Can we now finally get rid of 'Do they know it's Christmas'?

[Tokenminority]

This song drives me absolutely up the wall. It's patronising, reductive, and it completely harms efforts towards equality.

I understand the focus on equal opportunities and stopping police brutality, but other narratives, such as the pictures painted in the 'Do they know it's Christmas' song, can be just as harmful.

'Africa' is not a country. You did not go on holiday to 'Africa', similarly to how you wouldn't have sent that you went on holiday to 'Europe' when you in fact went to France.

Of course there are major problems surrounding poverty on the African continent, just as there are in other places, but African countries are not only filled with begging, malnourished children who have never seen a Christmas present.

The picture attached is a photograph of Lagos. If I went on the street and asked random people on which continent that photo was taken, would anyone even consider the possibility that it may have been Africa?

Yup nothing to do with a song - wrong thread!

"I think this is a little unfair. I was at primary in the 1970’s and the trope about African’s living in mud huts was well established, and had been for decades"

There still are a lot of Africans that live in mud huts actually.

Hate this song. Maybe it is ‘of its time’ (I am sure there was some better charity comms practice around at the time) but time to ditch it, it can be left in that time now.

You can raise a lot of money quickly by presenting a simple and dehumanised image of suffering. I don’t believe you should, simply because it is wrong and disrespectful to the people you are intending to help. But there is the further issue of whether you do more harm than good in the long run by building and adding to stereotypes of Africa and Africans that disadvantage people from the continent long term. Also, 40 years on when you are STILL showing this one-dimensional image of ‘Africa‘ to raise money how many people will turn around and say ‘ugh we’ve been seeing these pictures of Africa for 40 years and nothing ever changes, what is the point in trying to do anything about global poverty/injustice?’

I don’t think the ends justify the means

I haven’t had time to rtft so maybe someone already linked to radi-aid. They are a bunch of Norwegian students who did a spoof fundraiser asking Africans to send radiators to Norway where the weather is horribly cold. www.radiaid.com/about

And they have done an award for good/bad international charity comms: www.radiaid.com/radi-aid-awards-2017

(It’s older than I thought actually but the latest winner from 2017 is really moving but also done showing agency and dignity on the part of the refugees it is appealing for)

Update in case anyone actually did click through 😊 the embedded winning video is not working for me now. It’s here

drivingmisspotty I love Radi-Aid. They make some great points but in a humorous way, I like the videos they have up.

I actually think it was getting the “Radi-Awards” that prompted Comic Relief to review and reflect on their way of fundraising and move away from the “Parachute western celebrity into poor black kids” model.

I love that War Child ad - in particular that it turns out to be his dad that he’s idolising and turned into a Superhero.

Slightly off tangent but I hate the way in schools there is a lot of ‘how is our town different from this town in *country in Africa’ cur all the ‘all their cars are rusty and old, they have dirt roads, their shops/homes are shit’ etc. It’s lazy teaching and gives children over here a jumbled view from the off. They could compare the cities/different areas of cities and rural communities in both countries quite easily, even in KS1.

Love that @drivingmisspotty

@Dyrne Comic Relief fund some amazing grassroots projects. Such an opportunity to use their amazing platform to highlight the enterprising and professional local people who are making it happen and challenge some stereotypes. I wish they would concentrate more on that and less on the tearful celebrities. Good they are being called out on it and reviewing their ways at last.

You can raise a lot of money quickly by presenting a simple and dehumanised image of suffering.

Yes, but Band Aid was a response to a news report. They didn't set up a charidee and then look for some images to wheedle money out of people.

@puffinkoala

If you ask the average thirty year-old what this song is about, I doubt you'll get that many people who say 'the 1984 famine in Ethiopia'. I'm sure you'll get a lot of 'saving the poor children in Africa' though

If they have any knowledge about the background of the song, they may link it with Live Aid. Or they may have no idea.

Since when are we meant to know the background of every song we might hear? I have no idea about why every song in the 60s and 70s was written! Or indeed many later than that.

You can't condemn someone in 1984 for writing a song to raise money and that raised millions at the time, that people would think is racist in 2020! Nobody has a crystal ball!

And as I said, the lyrics have been substantially revised in later versions.

The lyrics have been revised and are still just as prejudiced as they were in 1984. Comparing this song to any other song is not really fair. This song isn't just any other song. It has a momentous amount of baggage and social commentary attached to it.

The thing is that the song was always crap. The difference is not the song, but people's changing attitudes to their own lives and their self worth. I'm sure that there are many people with a variety of backgrounds who do not find this song offensive. There are also a lot of people who do, and now there is a third group of people, the people who have realised that it is ok to find it offensive.

