of the obscenely rich, and it’s the same in Abu Dhabi as it is in L.A.-la Land.
As Khouri’s brother said, “We wanted to be No. 1.Who doesn’t like to be the best in the world?”
