Is the ice bucket challenge for true christians?
by hoser 9 Replies latest jw friends
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Dis-Member
Just another social media fad .
(Quote:)
Ice Bucket Challenge: ALS Foundation Admits Less Than 27% Of Donations Fund Research & Cures$95 Million Later: Only 27% Of Donations Actually Help ‘Research The Cure’
As a huge proponent of serious charitable organizations, it always is disturbing to see trends such as Kony 2012 and various Susan G. Komen for the Cure initiatives take the social media atmosphere by storm. From the ultimate backlash against the celebrity-driven Kony fraud to the embarrassment of the KFC ‘Buckets for the Cure’ campaign backed by Susan G. Komen, I was immediately hoping that the infamous new ‘ice bucket challenge’ would in fact be an exception to the series of misled social media fundraising campaigns.
As soon as the ALS Association published its official numbers and my contacts within the investigative community confirmed the worst, however, it was apparent that once again we have been shoveling (or dumping in this case by the bucket-load) our hard earned funds into an organization that only uses about 27% of its financing to actually fuel research ‘for the cure’ — which just so happens to be based on pumping up the bloated pharmaceutical industry.
But don’t just take my word for it.
$95 Million Later: Only 27% Of Donations Actually Help ‘Research The Cure’
Reaching over 94 million in donations at the time of writing this article, thanks primarily due to the viral ice bucket challenge marketing campaign, you may be surprised to see the admitted breakdown of the company’s donated resources. You may be even more surprised to see the income breakdown within this non-profit that prides itself in helping ‘find the cure’ for ALS — now the most common among the five motor neuron diseases. From the company’s own records, we find the following cost breakdown for the year ending in January of 2014:
Research, as you can clearly see, sits at only 27% of the organization’s overall expenditures. Fundraising (marketing), stands at around half at 14%, and 1.9 million in administration (7%) was spent on their roster of highly paid non-profit executives. In fact, we even have the salary figures for each executive, including the ALS Association CEO’s six figure total:
- Jane H. Gilbert – President and CEO –$339,475.00
- Daniel M. Reznikov – Chief Financial Officer – $201,260.00
- Steve Gibson – Chief Public Policy Officer – $182,862.00
- Kimberly Maginnis -Chief of Care Services Officer – $160,646.00
- Lance Slaughter -Chief Chapter Relations and Development Officer – $152,692.00
- Michelle Keegan – Chief Development Officer – $178,744.00
- John Applegate – Association Finance Officer – $118.726.00
- David Moses – Director of Planned Giving – $112,509.00
- Carrie Munk – Chief Communications and Marketing Officer – $142,875.00
- Patrick Wildman – Director of Public Policy – $112,358.00
- Kathi Kromer – Director of State Advocacy – $110,661.00
When it comes to private business and commerce, it benefits us all to see growing numbers among a company and its members. This, however, is not the case for a ‘non-profit’ organization that is based around the concept of ‘searching for the cure’ and ‘funding research’ as its primary goal. Especially when this organization is being funded with close to 100 million dollars through a viral social media campaign in which it appears no one truly took the time to investigate the very company they are shoveling their assets into.
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Stirred
Yes, this whole buckets of wasting water to avoid donating scheme was not surprising for my non-JW contacts but what surprised me was that many JWs on my FB got on the whole wagon. It does some enormous good to have an advocate when there are nearly none for this disease. it is disturbing to see such high salaries for a charity.
I have not agreed to participate or support it to date though I'm considering All sides. I said to FB-JW "friend,"my conscience would not let me participate as I was still looking into this org and that so far I learned that one area of ALS research involves embryonic stem cells"...
NEVER did I think I would see JWs promoting this. I think she was offended I was not supporting her video with a like though I tried to support her being involved in a charity and having fun with it. She promptly started posting about service, convention pics, JW.org logo.
In some way I'd like to post some of this data but I don't want to be the spoiler either. It's just not something I'll support. There are charities I have long supported .....and maybe that's another reason I'm here. I just don't fit.
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Pete Zahut
If it's OK for Homer then who am I to question.....
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redvip2000
@Dis-member
These numbers are not all that unreasonable. They spend over 70% percent on the program. Typically a disease fighting organization doesn't spend the the lion share of its money on research grants alone. There is a lot of components of a program: education, financing treament, research, etc etc.
Perhaps 27% is a tad low, i would expect it to be between mid 30's to 40 percent, like the National Cancer Institute, but again i don't think it's unreasonable. The salaries are not unresonable either; whether we like it or not, these organizations need talented people leading the way, people who have good networking skills and that are able to follow through on a vision.What also happens sometimes is that these research grants are given to research teams who demonstrate worthiness of receiving the grant. If not enough teams meet this standard, the organization will invest some of the monies in other areas of the program.
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sowhatnow
one of my jw family members was told this was 'worldly'
lol
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PSacramento
I don't know about anyone else, but I personally know of quite a few people that have become aware of this disease because of this challenge.
The amount of many raised for ALS has been unprecedented.
It isn't just about reaserch but also the support that familes dealing with ALS need.
Just and FYI:
I lost my Dad to ALS this April 12 after fighting it offically for 2 years ( they were not sure what He had untill two years ago on his 65th birthday when the diagnosis was made "offical".
People had heard of Lou Gherig's disease but had not true idea of how horrific it is, that there is NO TREATMENT and NO CURE and that it is terminal.
I was against this challenge because I saw far too many celebrities involved BUT I was wrong, raising awareness and money IS important in fighting ANY disease but I didn't realize how little people knew about ALS.
You are suppose to do the challenage AND donate by the way, the challenge is NOT a way out of donating.
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likeabird
Why do people distort/misinterpret the figures just to pass a negative message? It's plain ridiculous.
A total of 92% of the money goes to where it is intended. Research is vital, yes, but are they saying that those already living with the disease don't need and aren't grateful for the help and services that that money can cover, something they may not have the means to pay for themselves?
Are they saying that public and professional education is not a useful way to spend that money? To train people as care workers? To improve the quality of services through professional training?
And what about fundraising? They may put 14% of funds into this, but for $3.6 million dollars to give a return of $95 million, is that a bad thing? If we need to know anything about charities, fundraising is key to the long term running of the programme. No fundraising means no money and no research and no services and so the list goes on.
Add on to that the administration costs of 7%. By way of comparison, Oxfam spends 9%, Red Cross spends around 5%. This is way below what a company would on their corresponding costs. Just because they are a charity doesn't mean they need any less skilled people working at the top which also means they don't deserve to be paid any less.
And what is so bad about this fundraising campaign. To be sure, I'm not one to advocate wasting water, but it has captured the imagination of people everywhere and it has done what it has set out to : raise awareness and raise money for a worthy cause.
As a side note, I get that the thread is mainly a parody and did have a laugh when reading some of it. But it does raise some issues that people, including my former self would easily take and run with as an excuse to do nothing. I've worked with several people who work at the grass roots level and do amazing work to help those in need. Their main and recurring worries that even keep them up at night are how they are going to keep their structures open and providing services. This sector is widely undervalued and overlooked, not only for the incredible services they do provide, but also for the vast number of jobs they collectively provide to a country's economy.
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nonjwspouse
I was concerned about the embryonic stem cell research involved, but they also do adult stem cell research, and in donating I would specify on my check for adult stem cell research only.
