Sunday, June 17, 2007
Fair Vanity
This month, Vanity Fair magazine has a whole issue devoted to Africa as part of the (RED) campaign.A percentage of the cover price goes to helping wipe out poverty, but if you don't support the (RED) idea, and would rather buy Woman's Own/Playboy/Your regular monthly magazine on principle instead, so more 5 year olds will continue to die unnecessarily of malaria, that's fine.
Its interesting that the biggest opposition to (RED) seems to be coming from the emerging church at the moment. My own deification of Bono aside, I really can't see how taking a principled stand against consumerism can justify doing absolutely nothing at all to highlight, combat, or give any money to alleviate systemic preventable poverty of a whole continent.
Whilst the emerging community in the UK has rightly done a great deal of good to combat slave trafficking, we have done very little, on the whole, for Africa, other than a few Make Poverty History banners on the edge of various blogs. Not that I feel strongly... maybe I've just not come across it - I would love for anyone to prove me wrong on this one..
What I find most infuriating is the amount of energy and hot air put into slagging off the (RED) campaign - it's endless! Instead of wasting all that time and effort slagging off (RED), howsabout setting up the emerging alternative? We're often accused of being all talk and no action - here's a chance to prove the critics wrong.
It would be very easy to do.
A website called "The Gift" (or something similar)
A website where you can make a voluntary donation. No gifts, no silly t-shirts, no mugs with logos, no silicone wrist bands, no branded phones. Just the simple altruistic act of donating money - essentially a bank account that distributes money appropriately (maybe to the Global Fund or something like that). It could also be backed up with regular e-mail bulletins that disseminate appropriate information about Africa-related issues, with hints and suggestions about how to put pressure on politicos and the like.
Also, an RSS feed titled "The Gift" which culls together and spits out the latest news, information and stats on Africa related issues, so that we can all be better informed on how to act. I'm sure it wouldn't be difficult to draw on existing networks for things like this.
Maybe a funky strap line that makes a big deal out of giving a Gift rather than commodification, or consumption.
If all that seems like too much hard work, then go get yourself a copy of Vanity Fair.
But for God's sake let's at least do something.
Sadly, I'm going to be away from the internet for the next week, because I'd love to see how this develops in the comments box below...
