The ONE campaign

[Jamila]

you're very welcome, R8drgurl.

And here is the BEST article that I've EVER seen about Bono and The ONE Campaign. It really says it all.



GLOBAL LESSONS FROM A ROCK STAR

By Matt Gray
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Monday, April 18, 2005

When most people drop $100 on a concert ticket, poverty is the last thing on their mind. Bono was probably aware of this, but that wasn't about to stop him from opening his audience's eyes to a great challenge that they might not have known they were facing. Last week's U2 concerts in Glendale Arena featured some great music, but they also had one unrelenting request: Keep your eyes on Africa.

While most people probably didn't feel like an entire continent had slipped their mind, one phrase seemed to catch everyone by surprise: "a tsunami a month." That's about how many people die preventable deaths in Africa day in and day out. Every month, Africa loses 160,000 people to disease and other effects of extreme poverty.

So if more people in Africa have died since the tsunami hit than died in the tsunami itself, why haven't we all put the same kind of effort into poverty relief as we have into tsunami relief? The answer is simple: The tsunami replayed on our televisions every night for a month while the people of Africa have continued to suffer in silence. The crisis in Africa has gone on for years, but it is out of our American sight and out of our American mind.

After Sept. 11, 2001, Americans' generosity was overwhelming. The country came together and gave enough money to provide for all the grieving families. We were not about to let the tragedy defeat us, so we sacrificed and changed our priorities to lift up those in need. History will never forget our response in the late months of 2001, but what will it say about our efforts to help a region that loses more lives than Sept. 11 every day? Can we rally that same spirit of generosity and human understanding for a much greater challenge?

The One Campaign believes that we can and that awareness is the key. This group, which features leaders ranging from rock stars like Bono to movie stars like Brad Pitt to evangelical stars like Pat Robertson, is going to make sure you know about Africa. They don't want your money. In fact, their Web site doesn't take donations. Instead, all they want is for you to read and learn until you understand the African crisis and maybe wear a wristband.

Or at least that's what they want you to believe. The truth is, they know us Americans all too well. They know you dropped that $20 into the Red Cross tub on Sept. 15, and then did the same a few days after the tsunami. The members of the One Campaign know that once you understand the everyday tragedies that occur in Africa, you won't be able to forget. Once you've seen the faces, heard the stories and learned what you can do to help, human nature will take over from there.

Bono's hope is that this will be the hallmark achievement of our generation. He speaks fondly of those before us that defeated communism and ended apartheid, but he hopes that we'll do one better. It won't be easy. Lifting millions of people out of life-extinguishing poverty isn't the sort of thing that you can do in a weekend. Luckily, we happen to be citizens of a superpower. Once this nation dedicates itself to doing something, we find a way to make it happen. Just ask Saddam Hussein.

It's time we put our collective mind on Africa, the worldwide capital of human suffering. Get the facts, become informed, and then help your friends and family do the same. We have food and we have medicine. They desperately need food and desperately need medicine. Once we all put two and two together, there will be no stopping the immense good that flows when the American people are dedicated to a higher purpose.

If right now you saw someone across campus bleeding and broken, you'd run for help. Across the sea, Africa is bleeding and broken. We need to see it and run for help.
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What more can anyone say? All the excuses not to help Africa are mere covering for a callous heart.

Matt Gray said it better than anyone else yet (except Bono).

I NEED SOMETHING OTHER....

 

[R8drgurl]

That's a nice ONE as well! I like the Tsunami comments. Americans are generous whether they are giving through their church or through international organizations. It's really interesting that certain 'causes' will get the limelight, have celebrity telethons, etc. - while others go unnoticed.

I finally made it to Southern Africa last summer and am going to East Africa this July. Certainly changes the way you look at things...

 

[Jamila]

Thanks again, R8drgurl, for your enthusiastic response.

It's amazing how discussion in this thread fell off after the two "spot on" articles I posted yesterday.

And please keep us up to date on your travels to East Africa this summer. Where exactly are you travelling to?

THE GOAL IS SOUL....

 

[R8drgurl]

That's true - didn't notice that the discussion just ended...

I'm flying in and out of Nairobi but spending most time in Rwanda and Tanzania. Then I can start a thread - Ask a U2 Fan in Africa!

 

[BonosSaint]

On a whole, Americans are generous in the short term, get bored in the long term. And Africa is a long term problem.

 

[sulawesigirl4]

I hate to sound like a nag, but Americans live in the lap of luxury compared to most people in the world. It makes me ill sometimes remembering the whines and complaints of myself and my friends in the States. For goodness sake you have food and a place to sleep for the night. You have money that you can even use for non-necessary things like DVDs and U2 concerts! Here where I live the majority of people live on much less than a dollar a day. They worry about things like, how am I going to put food on the table today and how can I pay for the medicine WHEN (not if) my children fall sick to malaria, tuberculosis, cholera, or any of the myriad water-born diseases that are endemic.

Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed by all the hurdles facing the people here I want to cry. I hear stories on the news about cotton subsidies and then I think about the time I was stuck on a road down south waiting for our vehicle to be repaired. We were in a small village and their only livelihood is raising cotton. These people live simple lives. They live in small mud houses, the women walk for miles in the hot sun to search for firewood, the men do back-breaking labor in the fields, the children have little chances at more than a summary education. They can barely make ends meet because of the falling prices, prices that are artifically controlled by rich countries, places SO rich in comparison that it boggles the mind.

I know that I'm rambling and I am sorry. I know also that if you buy one less CD that doesn't mean that one African child will be able to afford school fees. But I just get so sick and tired of the gross inequity that I don't know how to feel.

