We can care about Flint, world hunger, refugees and the Notre Dame all at the same time.
By: Myra Gupta
Tags: Giving, Global, Charity, Donations, Notre Dame

We can care about Flint, world hunger, refugees and the Notre Dame all at the same time. Myra Gupta Apr 17, 2019·3 min read

In the days following the tragic fire at the Notre Dame in Paris, hundreds of millions of dollars have been donated to help in the effort to reconstruct the iconic building. In the meantime, some on social media have taken to a more cynical outlook on the outpouring of support for the cultural monument and started a Tragedy Olympics.

Sure, there’s an argument to be made that capitalism sucks for allowing wealthy elite to have millions of dollars of disposable income. There’s also an indisputable argument to be made that communities that fit select demographics routinely get left behind. But just to be clear that’s a very different argument than the one expressed in the following posts that have been filling up my newsfeed:

An “old building”, really? The Notre Dame is a historical icon of Europe and a religious icon for some of the World’s largest religions. What would you be willing to do to rebuild the icons of your city, your country, your religion?

I’ve seen these posts (and others) shared with captions reminding everyone of all of the many tragedies happening all around the world. I’ve seen reminders that there’s a crisis in Flint from people who haven’t posted anything about Flint in the last two years (I checked). I’ve seen posts calling out Disney’s “exorbitant” $5 million donation to the Notre Dame even though the company donated a total of nearly $333 million to charity in 2018.

Donating to charitable causes, and investing in a more equitable world is of course something we should all encourage. And there’s no doubt that a lot of people who have the means to help tragedies around the world choose not to. But there is certainly no universal definition for the most deserving charitable cause. The most wealthy people in the world donate not only to causes like disease, hunger and poverty in the most destitute places in the world but also to education, culture and the arts in their local communities. To say that our financial priority should always be the most pressing issue is to say that governments around the world should stop investing in preservation of all historical sites, cultural monuments and public art because all those governments (and all private and corporate donors that assist them) could instead use that money to help their citizens directly.

Just a reminder that, like the donors to the Notre Dame, a lot of us can invest in all of these issues at the same time and there are lot of ways to talk about all the many causes that people should donate to without delegitimizing art and history as one of them.

Donating to help the Notre Dame does not mean that you don’t care about the people of Flint, Michigan. Donating to Flint, Michigan does not mean that you don’t care about the 40% of Ugandans who have to travel more than 30 minutes for clean water. The Tragedy Olympics that people create by trying to “one-up” awful situations around the World is not only demoralizing but futile — one of the most iconic buildings in the World caught on fire, the water in Flint is bad, the water in Uganda is even worse, there’s famine in Yemen, there are asylum seekers stuck at borders all around the world, etc. but is figuring out the worst of those really the point?

There are a lot of horrible tragedies happening around the World right now, I hope you’ll assist as many of them, as much as you can…it’s up to you which one you start with.