Comments on: Texans Tearing Up The Trail

By: Sonya

Sonya — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:52:54 +0000

I would like to echo what Justin said. I have served in America, Guatemala and Mexico, and will be working in Africa soon. Development and poverty alleviation are complicated subjects and cannot be addressed with only one approach. It is important to do hands-on, action oriented things to alleviate poverty, but advocacy and fundraising are also important. It is a trinity: Act, Educate, Fundraise. The ONE campaign does not focus solely on foreign aid, and seeks to unite aid groups here in America to help our neighbors as well. I encourage you to do a little more research about the goals and actions of the campaign before you make any broad and generalized statements about it.

By: Justin

Justin — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 05:12:38 +0000

To say ONE members are not taking a hands on approach to solve these issues is indeed a misconstruded statement. As a member of the ONE campaign, I have traveled to Africa, Asia, and Europe. I have seen poverty first hand and the affects on men, women, and children. Through all of my time serving in countries on these continents, I have realized this issue will not be solved by simply working individually, but rather fighting it at the root of the cause. This means encouraging the global community to take action. So, I feel you are rather premature in saying we are simply complaining about issues and not doing anything about it in a hands on manner. Because I’m on my way to Mexico as we speak to spend my spring break serving people in poverty WHILE representing the goals of ONE. Perhaps you should reconsider your statement.

By: Angela

Angela — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 20:50:29 +0000

Just because we are fighting for a cause outside of the U.S. does not negate the problems we have in our country as well. Both can be fought for simultaneously. This is hardly a new “charitable” concept. People have been fighting for change in Africa for many years- its just the deserved attention is finally being noticed. ONE volunteers are going and doing to make changes stateside for Africa and other countries as well as on the ground in those countries. We are also just encouraging our government to put their money where their mouth is so to speak so that we can be even stronger for other countries less fortunate. The government push is only a small portion of what ONE does. I am proud to be a member of ONE and all that we do- as I know the thousands of other ONE volunteers are!

By: Leigh Beshears

Leigh Beshears — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 17:00:50 +0000

This huge ONE campaign saddens me as it seems to reflect the new american “charitable” concept, which is, don’t worry about going somewhere and helping, getting out and raising funds to help in an area you feel worthy, or giving of your own time and energy. Lets all focus on making the government do it. Even though we know doing it this way means half of everything collected will go to help pay salaries and expenses of organization leaders. Even though we know money raised this way often gets embezzled or mis-handled. It mankes americans “feel” like they are doing something without really doing anything. It is comparable to spending 40 hours into talking your brother into cleaning your neighbors yard. If you really feel strongly, you do it yourself. Of course, this organization apparantly believes everything in its neighborhood (USA) is hunky dory and in great shape and wants to go thousands of miles away.