CBC reports that Ottawa "Gentlemen's Club" Barefax is letting its performers accept toy donations as payment for table dances.
It's hardly the first time this kind of charity drive has happened. The Admiral Theatre, in Chicago, has been doing it for years. But what was interesting about this story was the question of whether strippers are morally acceptable benefactors to kids.
The Debra Dynes Family House, which provides support to low-income families in Ottawa, pulled out of the program after being contacted by a reporter. The CBC article states that the Ottawa Salvation Army did not reply to questions about their involvement. (The Sally Ann runs the biggest local toy drive, Toy Mountain.)
But what is the real problem here? It might be the uncomfortable connection it makes between the sex industry and young children. Or perhaps its a distaste for the perceived exploitation of the stripping business. Or they might just be grossed out by the idea of the toys having been handled by naked women and the men who pay them to give informal gynaecology classes.
While the PR opportunity for the club is obvious, I think the individual dancers really do just want to help kids. Many of them, inevitably, are moms themselves. And offstage, they are just members of the community who want to feel the spirit of Christmas.
A Barefax dancer with the stage name Melina told the CBC, "When they asked me to do this I thought it was a really good idea because there’s a lot of children who have nothing. Just because it’s a strip club doesn’t mean that we’re mean people and we can’t do any good."
According to Know Your Meme, it started when a Reddit user reposted the fan video as “Overly Attached Girlfriend,” which went viral along with the original upload. Within a day, a screencap from the video (above) became a popular image for captioning and sharing. The meme continued to grow, quickly, generating a parody Twitter account and a Tumblr.
Often, this kind of "fame" ends up embarrassing the original subject, who becomes a target of anonymous bullying in the form of parody. But not this time.
When 20-year-old Laina Walker was "outed" as the person who created the video, she took the opportunity to promote herself, on Twitter and YouTube, as the "real" Overly Attached Girlfriend. Sge now has 126,630 followers on Twitter and 273,245 subscribers on YouTube.
But this kind of fame is fleeting. Online memes are like grass fires: they start unexpectedly, spread rapidly, and soon burn out. Ms. Walker first tried posting new videos in the same style as her original one, but they were pretty contrived.
Now, however, the woman behind the meme has decided to do something worthwhile with her accidental internet celebrity: she's using it to raise funds and support for a good cause:
Her idea to take "dares" online, and fulfill them when a fundraising goal is reached is quite smart. It's high-engagement, and is very sharable. I think Ms. Walker has found her calling.
Her first beneficiary, Surf Camp, is a charity that brings students with Autism Spectrum Disorder and their families on a two-day field trip. The (under-construction) site explains, "In addition to ocean surfing, the goal of the camp curriculum is to improve social social skills and sensory motor development important for student achievement and active engagement in learning." Fundraising is being done through rally.org. So far, $15,877 has been raised towards their $50,000
goal.
Interesting how someone who could have been a target for bullies is trying to help people who are so often targeted for no other reason than their natural diferences. Good for her.
Horrified vegetarians and rabbit-lovers aside, it's actually a great cause. For a $35 donation, Plan Canada will add matching funds and send an orgy of six sex-crazed rabbits to a family in the developing world to breed for food.
"Working out the math for this gift could keep anyone hopping. Six rabbits, which can breed up to 10 bunnies every 31 days, can also create an instant business for a family. That business means food on the table and an income to pay for housing, healthcare and education. All of which adds up to families in charge of their lives, children with opportunities, and hope that will reproduce just as rapidly as this gift."
Huffington Post says that when customers bring in a toy worth $25 or more, Monday through Wednesday, they can get a tattoo or piercing of comparable price in exchange. Guzman said in an interview, "Everybody associates tattoo artists with being criminals, bikers, degenerates — and I'm a believing Christian and I believe what better way to be Christ-like than by giving back."
It's a good point. Strip clubs, tattoo parlours... if Jesus the man were here right now, that's exactly where he would do his ministry: among the very people his more hypocritical followers despise.
The Stiller Foundation (FB link) is a real charity, founded "to support children around the world by providing educational opportunities to help them realize their full potential."
The PSA, however, is just good old fashioned Stiller humour:
The URL is the best part, considering Aniston is one of the more modest and guarded blockbuster actresses out there. (Don't worry/get too excited, it just redirects to FB.)
But they're not asking corporations or governments for this ransom. They're asking you. And the proceeds go to Keep a Child Alive - an AIDS charity that provides life-giving medicines to afflicted kids in the Third World.
