People are skeptical and that makes me sad. I have been around long enough to see this. Everytime something goes viral-- unless of course it is a funny cat video-- some people criticize the impact of and judge others for jumping on the band wagon. One fairly popular incident in which most of you will remember was the "Kony 2012" movement and you can read my thoughts on that one here.
But this isn't a round two of Kony. This is about my thoughts on the ALS ice bucket challenge.
First I'll start off on saying that I quite like the ice bucket challenge. I think it is a crazy, cool, fun idea to raise awareness and money and everyone is able to put their own spin on it from just the simple `dump and bucket on your head" to "I'll poor myself a scotch with a couple ice blocks and write out a cheque" Cheers, Patrick Stewart. I also quite like it because I know a family who was affected by this disease and I saw their struggle as they went through it and were reminded often that there is no cure. So when I first saw all the hype on the ice bucket challenge I felt some relief in knowing that there might be hope in some research and awareness.
The internet is an incredible way of raising awareness and passing things along because everyone is so connected through the internet. So connected. But there is always another side to everything that happens on the internet. On one hand you notice all the gung ho people involved in the challenge, their screams and their encouragement to keep the awareness going. But then you see the other side. People who are skeptical. "They're doing nothing"... "That's not helping anyone"... "It's just another viral bandwagon"
This makes me so sad. When you look at the facts you see that more and more people are discovering the sadness of ALS. You see that over 50 million dollars has already been raised. And you see that hope is being given to those who are suffering from the disease.
People are annoyed at the self hype and the frequency of seeing the videos. But when it is something funny everyone shares it and has a good laugh. Personally I think it comes back to the old fashioned saying "ignorance is bliss". If we don't know about it, we don't have to do anything about it. If we close our eyes and cover our ears, we don't have to worry about the struggles of this world. If we don't know, we can live in peace.
I was listening to the radio and the guy was talking about how it's just getting more and more people to do the ice bucket challenge and people are jumping in and it's getting out of control. All I could think of was "Isn't that the whole point?" When a campaign starts, don't we want as many people as possible involved? The whole point was to raise awareness and look at how many people are aware now-- even if half those people are annoyed.
Face it, we have no trouble at all whinging about our own lives in a status. We can go all day long updating our statuses about how "we hate being sick", "yay to the single life", "UGH! McDonalds gave me coke instead of pepsi!" But as soon as something goes viral for a cause, there are those people who jump up and say "umm, excuse me, my news feed can't handle you changing the world"
Think about those families affected by ALS. Just think about them for a minute. How do you think they are feeling? I don't know about you, but I don't think they are sitting in their rooms yelling "how dare they shine light on ALS". In fact I almost guarantee it.
The thing about our society now a days is that to make anything known, you need to annoy the heck out of people. When things go viral, things get heard. Even though the ice bucket challenge is taking over our news feeds now, it's still doing something, it's still doing something. And that's the whole point. Isn't it?
But this isn't a round two of Kony. This is about my thoughts on the ALS ice bucket challenge.
First I'll start off on saying that I quite like the ice bucket challenge. I think it is a crazy, cool, fun idea to raise awareness and money and everyone is able to put their own spin on it from just the simple `dump and bucket on your head" to "I'll poor myself a scotch with a couple ice blocks and write out a cheque" Cheers, Patrick Stewart. I also quite like it because I know a family who was affected by this disease and I saw their struggle as they went through it and were reminded often that there is no cure. So when I first saw all the hype on the ice bucket challenge I felt some relief in knowing that there might be hope in some research and awareness.
The internet is an incredible way of raising awareness and passing things along because everyone is so connected through the internet. So connected. But there is always another side to everything that happens on the internet. On one hand you notice all the gung ho people involved in the challenge, their screams and their encouragement to keep the awareness going. But then you see the other side. People who are skeptical. "They're doing nothing"... "That's not helping anyone"... "It's just another viral bandwagon"
This makes me so sad. When you look at the facts you see that more and more people are discovering the sadness of ALS. You see that over 50 million dollars has already been raised. And you see that hope is being given to those who are suffering from the disease.
People are annoyed at the self hype and the frequency of seeing the videos. But when it is something funny everyone shares it and has a good laugh. Personally I think it comes back to the old fashioned saying "ignorance is bliss". If we don't know about it, we don't have to do anything about it. If we close our eyes and cover our ears, we don't have to worry about the struggles of this world. If we don't know, we can live in peace.
I was listening to the radio and the guy was talking about how it's just getting more and more people to do the ice bucket challenge and people are jumping in and it's getting out of control. All I could think of was "Isn't that the whole point?" When a campaign starts, don't we want as many people as possible involved? The whole point was to raise awareness and look at how many people are aware now-- even if half those people are annoyed.
Face it, we have no trouble at all whinging about our own lives in a status. We can go all day long updating our statuses about how "we hate being sick", "yay to the single life", "UGH! McDonalds gave me coke instead of pepsi!" But as soon as something goes viral for a cause, there are those people who jump up and say "umm, excuse me, my news feed can't handle you changing the world"
Think about those families affected by ALS. Just think about them for a minute. How do you think they are feeling? I don't know about you, but I don't think they are sitting in their rooms yelling "how dare they shine light on ALS". In fact I almost guarantee it.
The thing about our society now a days is that to make anything known, you need to annoy the heck out of people. When things go viral, things get heard. Even though the ice bucket challenge is taking over our news feeds now, it's still doing something, it's still doing something. And that's the whole point. Isn't it?
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