When it comes to international aid and development, we are all biased. It doesn't matter if you're a donor reading pamphlets, a celebrity or YouTuber endorsing your favorite NGO, a journalist interviewing villagers, an academic outside of the ivory tower, an experienced aid professional talking about "good aid", or even a free agent trying to be a bridge-maker.
There is nothing nefarious about this fact. We as human beings, while capable of untold capacities for empathy, will never have a complete verstehen and fully imagine the complexity of others. This is important because the arbiters of what is and is not ...
5 Steps for NGOs to Move from Guilt to Empowerment
My thoughts on how charities need to drop the guilt is getting tons of views. But the question remains: how does a charity drop the guilt? Can they do it overnight? Cold turkey?
As I mentioned some charities, like the US-branch of Save the Children, have already stopped using "poverty porn". I'd like to share something I've talked to them about behind closed doors.
I guess you can call it a 5 Step Program for NGOs using guilt:
3 Reasons Charities Need to Drop the Guilt
[caption id="attachment_3629" align="aligncenter" width="473" caption="A Charity Guilt-Ad Currently Airing in Canada"][/caption]
It's 2011 and we still live in a world where many charities think that the best way to raise funds to help those in need is by using guilt.
This needs to stop and here are three reasons why:
How Come the Poor Can’t Video Blog? Thoughts on the Digital Divide
This year I’ve been talking a lot about the “Digital Divide”. But what is that? And why does it matter?
The “Digital Divide” is basically a term to describe the technological gap which prevents the poorest of the world’s poor from participating in global online conversations that are occurring on the internet.
This is important because what we are doing on the internet is starting to have the power to shape our politics, our governments, our economies, and our own personal priorities, opinions, and tastes.
If the poorest of the poor are excluded from these global conversations, we can only use the internet ...
Yesterday, I talked about a comment someone had written called “The Uncultured Project is totally useless!”. If you haven’t read it – check it out. Just to be clear – this wasn’t a hater comment. The points raised by the author are actually common points raised in the discussion about global poverty.
That’s why I want to talk about this.
And I want to bring someone else into this discussion – his name is Sharief:
People, organizations, and charities are starting to realize you can’t guilt your way into getting people to support your cause. Many charities are also starting to use the internet in a way that’s just more than uploading their TV spots.
I’ve talked about a lot of charities that are taking the lead in this. But today I’d like to talk about an unlikely source in helping to change this conversation – CollegeHumor.com.
Their recent spoof is a stab at what I consider the most annoying, guilt-inducing, charity commercial in the history of the world. First, take a look at the original (the charity has disabled YouTube embedding so that their video cannot be used in blog posts like this):
It’s got all the hallmarks of what I hate about charity commercials. CollegeHumor’s spoof takes this on – almost phrase by phrase. They also make fun of grad students which – as a former grad student – I can especially appreciate the humor.
Sometimes criticizing something doesn’t work as well as spoofing it. Hopefully, the only time we’ll be seeing Mr. White Beard of Guilt from now on is when he’s trying to help grad students.
This is not a charity, organization, or anything formal. It’s my journey to try and make the world a better place - one meaningful difference at a time. To learn more click here.
