africa for africa
was live 8 a success?
the critics and the praisers will be unable to answer this question until the leaders of the g8 have finished their meeting and their decision on how to tackle poverty in africa is decided
my opinion on the subject
1. i think it is idiotic not to gain any monetary contributions from any of the concerts. u can raise awareness without attaining significant amount of funds by askin every concertgoer to pay a dollar? without any money, africans feel like it was a publicityy stunt more so than a strong attempt at helping their cause.
2. what personal connection was made between the audience and africa? why..after watchin bono and mariah carey sing will someone feel any more inclination to help africa out then they did before? i may be grossly mistaken, but wat good is awareness if no future action is proposed. in an ideal, utopic world maybe some would take the iniative to help the africans but guess what...aint gonna happen. honestly, how many people do u believe will go to their representative and be like...AFRICA NEEDS MONEY DARN IT.
3. the basis of the awareness of the african poverty crisis over asking for money is that poeple are tired of giving money to the poor. but is this true? has there been even a remote indication that public consensus is so? the ONE campains commercials openly stating "they dont want ur moeny...they want ur voice", but, correct me if i'm wrong, couldnt giving someones money be construed as giving your voice? wouldn't people be more concerned with their presidents actions on an issue they've donated their hard earned money too? at least more so then if they were just "aware" about it. but i can see the pitfalls in this because how can we give our own money to a cause when we got these celebrities who have plenty of money to give.
4. one major thing that bothered me is the kind of generalization of Africa. unless u live under a rock, u should know that Africa is made up of countries not states. it is unfair to say as a whole that africa is suffering....as a whole africa is poor...but i can see from the organizers POV that it would be tooo complicated and too divisive to address the poor areas versus the rich areas. i dunno...for me being kenyan..and living in my uncles house (in kenya) which is about 3 times as big as mine..i hope that it is not ASSssU_MEd that all of africa is poor.
5. last thing is i feel we missed an opportunity. with 2 billion people watching, every 1/3 person is aware that africa has poverty but has no means to help other than go to the big man government and make them do it. the boat has sailed and already left its port, never again will something of this magnitude be able to address the problem as effectively simply because if this thing were to be pulled off next year, comparions would clearly be made, and i "seen-it, done-it" attiude would be put forth by the public. maybe for another decade or twenty years will a project like this will be able to garner the support, focus, and money (which falls under could of garnered).
but i'm not completely pessimistic
at least now people will know why i don't waste food
haha