I know what Sally Struthers looks like, and, like most of my generation, that’s not because of her filmography.  I know her from her television campaigns for Save the Children, the ones where she walks through a muddy village with her hands on the shoulders of a starving non-white child, and implores us to buy them lunch. (Or a year of lunches and some school supplies.) If I was less cynical about its campiness, I’d admit that watching starving children in a non-Western village is heartbreaking — almost heartbreaking enough for me to write a check.

That’s certainly the point. Development organizations, both domestic and international, have long used images to drive home the realities that other citizens of the world live in.  Think of how the images of New Orleans have driven a discussion about racism and poverty into the national spotlight over the past few weeks. Or how a photo of a girl in flames running down the street in Vietnam emphasized the toll of war.

But when do those images become exploitative? Where do we as potential donorsdraw the line? Ruth Gidley writes, “ fierce competition for donations in a ballooning NGO sector has led to an alarming resurgence in shock tactics that critics call “development pornography.” As donors, we want to know that our money is needed.  In giving money, we are essentially buying a product. And, as advertisers know so well, we buy what makes us feel good. Helping others makes us feel good — so are NGOs doing anything wrong in selling us an image that may result in much needed resources?

We are all done a disservice when such distorted images become emblems. As Paul Davis of Oxfam notes, “‘The idea that pervades is that Africa is a broken, dusty place without food or hope,” he said. “Many children in the UK simply don’t believe there are cars, cities or mobile phones in Africa.’” Ultimately, a more nuanced view of the world and its people would benefit the starving and poverty stricken much more than any single sponsor a child program would.

llouison