Wednesday, you see, is World AIDS Day. And this "Digital Life Sacrifice" is a way of doing something important.
Let's put the importance of the cause aside for a moment. (Don't worry - we'll come back to it with all due respect.)
I'd like to take you back 25 years, to a charity concert for African food relief called Live Aid. Remember that? It was cool.
But I also remember being struck by a article later written by American conservative humourist PJ O'Rourke, which was published in his 1992 book Give War a Chance. Ever since, it has popped up in my mind whenever I am trying to grapple with my cynicism over certain celebrity acts of charity:
"As an example of charity, Live Aid couldn't be worse. Charity entails sacrifice. Yet Live Aid performers are sacrificing nothing. Indeed, they're gaining public adulation and a thoroughly unmerited good opinion of themselves. Plus, it's free advertising. These LPs, performances, and multiform by-products have nothing in common with charity. Instead they levy a sort of regressive alms tax on the befuddled millions. The performers donate their time, which is wholly worthless. Big corporations donate their services, which are worth little enough. Then the poor audience pledges all the contributions and buys all the trash with money it can ill afford. The worst nineteenth-century robber barons wouldn't have had the cheek to put forward such a bunco scheme. They may have given away tainted money, but at least they didn't ask you to give away yours."
It's hilarious, brutal, and insightful. (Remember when right-wingers were actually smart and self-deprecatingly funny?)
I've written before about my skepticism around celebrity campaigns, and this is where it comes from. While not of PJ's political persuasion, I still wonder why celebrities don't just cut a big fat cheque to the charity of their choice, rather than telling their fans to do it for them - occasionally through questionable organizations.
"Stick it Where The Streets Have No Name, bub!"
But as someone who has worked on a couple of "celebrity" PSAs, I know that there is another side to this. Cynicism aside, celebrities' time is valuable. And that value depreciates. Fast.
Unless you're Mick Jagger, or the late great Leslie Nielsen, you can expect your star to start fading within a few years at most. You have a hit, or do something grand, and the world is your oyster. But almost immediately, your clock starts ticking. And the further you get away from your last hit or moment of excellence, the less people care.
The less people care, the less celebrity you have. So you are under pressure to spend your diminishing capital as wisely as possible, and just as quickly. Your agent manages your public time to the minute, squeezing every last penny out of it. And what you give to charity? He or she can't really get paid on commission for that. So your charitable time becomes even more valuable when you give it away.
And there you have it. Gaga is giving away a precious piece of her fame so that kids in Africa can get well. Sure it would be more impressive if she actually went over there on her own dime and distributed the drugs out of pocket rather than pledging to do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING online for a few days, but at the bottom line people still get what they need.
The remaining problem, however, is that fans do not have deep pockets. Whatever they give to this charity represents money they won't give to another. It's a sad thing to talk about in the cause marketing world, but the fact is they're all in competition for whatever you're willing and able to tithe yourself.
At least the Keep a Child Alive kids have this kind of fame monster on their side:
We've all seen that episode of Mad Men where Don Draper gets his revenge on Roger Sterling by tricking him into walking up 23 flights of stairs after a multi-martini and oyster lunch. Yeah it was gross. But it inspired our latest agency fundraising challenge.
No, it's not oyster shucking or martini mixing (or even hitting on other people's spouses) it's the "Stairs for Chairs" fundraiser, next week (April 6 -9) at Acart.
Every few weeks, we adopt a new cause to support with time, money or work. After all, we're a Social Issues Marketing company. We care about people.
Next Monday, a number of us have pledged to avoid using the office elevator for a week to help raise money and awareness for Humanitarian Mobility International (HMI). Based in Ottawa, HMI provides mobility access and specialized equipment to victims of war and natural disasters around the world.
HMI’s operating budget relies completely on sponsors and donations. The money Acart raises will help HMI buy a trailer used to transport the wheelchairs to the warehouse.
HMI is focused on peacekeeping, post-war reconstruction and disaster relief. They work with medical centres and hospitals worldwide to help people with disabling injury or disease. They work with other organizations to refurbish mobility equipment such as wheelchairs. Currently, two members of HMI are in Beirut, ensuring wheelchairs arrive safely and are distributed to those who need them most.
Why the stairs? We often take our own mobility for granted, so we want to put our legs to work to remember how fortunate we are, and how we need to use those abilities to improve the mobility of those who don't have the luxury. The environmental and health benefits don't hurt, either.
Plus, in the interest of full disclosure, the Acart Building is only 6 storeys high. And we rarely drink Martinis at lunch.
