RBM
CAGiversary!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/4642169.stm
There are many articles and blogs about Live 8, but I like the one in the link because it offers some reader opinions already. A few (edited) views on the perceived and realistic benefits of the Live 8 concerts going on across the world today are:
Poverty is present in the majority of the world, especially in the Third World countries. It is not going to go away, no matter how many concert you have, a bunch of rockers getting together is not going to change that. You want to make a difference? Then do something with that money that will make a long term difference. Like building some schools, building irrigation systems etc using local labour. (from Sri Lanka)
Apparently some of the boards advertising LIVE 8 have been defaced with the messages "Hypocrites" and "Don't oversimplify poverty". To those who do not understand; it's not about oversimplifying anything, it's about doing something as opposed to nothing. If money helps and awareness helps, and if hope helps, then LIVE 8 will have done something, and it will be a greater something than the nothingness of mindless messages of bigotry. (from the UK)
Of course the Group of 8 will have to move fast on corrupt African regimes which are terrorising and impoverishing their own people by destroying their so-called illegal houses who are already suffering from the unfair terms of trade with the West. Live 8 will help change the attitudes of the leaders of the G8 towards African people because they are being told to do so by their own people like Sir Bob Geldof, Bono and others. (from Kent)
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My own two cents: a cynical view of the Live 8 concerts might be that they serve to soothe the conscience of the international community, while yielding very little (if any) actual benefits. If a man donates ten dollars toward a fund to help alleviate poverty or if he votes to approve a proposition supporting third world debt cancellation, then he derives a corresponding sense of "having done something" to tackle the problem, while attending a Live 8 concert and cheering celebrity speeches about those same issues might elicit a similar sense of satisfaction without having had to do anything meaningful.
A counterargument to that line of thought might be to point out that the concerts are free because their goal is to raise awareness and not donations. Namely, that these concerts serve as preliminaries to donation drives and political approval for debt cancellation. Neither of these two movements gets far when the public is apathetic or ignorant of the problem, and so these concerts serve to drum up both in anticipation of later action.
If the point is to raise awareness, then you need something to draw the masses so that they'll listen to what you have to say. It's prohibitively expensive to use free food or free beer for masses across the world, so you use free music from popular celebrities...including African musicians would make it more meaningful, but if you wind up drawing fewer crowds due to lower name recognition, then that might not be worthwhile.
Lastly, I don't believe either camp (those openly supportive or those openly critical of these concerts) have put forth any ideas on how to combat government corruption in the third world. International headlines regularly expose graft and corruption in the bureacracy, the military, and the courts...and pumping more money into those agencies obviously won't help. Supporting anarchy or revolution isn't the answer; I haven't heard any proposed answers to this glaring obstacle in alleviating poverty.
There are many articles and blogs about Live 8, but I like the one in the link because it offers some reader opinions already. A few (edited) views on the perceived and realistic benefits of the Live 8 concerts going on across the world today are:
Poverty is present in the majority of the world, especially in the Third World countries. It is not going to go away, no matter how many concert you have, a bunch of rockers getting together is not going to change that. You want to make a difference? Then do something with that money that will make a long term difference. Like building some schools, building irrigation systems etc using local labour. (from Sri Lanka)
Apparently some of the boards advertising LIVE 8 have been defaced with the messages "Hypocrites" and "Don't oversimplify poverty". To those who do not understand; it's not about oversimplifying anything, it's about doing something as opposed to nothing. If money helps and awareness helps, and if hope helps, then LIVE 8 will have done something, and it will be a greater something than the nothingness of mindless messages of bigotry. (from the UK)
Of course the Group of 8 will have to move fast on corrupt African regimes which are terrorising and impoverishing their own people by destroying their so-called illegal houses who are already suffering from the unfair terms of trade with the West. Live 8 will help change the attitudes of the leaders of the G8 towards African people because they are being told to do so by their own people like Sir Bob Geldof, Bono and others. (from Kent)
***
My own two cents: a cynical view of the Live 8 concerts might be that they serve to soothe the conscience of the international community, while yielding very little (if any) actual benefits. If a man donates ten dollars toward a fund to help alleviate poverty or if he votes to approve a proposition supporting third world debt cancellation, then he derives a corresponding sense of "having done something" to tackle the problem, while attending a Live 8 concert and cheering celebrity speeches about those same issues might elicit a similar sense of satisfaction without having had to do anything meaningful.
A counterargument to that line of thought might be to point out that the concerts are free because their goal is to raise awareness and not donations. Namely, that these concerts serve as preliminaries to donation drives and political approval for debt cancellation. Neither of these two movements gets far when the public is apathetic or ignorant of the problem, and so these concerts serve to drum up both in anticipation of later action.
If the point is to raise awareness, then you need something to draw the masses so that they'll listen to what you have to say. It's prohibitively expensive to use free food or free beer for masses across the world, so you use free music from popular celebrities...including African musicians would make it more meaningful, but if you wind up drawing fewer crowds due to lower name recognition, then that might not be worthwhile.
Lastly, I don't believe either camp (those openly supportive or those openly critical of these concerts) have put forth any ideas on how to combat government corruption in the third world. International headlines regularly expose graft and corruption in the bureacracy, the military, and the courts...and pumping more money into those agencies obviously won't help. Supporting anarchy or revolution isn't the answer; I haven't heard any proposed answers to this glaring obstacle in alleviating poverty.
