Editor's Note: "Outsider Perspective" is a series of pieces on Francesca's experiences as an intern with a conflict management organization in Bujumbura, Burundi.

Problems throughout the world are our problems, too. (US Army Africa, Creative Commons)

By now, I know their responses by heart:

“It’s sad, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“They’ve been killing each other for 1000 years and they’ll be killing each other for 1,000 more.”

“When everything’s perfect over here, then we can go over there and help them.”

“Why should we care? It’s not our problem.”

As an immigrant—even from a prosperous and politically stable nation—I’ve always found this attitude disturbing. As Pocahontas taught us in her famous Disney ballad, “Colors of the Wind,” “the only people who are people” are not just those who look and think like us. It is a fundamental political principle that governments are responsible for taking care of their own. But who does that mean, exactly?

Millions of American families immigrated to the U.S. within the past 115 years. (An estimated one in four American children have at least one immigrant parent.) Many of us maintain family ties with people who live across the border or are foreign-born ourselves. Many more have jobs that rely on foreign markets or own stock in multi-national corporations.

And none of us goes a day without interacting with something that came from abroad. Read the tags on your clothing. Go through your kitchen cupboards. Take a look at your newsfeed. How many countries do you see?

Exchange with foreign countries is why Americans are able to enjoy the diverse array of products and services that they do. It’s why a package of Ramen Noodles costs 15 cents instead of $15. It’s why you’re not only studying Hemmingway and Salinger, but also Nietzsche, Confucius, Hosseini and de Beauvoir. (Incidentally, it’s also why many of Hemmingway’s short stories are about adventures in eastern Africa and not driving on I-95.)

It’s why your car has gas.

We have some of the most varied diets, styles, cultural practices and leisure options on the planet, and it’s not just because we’re rich. It’s because there are people in over 200 other countries that are generating that variety for us. It’s because we have cities that speak practically every language in the world.

The fact of the matter is that we live in a globalized society. Like most things, globalization is a double-edged sword. The side effects of trade, technology, vacation spots and foreign alliances sometimes include war, poverty and civil unrest.

In some cases, our practice of foreign exchange leaves us not only connected with, but partially responsible for problems abroad. Americans have economically and sexually exploited people around the world. Our military has invaded foreign nations under false pretenses and committed atrocities against civilians. And while many Americans may not share in the responsibility for these specific actions, we often benefit from the results. Third-world sweatshops cut labor costs. A history of American imperialism means we can visit just about any place in the world and find someone who speaks our language—a rare luxury, indeed.

Ethics, be damned, you might be thinking. If that’s what keeps us on top, so be it. But the truth is that those domestic problems we’re all so worried about—the poverty, the gang violence, the illegal immigration? They tend to get exacerbated when we mess up abroad.

Our Iraq blunder cost us billions in post-war reconstruction that could have gone to education. Our support of a corrupt government during El Salvador’s civil war sent hundreds of thousands of refugees into the southern United States without green cards, jobs or an English vocabulary. Repeated violations of global human rights conventions during our engagements in the Middle East have made it easy for terrorists to present us as the bad guy. And when a country falls apart—from our own action or another’s—so do our economic prospects in the region for years to come.

Yes, America has problems. Yes, they are bad. War in Syria does not make war in the ghetto irrelevant. Gang-rape in the Congo does not supersede rape on college campuses. To attempt to compare or rank genuine experiences of misery is callous and, quite frankly, a waste of our time.

But that goes both ways. Obviously, we have a greater capacity—and in the case of our government, a more direct financial obligation—to tackle the problems within our own borders, but what justification do we have to completely ignore the problems everywhere else in the world, particularly when we are perfectly content with reaping all the benefits that come from interacting with these regions?

When we, ourselves, are having a bad day, do we completely abandon our compassion for others? Hopefully not, because the old adage “Nobody’s perfect” means no life or no country is ever going to be, either.

There will always be problems, both at home and abroad. And we will always be tied financially, socially and intrinsically both to our fellow Americans and to those who live on the other side of the world. The best solution seems to be not to give up on the 95 percent of humanity that does not live in America, but simply to help when we have the opportunity to help, regardless of where that might be.

A better world is a better world for all.

Reach Senior Opinion Editor Francesca Bessey here; follow her here.