You may not understand so let me use a more familiar example. Until five years ago, I never corrected man who made a derogatory joke about my appearance. I never called people on filling the workplace with pictures of naked models, or of friends' 'banter'. You know why? Because I had been conditioned to think that these things were acceptable, and that I was supposed to laugh and go along with them to be be a good, modern woman. I didn't think it was sexism, or misogyny. Those things were about not being allowed to go to work and drive, or rape, or not having the vote.

For some people, the killing of George Floyd and subsequent outrage was like being in an abusive relationship, and someone from Women's Aid telling you that isn't how relationships are supposed to be. And you focus on the big things at first; the abuse, the manipulation. And then, the longer you think about it, you notice all the other little things that you always thought were not the best, but they were things that you had been gaslighted into accepting as being how you deserved to be treated, and now you are starting to uncover the sheer depth of unfairness about everything to do with your relationship. You start to realise people aren't supposed to tell you how to wear your hair, or that sulking because you won't have sex with them one time is not normal behaviour that's part of being with someone. And it hurts.

I have always found this song irritating. The thing that is recent is that I perhaps finally feel liberated enough to be offended by it. The fact that this song raised millions of pounds, or that it was made with good intentions, don't change that sentiment one bit.

Edward Colston raised a lot of money for charity. He was also a slave trader. The two can coexist. Here's to hoping that any person who suggests that it would be unfair to scrutinise Colston for his profession because he raised so much money for the city of Bristol will not get a warm reception by the majority of people.

Yanbu OP. Even as a 10 year old me and my friends all thought it wasn't a very good song but it was good that they were raising money.

Now ofc we know that it was another "starving Africans" trope and that a lot of the money went to the wrong places because actually people in Ethiopia weren't starving because they were African but due to complex political and economic factors.

I think this attitude of categorising countries within a continent as one amorphous mass happens also with the South American continent: Africans are all starving and South Americans are all violent dancers and both continents are problematic victims.

Europeans do not categorise themselves as problematic victims but actually in my lifetime there has been/continues to be, in various parts of Europe: civil war, refugee camps, internally displaced persons, totalitarianism, revolution, human trafficking, widespread uncontrolled HIV infection, homelessness, unsafe drinking water, radiation poisoning, state killing, extra judicial killing, secession, formation of new nation states, government corruption, industrial decline, widening inequality, prolonged industrial dispute, child poverty, food supply disruption etc etc.

How would the world regard us if our imposed brand image as chosen by Ghanaians was a rundown former communist apartment building in Pristina, or if it had been cardboard city in Waterloo 30 years ago?

@crumpledhorn

I don't know anyone who's ever had any racist feelings until now but after burning the Union Jack flag and pulling down the statue and causing such antisocial behaviour I've never seen so many people's opinions on them turn.

I think they've caused a divide now and as a consequence will find people who previously couldn't have cared less if they were here or not wanting them deported.

They haven't done themselves any favours at all and have shown disrespect to this country and will find that disrespect returned to them.

This is racist. Just to flag it here. Hopefully it will get addressed on the thread it was intended for as well, but in the meantime go and read the MN statement from yesterday. There's no place for your racist views here.

@LinemanForTheCounty

Yanbu OP. Even as a 10 year old me and my friends all thought it wasn't a very good song but it was good that they were raising money.

Now ofc we know that it was another "starving Africans" trope and that a lot of the money went to the wrong places because actually people in Ethiopia weren't starving because they were African but due to complex political and economic factors.

I think this attitude of categorising countries within a continent as one amorphous mass happens also with the South American continent: Africans are all starving and South Americans are all violent dancers and both continents are problematic victims.

Europeans do not categorise themselves as problematic victims but actually in my lifetime there has been/continues to be, in various parts of Europe: civil war, refugee camps, internally displaced persons, totalitarianism, revolution, human trafficking, widespread uncontrolled HIV infection, homelessness, unsafe drinking water, radiation poisoning, state killing, extra judicial killing, secession, formation of new nation states, government corruption, industrial decline, widening inequality, prolonged industrial dispute, child poverty, food supply disruption etc etc.

How would the world regard us if our imposed brand image as chosen by Ghanaians was a rundown former communist apartment building in Pristina, or if it had been cardboard city in Waterloo 30 years ago?

Thank you. To be honest, it's not really the people who don't believe that 'Do they know it's Christmas' is an offensive song who bother me. What is especially hurtful is the people who say that the song is offensive, but that none of that matters because it was for charity and therefore it's fine if something is a bit racist.