 

[youtooellen]

I agree.
it bothers me that people live in such luxury, but it bothers me the most when they know they live in luxury but don't even care about the lives of others. I feel spoiled just thinking about having the electricity to be on the web right now. if everyone realized what's REALLY going on around the world, i think the world would be a better place. like the tsunami relief reaction compared to reactions towards poverty. you can tell the enormous difference.

but it's like the saying my mom tells me when I don't finish all my food, " eat all your food, there's people out there starving to death and you're not even finishing your food.." it's a waste. but yeah. hard to explain my thoughts about all of this.

i might've gotten off topic/rambled, but yeah. jsut giving my opinion.

the One campaign is really opening eyes though. I love it.

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

the One campaign is really opening eyes though

I think so too

We are so spoiled and take so much for granted, maybe just realizing that is a good starting point. We can all do what we can do to educate ourselves and help.

here's an e-mail I just got, it's a start!

Dear Friend:

"ONE by ONE They step forward." As Brad Pitt and Cameron Diaz uttered those simple phrases on MTV, ABC and Christian Broadcast Network earlier this month, a new chapter was opened in the fight against global AIDS and extreme poverty as more than 100 million Americans were introduced to ONE! If you haven't had a chance to see the full 60 second version of the video, make it ONE hundred million and ONE

History is being made by YOU! Across America, people have responded, as ONE to the emergency of AIDS and extreme poverty - in the past four weeks alone, more than 200,000 Americans have joined, more than doubling the size of ONE: The Campaign to Make Poverty History!

Like you, Jamie Foxx believes that together, ONE by ONE, "we can start to make poverty history."

Learn the facts, share your knowledge, and teach others that it is possible to create a world where extreme poverty is a thing of the past. Visit ONE.ORG to learn about the challenges facing our world today. As ONE, we can make the difference.

ONE by ONE, we will continue to make history; help keep our momentum building by emailing your friends and family and ask them to join The ONE Campaign. If each ONE of us shows this video to even ONE friend and they sign the declaration at ONE.ORG, we will double in size again!

Thank you,

The ONE Campaign Team

 

[oktobergirl]

I hate to sound like a nag, but Americans live in the lap of luxury compared to most people in the world. It makes me ill sometimes remembering the whines and complaints of myself and my friends in the States. For goodness sake you have food and a place to sleep for the night. You have money that you can even use for non-necessary things like DVDs and U2 concerts! Here where I live the majority of people live on much less than a dollar a day. They worry about things like, how am I going to put food on the table today and how can I pay for the medicine WHEN (not if) my children fall sick to malaria, tuberculosis, cholera, or any of the myriad water-born diseases that are endemic.

Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed by all the hurdles facing the people here I want to cry. I hear stories on the news about cotton subsidies and then I think about the time I was stuck on a road down south waiting for our vehicle to be repaired. We were in a small village and their only livelihood is raising cotton. These people live simple lives. They live in small mud houses, the women walk for miles in the hot sun to search for firewood, the men do back-breaking labor in the fields, the children have little chances at more than a summary education. They can barely make ends meet because of the falling prices, prices that are artifically controlled by rich countries, places SO rich in comparison that it boggles the mind.

I know that I'm rambling and I am sorry. I know also that if you buy one less CD that doesn't mean that one African child will be able to afford school fees. But I just get so sick and tired of the gross inequity that I don't know how to feel.

The purchasing of the CD analogy to a child not affording school fees..is very affecting. I think people also tend to minimize the importance of fair trade in all of this. It's great to give money, whether it be 1% of the GDP, or debt relief from the UN summit, but fair trade has to be incorporated as well, for any of it to work on a long term scale.

 

[starsgoblue]

I'm not suggesting that it would be spent on a wasteful purpose. All I am trying to say is;

1)They are asking for your money so why say they aren't

2)They won't be affected but the poor in America will.

First of all....you are going to pay taxes regardless. Asking for the US government to do what it has already pledged it would do isn't going to change that. It would require a shift in what is already done with government money.

It is not going to cause more hardships for Americans. Yes, there are poor Americans but they are not subject to the EXTREME level of poverty that exists in impoverished countries in Africa where people live on less than a dollar a day, have limited access to clean drinking water and are dying for want of immunizations that cost pennies. This is a completley different level of poverty and one that just should not be tolerated when the resources are very much available.

As is stands now the World Bank and International Monetary Fund have the resources to cancel the debt in these impoverished countries.....even more so, they have enough resources to cancel 100 percoent of the heavily indebted poor country debts without any impact on their credit rating or abilility to lend.

What is going on in these impoverished countries is horrendous and I would argue is a result of a subtle vein of indifference.....if what was happenening in Africa was happening here in America or Europe I do not doubt that it would be snuffed out in a second. I feel that in some way, Africans are not truly regarded as equals. The metaphor of Africa being a nation in flames is so true....we HAVE the watering cans and we're just standing around arguing about whether or not the fire is really all that hot.

 

[the soul waits]

Thanks for posting those amazing articles, Jamelia.

I live in Europe and there's a lot of work to be done awareness-wise here as well. Bothers me a bit that it's all about America in those articles, while it's a world-wide concern and everyone has to chip in.

I like the campaign, it's opening eyes for sure.
It's actually a full-circle thing - by realizing we actually CAN make a difference, the people of the western world are given a chance to regain the spirit of life they often feel they lost, being numbed by the overstimuli of radio, tv, internet and all the luxury we have.

By helping Africa, we can see that our lives DO have meaning. I think it's gonna improve the world on a global scale, far beyond relieving poverty, which, needless to say,obviously is a goal to persue in itself without the extra benefits for the western world.

 

[Jamila]

I feel the same way too, the soul waits.