Comments on: Spendenmarathon 2007

By: kamau

kamau — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 04:00:17 +0000

aaargh! so true. all this “poverty = africa” talk blots any other image of africans and africa.

By: irena

irena — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 01:06:19 +0000

@Mr.Zed: Some if us talk the talk and walk the walk hence know that local folks are capable of taking care of the problem without too much interference but collaborations

By: kikuyumoja

kikuyumoja — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 01:00:25 +0000

Ach und nochmal auf Deutsch: es geht wirklich nicht ums Spenden oder um das öffentliche, eh schon verzehrte Afrikabild, sondern um diesen Hype, wie Spenden medienwirksam eingetrieben und dazu Bilder verwendet werden, die bei Spendern positive Gefühle auslösen sollen. Solche Aktionen finde ich gerade kontrakproduktiv für die kleinen Hilfsvereine, die bei wirklich geringen Verwaltungskosten ihren Beitrag auf unterster Ebene leisten.

Aus diesem Grunde gehe ich auch auf die angesprochene Kritik zu den NROs nicht weiter ein, weil das imho ganz unterschiedlich ist, und manche selbst auf Regierungsebene ihren guten Beitrag leisten können in einem bestimmten Bereich.

By: kikuyumoja

kikuyumoja — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 00:46:55 +0000

We? I am already contributing my share of altruism since a few years now.
As for the indirect help through contributions: I can see a need for emergency responses for which donations are required, but sustainable help is – in my opinion – best (not only) achieved by supporting economic progress in a Ayittey sense. Pls remember that my criticism isn’t against the donation-business or on overhead costs of some NGOs, but about the usage of this image above to generate attention.

By: Zed

Zed — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 00:44:20 +0000

… oh and why forget about stereotypes if they exist? Because stereotypes create wrong answers. Most of the time ;-)

By: Zed

Zed — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 00:23:17 +0000

@JKE re.the tremendous feedback: It is a bit of a hot potato, and there are no easy answers – there is truth in all of the opinions expressed. Maybe the question should be – what do I do against poverty and for the needy, even the homeless in our western cities. What’s my personal response to the whole issue of living selflessly? Is it judging all the attempts of caring, helping, empowering, restoring, good governance and business development to deal with these issues – now matter how imperfect,ill conceived, unbalanced, paternalistic unsustainable they might be – or is it seeing my own responsibility in making this world a better place, and reaching out to the needy? Can I give up that neext new gadget (e.g.) and donate that money to an org you trust and have seen do good work, and they are there – working in local grassroot community development and all the other more ideal scenarios suggested in this discussion. It’s so darn easy to argue, discuss and condem “them” for all of these wrong things and the many failures. But then please let’s also walk the talk and do it better.

By: Riemer

Riemer — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 20:19:42 +0000

@Zed
It is not necessary to display faces of children, every advertising agency can use fonts showing the topic.

By: irena

irena — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 18:54:34 +0000

Jke: Like I said, using the black girl = “image that sells”. As stereotypical as it is and we all have issue with it, youknow if they put a white girl, perhaps it may not create much attention unless “she has been kindapped or lost during vacation” = A known stereotype that the media only covers “white little girls who have disappeared” Sorry it is the world we live in…

By: kikuyumoja

kikuyumoja — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 18:32:29 +0000

Hey guys, thx for the tremendous feedback, but let me remind you: the issue i am having with the image above is that they’re using a black little girl to make ppl think about donating money, and that it only serves this stereotype.

AS FOR THE NGO world of good and bad business…*sigh*….you know there’s this “don’t mention the war” phrase which could be applicable to this matter as well.

By: irena

irena — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 17:45:39 +0000

@Gathunuku: You have nailed it, there some groups out there who will continue to hope that Africa wallows in poverty for their mortgages and good lifestyle . Someone even in that “fundraising” campaign is going to get paid . For example
The lighting company that is going to put up the Mic and the media,
The Catering company that will need to feed the :chairman of the Harambee (sic)
The graphic designer for the brochures
The consultant or what they call these days :Development/fundraising consultant need his professional fee and per diem reimbursement taken care of…
The President of the organization who we cannot forget need to be compensated for the time used to organize and spearhead the organization in the right direction of helping poor kids in Africa and that takes a whole lot strategizing etc = over $100k .After retiring from some major corporations and need spare time to do good and give back to the society.

That is one of the many examples of expenses the so called fundraising campaigns rake in or rather the organization worldwide who are there to eradicate poverty in Africa. You should see the Budgets of some of the organizations. The expenses of just the consultants and other personnel outweighs almost the so called project that are put in place in poor rural Kenya etc.

Question remains, why not use a local consultant and local people to do all the strategising and planning if at all one want to help. Why does a project in Kisumu need someone who has never lived there spearheading it. If it is for transparency purposes, put mechanism in place to monitor the project and visit periodically but does that require a team of some “westerners” to camp in kisumu, to support a project lending a helping hand when that monies they are going to spend could have easily been used to pay a capable and educated Kenyan thus killing two birds with one stone?

Sure there are many NGOs that try to do good but many out there are just taking advantage of situations and poverty is a cash cow for someone and the more the poverty , the richer they become.

Unfortunately, Africa has been blinded by all this and the day Africans will start to take matters into their own hand and shape their own destiny , with their own tools and brains, perhaps then poverty will be eradicate.

Oh what am I saying.(out of context) we cannot even strategize using our own brains to defeat an incumbent from the political office, we require an outsider to help us ?mmmmhhh dream on Irena

As of the face on some campaign, a poor smiling African girl/or boy sells,it is the in thing these days JKE. I’m surprised her nostrils are actually clean and no flies buzzing around her ….now that is the image that really sells!!