Celebrities and ordinary people are being challenged to really find out what it’s like to be poor.
A campaign called Live Below the Line aims to change the way people think about poverty. Their challenge: spend five days living on $1.75 a day in Canada or $1.50 a day in the US. That’s the equivalent of the extreme poverty line in each country. You can’t take handouts from family or friends and they recommend spending the allowance at the beginning of the week and portioning out the food each day. It’s very little to live on and that’s the whole point. 1.4 billion people live this reality every day and it’s an abomination. There’s plenty of wealth and food to go around, we’re just not sharing it properly. Every time I read about the world’s “new” richest person I think, FEED SOMEBODY you a-hole. But I digress.
Ben Affleck is going to do it. Hugh Jackman and other actors have already done it. I’m in radio and early in my career, I lived it. Kraft Dinner cost just a few cents 30 years ago and cutting a boiled egg into it and eating only half was often my meal for very little money. But it’s something plenty of people have never experienced and thanks to Affleck’s agreement to take the challenge is getting a lot of attention. People are blogging and taking to social media with their experiences and even recipes. The conversation is well underway and donations go to partner organizations to end poverty. The Canadian website is HERE.
This form of symbolism has no more value in addressing the underlying problem than leaving flowers at the site of a bombing does! This is a chronic societal and economic derived issue propagated by society itself. We immediately look to governments to solve the problem, but governments are only great at solving symptoms, not problems. Poverty, is a complex societal challenge, so enormous, that we can’t likely eradicate poverty world wide, but we can make a serious dent in the problem, but it will take society to push governments to make essential changes to their policies and programs in order to break the cycle.
So, what constructive, effective and real changes are these individuals prepared to hold there government representatives accountable to and continue to hold their feet to the fire until change actually occurs? Not a F’n dam thing!
I completely disagree. The only thing that will convince people to push for action is if they fully understand the problem. And I believe most people don’t. Trying to live on less than $2 a day, if they’re willing to do it, will create an empathy for those who are poor that you can only get through an experience. It is nothing like leaving flowers. It’s tangible and it raises money for causes that work directly toward eliminating the problem. Now if only bloated celebrities like Paul McCartney would do it and do something tangible with the money they hoard, we’d be onto something. Note that Richard Branson and his wife are leaving most of their money to charity. But the hungry need help right now.
Paul McCartney has for decades sponsored a school for those with special needs among many of his other charitable works. To each his own. As someone who lives at 30% below the poverty line, having witness those type of efforts for nearly 3 decades, these media events, for that is all it is, are absolutely bull shit with no long term benefits, for a week after the event, it becomes nothing more than a foot note smothered by current events with no quantifiable results other than more political platitudes by those with no power to make change. Sorry, been there, seen it and nothing has changed!
Several months ago, a variety of leading officials and, business personalities and local celebrities spent the night sleeping outside in order to experience what its like to live on the streets of Toronto, has anything changed, are people talking about it, is it on the minds of those who live and travel within the city? Not a hope in hell, its been long since forgotten! A simple page in the history of non events in Toronto.
I believe there isn’t a problem on earth that can’t be solved by education. These celebrity `stunts’ are the catalyst for awareness and ultimately education. If our governments aren’t doing the right thing (which they obviously aren’t) then what better way of getting awareness of this massive problem out to those who can make real changes (society as a whole) than to use people who are followed 24/7 by the media anyway? I can’t see any realistic way this dilemma ever gets solved unless people stand up and try to shed light on the problem and if some of them happen to be high-profile celebrities, so much the better!
Like you said Allen, “it will take society to push governments to make essential changes” but in order for society to push they must first be aware. If we don’t try programs like `Live Below The Line’, then how do we make people aware?
Poverty isn’t new, the homeless and hungry isn’t new, these type of demonstrations or if you wish, education has occurred for decades and what are the results? Poverty and the hungry have increased, governments moved by these actions, have simply conducted study after study looking into the issue, the electorate forgets, governments change the burning anger subsides and society moves on to the next issue of the day and those studies, well they collect dust on a shelve somewhere never to see the light of day.
