Reservations: Third World Countries?

During our discussion in class today, we were talking about the Awareness Week, and some ideas or possibilities that we could possibly do. It was Taylor that offered the idea of having a sort of donation center for the Native American's that were on reservations. Like most people, I was aware that the living conditions on these reservations not pleasant, but I had no clue just how bad they were. I'm not really sure how many people are actually aware of not just the poor living conditions, but the horrible ways of life that are on the reservations.


I knew that, as I have stated before, living conditions were not the best reservations. I also (thought I) knew that most, if not all, reservations are either just at the poverty line, or actually impoverished. Well, I did some research. I went to Google and began typing in the search box. I typed in, "poverty on" and before I could finish my search, the first three choices that I could have chosen from were: "Poverty on Indian Reservations", "Poverty on Native American Reservations", and "Poverty on Reservations". Clearly, that states that, I'm assuming, a lot of people have at least have been interested enough on said topic to look it up. After looking through a few Wikipedia articles to get some basic information, I began to look at some "actual" articles. The first article I clicked on, which ironically was the one that Taylor had also mentioned in class today, was about the National Relief Charities. NRC is a non-profit organization that helps the Native Americans that live on remote/ poverty ridden reservations, specifically those living in the Southwest and in the Plains. Their mission is, "...to help Native American people improve the quality of their lives by providing opportunities for them to bring about positive changes in their communities".  

What I have basically gotten from reading the numerous Wikipedia articles and the NRC website is that they are one of the most poverty-stricken places in America.  On some of the reservations, such as Pine Ridge, they don't even have enough money for beds for everyone.  To me, it is absolutely so absurd that we are not only forcing these people to live on these reservations, but we are leaving them there, completely helpless, and dying.  I support the idea that we have a sort of donation center for the American Indian's that are on the reservations (obviously we can decide on which reservation and which tribe).  I think that it is more than obvious that they need the help.  Their conditions are the same as or even worse than those of those in Third World Countries.  So, my main question is why is there so much publicity about the people in the Third World Countries and helping them, rather than helping the people, the Indigenous People of our country?