I have a confession to make: I am a fan. I read fan fiction. I participate in Livejournal communities. I have actually written fan fiction on occasion. It’s been a great hobby in a life where I can’t have hobbies that involve material things, and fan fiction has saved me more than once from death by boredom on trips too long to carry as many books as I need.
It’s traditional to pretend to be ashamed of this hobby, but I’m not. It’s been crucial to my understanding of social media, community, and the way the world has shifted to a new participatory culture. I am proud to be a textual poacher. This level playing field has even changed the way I see international development. And sometimes fans do wonderful things.
Which is a long way of getting to this post by Laurenist. In it, she deconstructs a new charity started by Misha Collins, the actor who plays Castiel on Supernatural. Here’s how she begins:
Now, Misha is attempting to once again tap his social networking prowess (and large fanbase) to raise funds for a new charity, Random Acts. Not awesome. (Sadface.)
Don’t get me wrong. I like charities! I like Misha! I want Misha’s charity to be one that I like. Unfortunately, it seems the people behind it have good intentions, but as we in the international development blogger community know, “Good intentions are not enough.”
Let’s look at how Random Acts says it’s going to spend the money it raises:
- 33% will be divided between the orphanages we support in Haiti
- 15% will go to support victims of the horrific flooding in Pakistan
- 51.99% will go to support random acts of kindness all around the world
- .01% will be spent bribing public officials
She has two major criticisms: 1) Orphanages are a bad idea and 2) Supporting random acts of kindness is not an effective use of money. I agree with her on both points. Orphanages are a bad idea, almost always. Saundra can tell you why. And the whole random acts idea strikes me as kind of weak. A lot of feel-good; not much actual result.
But.
Misha Collins actually responded to Laurenist’s post with a well-thought-out comment, and here’s what he had to say about the “random acts” portion of his charity: “Part of what made me want to do this project was seeing so many of my followers on Twitter putting so much energy and so many resources into fandom. I think all of that energy is great, but my thinking was, perhaps, if we could harness a fraction of those resources (both creative and fiscal), we could put some of this c-list idolatry to good use.”
He’s got a point. Fans are completely off the hook crazy. I know this because I am one. I once sent a postcard to David Hewlett that said “how are you so awesome?” I have seen every movie Josh Charles ever appeared in, and that takes some serious endurance. Small wonder Misha Collins wants to tap this fanatical surplus.
The thing is, fans are crazy because being a fan is fun. It’s not meaningful, Henry Jenkins aside. It’s not purposeful. It’s just fun. People don’t do fannish things because they want to be useful. They do it to entertain themselves. While a Misha Collins doing-serious-things charity probably wouldn’t capture fannish attention, maybe his doing-silly-things charity will. And while those silly kind things may not be terribly effective, they are not, as the comments on Laurenist’s post pointed out, worthless.
Misha Collins, in his own way, knows the community he’s dealing with: nutso fans. He’s designed a charity that will appeal to nutso fans and use their energy for good. So, this time, I have to say – more power to him. (Except for the orphanages.)
———–
Yep, that’s Misha Collins.
The fen are great and I’m happy you noted help_haiti as I think it exemplifies the type of energy that fandom has to spread good-will. Even now, the help_pakistan community is bursting with authors and artists auctioning their services for donations to international relief agencies. It’s hard to call this random, though, as a lot of planning and organization goes into any endeavor such running an auction community.
This is, of course, where my thoughts about Random Acts diverge from yours. I’m not anti-kindness, rather I’m actually staunchly pro-kindness (with a few exceptions such as tourists who stand on the left on escalators–but that’s a whole other blog post.) If the idea is to spread kindness in one’s own community, though, I think the onus is upon the individual to do so, to smile at a stranger, to chat with the cashier at the grocery store. Outsourcing kindness, while certainly spreading it to other places, does little to spread generosity and humanity within our own neighborhoods.
tl;dr: Fans can spread kindness for free, they do it all the time (thanks Dean/Castiel writers!) and those acts aren’t worthless. Those things are priceless, why charge for them?
