In a recent online column, ISU alumnus Paul Shirley questions the validity of foreign aid currently pouring into Haiti.

Our problem isn’t Mr. Shirley’s message — everyone should question where their money goes — but, rather, the tone he used to present his argument. Well, Mr. Shirley, we called a special editorial board meeting and in 28 minutes of deliberation, we dissected your argument and created a list of 5 things you neglected.

1. You failed to assess, or even mention, the country’s history: The column misses the mark by failing to address, or even mention, Haiti’s troubled past. He does mention the inhospitable natural location of Haiti when he said, “It was a great idea to put 10 million people on half of an island. The place is routinely battered by hurricanes … it holds the aforementioned title of poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, and it happens to sit on a tectonic fault line.”

But where do you expect 10 million people to go? Haiti was established in 1697 — 21 years before New Orleans was founded. Yet, we rebuilt New Orleans. California is a bankrupt, flood-ridden, wildfire-plagued, mud slide waiting to happen that straddles a fault line, yet nearly one–sixth of the U.S. population calls that mess home.

We can’t even decide what to do with a few hundred inmates at Guantanamo bay! Where, Mr. Shirley, should these people go?

2. You villanized the wrong people: The leaders, both of Haiti and the world are at fault. The citizens are simply victims of their own circumstance. We allowed a nation with more people than the Chicago metro area to suffer in extreme poverty for a century. As a society, we cannot simply wait for disaster to strike before we provide aid.

3. You fail to mention appropriate technologies or micro-loans: Currently, programs exist that aim to help developing nations help themselves. Our well-educated populace has the capacity to produce low-tech solutions, like pre-fabricated housing and low-cost stoves, that could improve the quality of life for millions of people. Using aid money for micro-loans (on the order of $25 – $50) could help the people of Haiti buy tools and animals that increase their ability to produce for themselves. Yet, Mr. Shirley instead insinuates that money sent to Haiti is doomed to disappear forever.

4. You sound like a kid crying on Christmas: Regardless of the validity of Mr. Shirley’s points, the tone is all wrong. He is a smart, well-educated man, in a wealthy, developed nation saying that the people of Haiti should have helped themselves instead of allowing a natural disaster to wipe out more than one percent of  their population.

Sometimes, it doesn’t matter how right you are.

It’s hard to tastefully criticize people when looking down from the top, and we firmly believe that Mr. Shirley didn’t mean to sound pompous. However, for all the things he said, he left far too many things unsaid.

5. There’s absolutely no assessment of the current situation, or prediction of impeding needs: His largest mistake was allowing his voice to go to waste. Rather than presenting a well-structured argument with individual and societal alternatives, he rants about how stupid Haiti is for being poor. Shirley’s good points and good facts are clouded by poor presentation.

Paul Shirley is a functional, human adult with a functional, human adult brain. Further, he had the ability to change minds and hearts while providing a valuable service.

Too bad he didn’t.