I’m 
... on Awhile back, I blogged about this essay in the Washington Post:
Last fall, shortly after I returned from Nigeria, I was accosted by a perky blond college student whose blue eyes seemed to match the “African” beads around her wrists.
“Save Darfur!” she shouted from behind a table covered with pamphlets urging students to TAKE ACTION NOW! STOP GENOCIDE IN DARFUR!
My aversion to college kids jumping onto fashionable social causes nearly caused me to walk on, but her next shout stopped me.
“Don’t you want to help us save Africa?” she yelled.
Today, in the Christian Science Monitor, this article, “Anatomy of a Start-up Antigenocide Charity,” poses some of the same questions, with very different answers. (It also happens to be by my friend Jina, props to you.)
Many told Hanis his idea was naive. But in just four months, he’d raised a quarter of a million dollars. This was in the spring of 2005, before Darfur became a cause du jour – before George Clooney and Mia Farrow, before Panties for Peace or Timberland boots with “Stomp Out Genocide” soles. This was before Hanis himself imagined his idea going national, with 10,000 members and a $3 million budget.
The article shows how two college kids raised a bunch of money and actually managed to do something, though there were many snags along the way.
“What these kids have done is something unique, something that opens the door for this kind of campaign … for the next Darfur,” says Ted Dagne, an Africa specialist at the Congressional Research Service. He credits the group with helping successfully pressure the president to name a special envoy to the region and Congress to commit more funds to the African Union. “Even now, their continued engagement really has influenced our politicians, our teachers, our community leaders, our churches…. That means a lot, even though it probably doesn’t end it.”
No one can individually end it, but if everyone stopped trying to save Africa, there might be Hanis’ $3 million less, and a bunch of groups like his not doing what they could be.
Maybe Uzo should take a look at Hanis and reconsider if he really wants all the college kids to stop. Sure, some of them are idealistic and misguided, but maybe some of them really are doing some good.
Happy Monkey says:
You say “no one can individually do it” and I am compelled to say “everyone can inidividually end it.” One voice, united with another voice and another voice and another voice is all it takes. We can change the world… one person at a time!
Thanks for your post…
[Reply]
— September 11, 2007 @ 6:08 am
Scarlett Lion says:
No prob….
[Reply]
— September 11, 2007 @ 6:18 am
Anonymous says:
The criticism about the movement is different from the recent article written. The former questions the mode in which college groups, Americans, and implicitly the occident, interact with Africa, while the latter just shows that a few kids are business savvy and competent at managing an organization. The ability to run an organization well doesn’t erase the dynamics on which it is based.
[Reply]
— September 11, 2007 @ 7:14 am
Scarlett Lion says:
Anonymous –
You’re missing the point. The two things are DIRECTLY correlated. Yes, Uzo’s essay is talking about a kind of interaction, but by choosing to lead with the bright eyed college girl, he’s also pinpointing these kind of activities as one of the foci of the problem.
Yes, he was describing a kind of dynamic, but he was also saying that kinds of groups are all catagorically like kids picking up dogs on the subway. It’s nice to see that some of them aren’t.
[Reply]
— September 11, 2007 @ 9:32 am
Kizzie says:
buying a t-shirt or giving away 2 dollars will not stop the violence in Darfur, we need a serious political resolution.
Also people need to mention what we are doing for our country, we are not exactly siitting on the floow waiting for help. Other than that I welcome and appericiate all initiatives
from a sudanese point of view.
[Reply]
— June 30, 2008 @ 2:23 pm