Oh God, I don't think that now! I did aged 10 because that was how it was presented: that starving is something that Africans "do", and that us nice white people get to stop it. I agree that it's racist and also re practicalities it hinders attempts to assist.

Watching that Buerk report again, the very top of the item talks about the civil war in the north. However the rest of the report is about crop failure which is the line that the Derg government was pushing, even though agency monitoring at the time showed that although there was some localised drought problems the main issues were the preceding few years of displacement and restrictions on food distribution. Because we in the UK have this narrative about Africans just starving spontaneously, we were happy enough to see Buerk referring to "biblical" famine and go along with the line spun by the Ethiopian government. This ofc led to the now known problems as to where the money went because we didn't look closely enough.

So yes I agree that it's racist and also counter productive to us "saving" poor starving people anyway.

Saraclara As the song was written in 1984, it doesn't matter that if it were written today the lyrics would be different. It was written then not now. I think people are looking to be offended at things at present. That song raised a lot of money, and afaik, still does. It was a way to raise money. It worked; it focussed attention on the famine, and the attention of the younger generation, many of whom have supported aid for African countries ever since. Is that such a bad thing?

I would also add that hindsight is a wonderful thing, but at the time, I don't suppose how the lyrics would seem 36 years on would have been a consideration.

To be clear, I'm not suggesting the tropes weren't racist, just that they weren't invented for the song. That was literally how Africa was presented by the Christian Church for decades because it suited their agenda.

Of course we now know better, the song was and is shite and the money should have been distributed more wisely. I still can't condemn the efforts of people to try to make a deference, and actually I'd like to see more of that can do approach. It's better than judging people on social media.

Smellbelina my son has looked at a few on BBCbitesize actualy what he found was more in common. So I think some of your views might be outdated or just your experience.

Also any time you give to any charity it,s worth looking at where the money goes, what is the agenda? Anyone remember the UN food bags being given to Hutto,s and not the Tutsi,s (or was the other way round. and excuse any spelling errors.)

Comparing Midge Ure to a Bristolian slave trader is a ludicrous reach.

Edward Colston raised a lot of money for charity. He was also a slave trader

Are you seriously comparing a man who enslaved 100,000 people, and killed at least 20% of them in the process, with two men who raised millions to help famine victims, but whose lyrics haven't aged well?

That is fucking ridiculous.

It was a song written on the back of a fag packet to raise money for starving people.
It wasn't a good song in 1984, it was poor even by the standards of the day. That wasn't the actual point of it though was it? It was solely to raise money which it did at a time of acute need? Hasn't stood the test of time? It wasn't meant to.

@MrsNoah2020

Edward Colston raised a lot of money for charity. He was also a slave trader

Are you seriously comparing a man who enslaved 100,000 people, and killed at least 20% of them in the process, with two men who raised millions to help famine victims, but whose lyrics haven't aged well?

That is fucking ridiculous.

Yes I am, because posters seem to be continuously suggesting that the mere fact that this song was written for charity is enough to absolve its offensive lyrics (which are still in use to tug at the heartstrings of people today) of any scrutiny whatsoever on how they might have contributed and continue to contribute to some of today's stereotypes and prejudice towards the African continent.

This thread has made me really depressed.
Can we not even agree that wanting to help people in appalling suffering is a Good Thing. Something we should all be doing for each other.

It reminds of that horror story where nuns wouldn't let the girls escape from the burning orphanage on the grounds it would be improper to be seen in their nightgowns by men. On the surface miles away, but not that different really. Dogma over pragmatic life saving.

I understand the issues with representation and I've learnt more about the background of Ethipia at the time, so thanks for that. Even the organisers acknowledge that things could have been done differently.

But I cant help feeling it is the height of privilege to weigh up literally putting food in peoples' mouths and being personally irate because ignorant people wont bother to educate themselves and will stick to stereotypes . And come down of the side of irritation. We've had voices from a lot of places on this thread, but none from an Ethiopian afaik. I wonder what someone who lived through it would say?

AJP Taylor makes an excellent point that it wasn't supposed to stand the test of time. It was supposed to be an urgent, emergency, of-the-moment, charity single. They didn't know it would endure for decades. I'm not defending the lyrics nor denying that they are extremely dubious, by the way.

Of course you can scrutinise it. The lyrics jar, and in fact I remember thinking wtf about the snow in Africa line even as a teenager in 1984.

But given the context, the discussion isn't open and shut. Do They Know its Christmas is a huge part of our social history. It does warrant analysis, and I dare say every year there are lively conversations about it in the nations pubs.

But getting rid of it? In what sense do you mean? Banning it from airplay? That makes no sense and I'm sure you know the backlash would make it totally counter productive.