Hi! I think that a lot of charities have to balance carefully between “what people feel good/have fun donating to” and “what will do the most good in the world.” It’s unfortunate that many very useful projects are unsexy and unfun. They’re not going to bring in the big bucks, while a sexy, fun, not-very-useful project will.
Enter Misha Collins, sexy and fun. He could probably get fans to donate to the International Commission to End Public Nose-Picking if he wanted to. His great advantage is that he can get people to raise money for *anything*, because they’re choosing his project for its brand, not the place the money ends up. He has an excellent opportunity to sidestep the compromises so many charities go through to get donors.
And he dropped the ball.
When your advantage is the ability to get people to donate, you should be double sure that the money is going to the best possible use. His fans, when faced with concerns about how the money is spent, tended to reply, “Misha is very smart and has a lot of experience, so I trust him.” Using the money for projects that have unintended negative consequences for a community is an abuse of that trust.
Second (and much less important), local random acts of kindness are no longer random if they have to be applied for and funded by a central pool of funds. It makes a lot more sense for these things to be funded locally than to have a central administration weighing down the operations.
Also, ditto to Lauren that spreading kindness can be free.
For a Pakistan example of what not to do when you’re a c-list celebrities do-gooder, do check out this link from my blog.
Here via way of Laurenist’s blog.
I agree with you that “Random Act” is not a worthless idea. Just like Jared chooses to use his fame to improve the life of dogs, Misha is free to choose what endeavor appeals most to him. (Even though I believe he should keep in mind that what impressed him as a child was the fact someone gave his family $100 to buy food – I sincerely doubt he’d have been as impressed if it had been a bouquet of flowers.)
However, I disagree with you about them doing “silly kind things”. I found some of the acts shown in the video not silly, but actually harmful in the bigger scheme of things. I consider unacceptable to buy cut flowers grown with chemical fertilizer and pesticides, instead of small pots with alive flowers, grown in a way respectful to the environment. Apart from offering temporary joy to a stranger with a kind gesture, we should also think about how our actions influence the PLANET long-term. Personally, if I had been the recipient of that bouquet of cut flowers (even worse, in the name of a celebrity), I wouldn’t have considered it a kind gesture – I’d have considered it a little-thought gesture!
Should children in Mexico receive PLASTIC toys to get a smile on their face? What happened to toys that are friendly to the environment? Not to mention that the child on the video did not smile – he might not even care about his present. Were the children allowed to choose their toy?
Umbrellas are very common items in Korea, and everyone has a few (or more). Did those people need one more to be BOUGHT for them with the fans’ money by Misha Collins’ charity? What did this achieve, except for (I’d have never thought I’d say this about Misha, but I can’t help that this is what I’m thinking now) advertising his name, boosting consumerism, and increasing use of plastic, and eventually non-biodegradable waste? I would even bet that some of those people thought “oh no, not another one, I’ve no space for one more umbrella!”
I could go on, but I stop here.
Like you, I also say “more power to him”. Lisa above said he dropped the ball, but I think she expected too much of him in way of him using his fame. He’s not the divine solution to humanitarian aid, he’s just a person trying to do good his own way. I can’t lie, I was also disappointed he’s not as environment-considerate as I had assumed (and you know what they say about ass-u-me) from his monastery retreats, nudist stints, etc, but I still love the man who cracks me up with his interviews and gets me excited playing Castiel. I’ll definitely cheer for him on the day of his run, although I won’t donate because my conscience doesn’t let me. (I had a very hard time trying to decide what to do, my love for Misha battling my beliefs, but at the end I just don’t feel right donating for cut flowers and plastic toys, so I won’t do it. Maybe next time, if next project is different.)
I do agree with Laurenist that he’s creating the middle man here. Ironically, he’s not even achieving what he set out for. The handful of fans who run Random Act will be the ones acting, while the other fans will only participate through their donations – most will feel good offering money, but they won’t learn practicing kindness outside the internet, in everyday life.