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VOLUME LXV ISSUE i
SERVING RIORDAN SINCE 1949
ARCHBISHOP RIORDAN HIGH SCHOOL
October 2014 THE NEWSPAPER OF CRUSADER COUNTRY
Ice bucket challenge creates supporters, critics By Greg Schoepp ’15 This past summer, social media ignited a firestorm with one Facebook wall post, the first video of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. American social media has since been swarmed with countless videos of what seems like everyone we know, dumping water on their heads and spreading awareness for ALS. However, the movement has come with some serious criticism. More specifically, drought-stricken California residents have scorned the challenge for causing further depletion of usable water. In addition, critics from all over the country have attacked the challenge for being a medium of “slacktivism.” Nevertheless, the sheer amount of donations, spreading awareness, and support of ALS affected families exhibit just how beneficial the challenge really is. On July 14, Jeanette Serchia completed the challenge for her husband, Anthony, who suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis -- more commonly known as ALS. She then posted her video to Facebook, and in a flash, their entire community of friends and family rallied around the Serchias, making videos of themselves completing the challenge and then posting them to social media. “Everybody came together in our community,” Senerchia said. “We couldn’t keep up with all the videos.” Not long after, these videos started clogging the social media pages of Pat Quinn, an ALS sufferer who has many connections in that community. He passed it on to Pete Frates, a former Boston College baseball captain, who in turn passed it on to various athletes and celebrities. And that’s where the Ice Bucket Challenge really took off. That’s where it officially became the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. As this social phenomenon exploded, criticism spread everywhere like shrapnel. The first major issue critics tend to have with the challenge is that it allows for superficial people to pretend to care about others in order to get Facebook likes or other forms of praise on social media. While some see this as a valid argument, and it may be true, sufferers of ALS could not care less. Bo Stern, an author and wife of an
Eric Rocha and Wesley Morris douse Band Directors, Kyle Hildebrant and Scott Souza, Jason Conci and Nick Silva.
ALS sufferer wrote in her blog titled, “What an ALS Family REALLY Thinks About the Ice Bucket Challenge”: “And if someone gets to look good while plunking their $50 in the ALS tip jar, I have zero problem with that. Because here’s the deal: We are in for the fight of our lives with this monster, and the very LAST thing I want is for people to give quietly, anonymously, and then slink away. Raise the roof! Raise a ruckus! Call all sorts of attention to yourself! I will be happy for you and every Facebook like you receive, as you nudge ALS an inch or two closer to the collective public consciousness.” Essentially, what Stern says is that this transcends the cynicism of critics. ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, as it is also known, is severely underfunded and lingers in the shadows of the unknown for most Americans. Because of this lack of adequate attention, any and all efforts to promote awareness are appreciated. The next curveball critics try to throw at the Ice Bucket Challenge is that it seemingly does not raise enough money, seeing as the option proposed in the challenge is to either donate $100 to ALS or dump the bucket, so anyone posting a video of water dumping (which is A LOT of people) apparently did not donate, right? Wrong.
The overwhelming trend throughout the course of the challenge has been that the majority of people do the challenge AND donate, and boy do they donate. According to Matthew Herper’s article on the success of the challenge in Forbe’s magazine, “the ALS Association has since said that it has raised $15.6 million as a result of the challenge, nine times what it normally raises in the same time frame. Another ALS charity, Project ALS, told the Washington Post that its donations were 50 times normal. ALS TDI, another ALS charity, says it has raised $580,000 since the beginning of August, 10 times what it normally receives.” Being California residents, the repercussions of the challenge in light of the drought must be considered. According to the Washington Post, the challenge has used a little more than 5 million gallons thus far, and more is on the way. Many ice bucket challenge takers felt terrible for having done the challenge, seeing as seven communities were predicted to run out of water by Sept. 1 in California. However, further information from California’s Department of Water Resources information officer Doug Carlson in Wire may have changed more minds.
Photo by Viggen Rassam
“In the severe crisis we’re in right now, people should reduce the water they’re using,” he said, adding that the department has not given the Challenge any thought in light of the drought. “People waste more water than [the 5 million gallons] needlessly watering their lawns.” Shirely Li, journalist for the Wire continued, “Indeed, there are many ways to look at the math. If it’s 5 million gallons of water wasted so far in three weeks, that’s a tiny amount compared to the 320 gallons of water used by an American household per day. Then, given 117,538,000 households according to the last census, that’s 37,612,160,000 gallons used in one day. Five million out of more than 37.5 billion gallons equals about .01 percent. That’s literally close to nothing.” Essentially, the Ice Bucket Challenge comes with some serious pros but cons. However, for some, the pros drastically outweigh the cons, due to the sheer amount of money raised, and the awareness that has spread. When it comes down to the issue of the drought in California, supporters say that California residents who take showers longer than one minute, water the lawn, or wash their cars, have no right to criticize the Ice Bucket Challenge.