If these actions raise money for those groups or charities serving those in need, great, but as to empathy, stick it where the sun don’t shine! Action is required!
These types of demonstrations have never occurred before! This is a world where Ben Affleck has 600,000 Twitter followers who will read in his own words, what the experience was like. Where Hugh Jackman has 2.3 million followers and read his accounts of living below the line. The power of people like this to persuade by speaking directly to fans, 140 characters at a time, is unprecedented, and the campaign is gaining momentum. Will it change the world? I don’t know. But I do know that we’re doomed if we stop trying.
I agree that action is required. So how do we motivate ordinary citizens who have little or no knowledge of the crisis to act? The answer, as I’m sure you are aware, is we can’t. Without awareness, there is no outrage. Without outrage, there is no action.
Couldn’t agree more, Lisa. The same people who say that they’ll turn ON all their lights on the night when we’re supposed to turn them off, and say that Earth Hour doesn’t make a difference don’t understand that simply by going around, turning off and being aware of what we use without thinking about the amount of power we normally waste, miss the point entirely. I’m all for creating awareness. Because who knows when that penny will actually drop, and people might decide to try and do something a little more concrete down the road?
See you in 5, 10, 15 and 20 years from now, while were still waiting for change.
Motivation is self sustaining, continuous and enduring derived from within whereas a burning anger is short lived and like any fire, if not constantly stoked quickly burns out.
These type of demonstrations have occurred before, the only difference this time around is the delivery mechanism.
Remember Live Aid? Have things changed? There is a significant difference between living the life and simply being a wine taster. Hey, if they want to truly experience the life, live it 3 to 6 months.
So you are convinced this won’t work Allan. Should we just do nothing? Isn’t trying different approaches better than just sitting back and whining about it? What should we do? What’s your solution for motivating the masses?
Kevin, I don’t have all the answers, but what I do know is as follows:
Motivation, is an internal personality trait, it can’t be triggered by external sources, for you can’t get someone to do anything there not willing to do or aren’t interested in doing. So, first we need to understand what motivation truly is, so we can invest the time and effort into the right avenues. These type of events simply stoke a fire, but its not enduring which is what is required.
Education, I fully support and agree is required, but these media events aren’t educational, there merely media events. Education addresses the who, what, where,when and most importantly why which these type of activities don’t answer in any capacity, simply muddy up the water for those trying to find solutions.
Action for actions sake, is valueless. The key to success is to constantly evaluate and re evaluate your efforts identifying what worked and what didn’t work and adjust accordingly focusing on that which worked and building from there. I don’t know about you, but when I try something and it doesn’t work, I learn from my mistakes/efforts and try something different until I find the write answer. I simply don’t keep doing the same thing over and over again.
The single most powerful word to finding solutions and eventually over time answers is the question “Why”. By asking the question “why” eventually you will work your way down to the true problem eliminating the perceived and symptomatic problems. If you simply cut the head off a dandelion the problem remains.
I prefer to invest my time seeking answers, not repeating the past mistakes of previous generations and I do that by researching and trying to understand those issues of interest to me and once I feel I have a good understanding, i draft reports/proposals/recommendations and send them to those in power with the capacity to make change. I offer ideas, solutions, possible approaches and potential answers not media events nor do I patronize those I’m trying to help.
I can’t help but feel that I didn’t explain the program very well. It was started by ordinary people and it has grown to the extent that it caught the attention of some major celebrities who are now pledging to take part. I don’t know if that makes any difference but if I gave the impression that this was a stunt or event by a celebrity to draw attention to themselves, that’s not what it’s about nor how it started. In fact it reminds me of KIVA, the interest-free loans to third world entrepreneurs that Derek and I are involved in. It hasn’t changed the world but it has changed the worlds of thousands of people who are trying to better themselves and it’s a case of the haves (us) helping the have-nots by offering a hand-up, not a hand-out.