So WorldVision = bad idea? Why? How much of our money would go towards the children we're trying to help?
It's not really about the money, but more about how they operate in general. I understand that the vast majority of their members and supporters are philanthropic folks who just want to help, but the path to Hell is paved with good intentions
Without even addressing the blatant conflict of interest present in faith-based aid organisations, most aid and development organisations just don't get it. You can't just walk into a problem and throw money at it to make it disappear. You can't expect the problem to go away without understanding the issues and educating your supporters about the root causes.
To use World Vision as an example again (mainly because they are the most visible), just remember the last World Vision commercial you saw on TV. Did you feel depressed after watching it? Their commercials and fund-raising tactics seem to focus more on guilt-tripping money from people than focussing on actually making people care. Their ads are also misleading in that they portray developing nations in extremely negative light, which is far from the truth. Notice how the only images they show of troubled spots are black and white? It's all about the marketing, with little to no regard for the fact that a lot of people are actually living happy lives in these developing nations. Fact is, their marketing strategy is degrading to entire societies and misleading their supporters.
A dollar a day will not save a child. World Vision chose to market that figure simply because it sounds better than reality. I won't even get into how child sponsorship programs can foster bad blood and sentiments of inequality among youth and create sharp divides in communities.
World Vision's support of Food Aid is also extremely troubling and reveals a fundamental lack of understanding of the real issues here. Google for "food aid" and click "I'm Feeling Lucky" for a short introduction to the problems with Food Aid.
What about building schools and hospitals? Digging wells? Unfortunately, most of these projects just end up wasting money that could be better spent. Many development organisations build all sorts of neat things for communities, but the problem is that they don't support them properly. When it comes to water access, people think building a well will solve all the problems. An organisation will show up in a needy village, build a well and then leave weeks later, never to return. What happens when nobody is taught how the well works or how to maintain it? What happens if it gets contaminated? What happens when something breaks and the people have no access to replacement parts? Wasted time and effort is what happens, with the locals right back to where they started, if not worse off now that they've become dependent on the well. Even well projects that are run responsibly can run into counter-intuitive problems when a well just doesn't fit with the local culture.
I could rant on for pages and pages about problems with most development and aid organisations, but I think I'll cut it here for now. For some great insight into what's actually going on, I highly recommend reading the blogs of overseas workers involved with Engineers Without Borders (the Canadian organisation, that is...the American version suffers from many of the problems described above). My old roommate was placed in Ghana last summer so
here's a link to his blog while he was there. There are plenty of links to other workers available on his page too.
Abstract said:
What if we took up another cause, say an environmental one? They always seem a bit dodgier to me, but if there's a good one, we could decide on donating to another organisation rather than one that sponsors children.
Environmental support is cool too, but again, you've got to be careful who you pick
Especially if you want to get the whole MacRumors community involved, picking a controversial organisation (like Greenpeace or Sea Shepherd) wouldn't be the smartest thing to do, haha.
Abstract said:
I still like the idea of donating some sort of computer away because while food, clothing, and shelter are necessities, I never said we'd cut those out. The computer thing would be different. For these children, a computer would allow them to do see things they have never dreamt of seeing. The whole "one laptop per child" thing that happens in US high schools (and that's supposedly ending in many locations in the US) would totally work better in a country where computers and the internet AREN'T so commonplace and widespread.
Donating computers and technology is fine too, just make sure it's appropriately applied. Some cultures just aren't ready for computers, nor do they have the technological infrastructure to do anything useful with a computer. It would be folly to think that everyone in the world aspires to live as we do in "first world nations".
