So, Mr Beast made a YouTube video where he dug 100 wells in impoverished areas of Kenya and other African countries. CNN did a story on how he was being criticized for his good deeds. They quoted Saran Kaba Jones, a Black woman who has been building wells in Africa for 15 years, and a single Twitter commenter.
But... The Black woman praised Mr. Beast? She only asked that we consider maintenance, because many of the wells she digs are because existing wells weren't maintained.
And Saran pointed out how difficult it has been to raise money or draw attention to the need, but a famous YouTuber, who happens to be white, is able to do so instantly. She doesn't criticize Mr. beast for this. He didn't create that funding gap. And "That's the way the world works." Again, she praised the attention.
But of course, the "They're trying to cancel Mr. Beast!" outrage machine has already spun up, so Saran is being attacked on Twitter. 🤷🏿♂️
People are primed to hate Black women.
People pointed to her Pro Publica filing, calling her a grifter, because 90% of the money her non-profit takes in, goes to their own expenses! 40% of it is her own salary! Mr Beast gives 100% away!
But, a few things:
1) She works on this full time all year. She's a consultant.
2) 90% is the same expense ratio as UNICEF and Red Cross, and... Mr. Beast's charity, (called Mr.Charity)🙂🙃
3) Saran is a Harvard grad who left a job in private equity, and only pays herself $47K a year 🤯
We're so unused to the idea of Black women being paid for their time and expertise, that we view any of the time spent coordinating the digging of wells for 100s of thousands of people across Africa, as overhead. We zero rate the value of her time.
We consider her a grifter, while Mr. Beast has the same expense ratios (in line with the industry), and he pays the Executive Director of his charity twice what Saran makes. Mr. Beast's ED is not a Harvard grad, and didn't work in private equity.
You can see the ProPublica filings for UNICEF, the American Red Cross, Face Africa, and Mr. Charity here. Why is "Face Africa" the grift one? Why is the CEO pay for Face Africa considered "excessive?"
I view it as underfunded. Not overpaid. Her work is consulting. She could do more with more.
UNICEF:
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/131760110
American Red Cross:
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/530196605
Face Africa:
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/261443101
Mr. Charity (Mr. Beast's Charity)
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/852067214
Since 2013, the IRS has released data culled from millions of nonprofit tax filings. Use this database to find organizations and see details like their executive compensation, revenue and expenses, as well as download tax filings going back as far as 2001.
Anyway, donate to Face Africa here:
If you want to help with water access in the USA, donate to The Human Utility here:
https://detroitwaterproject.org
The Human Utility pays water bills for people in the US that can't afford it. Water should be a right, but it's not. So until then, we need to help each other.
Both of the Black women who run these organizations face abuse and insults online. Because we don't want to accept that Black women deserve to be paid for their time.
So Mr. Beast did a good thing.👍🏿
Saran did a good thing.👍🏿
CNN did an irresponsible thing, with predictable results.😑
Which is...
Black women being abused online for doing a good thing, and being held to an unrealistic standard that no one else is held to. The anti-woke mob never misses an opportunity to be cruel to Black women.
I understand why the anti-woke mob does this. They hate Black people, and that's not going to change. But make yourselves immune to their dynamic. Don't fall for it.
@mekkaokereke This is so angering, CNN has a history of this kind of shit getting worse in the last decade; and I don't know if it's mere irresponsibility anymore.
I don't know enough to know if this is the case for sure, but it seems that, like when two medications have a destructive multiplicative effect, the intersection of people primed to question the credentials of Black women (purposefully misunderstand), and the parasocial defensiveness so many fans of 'celebs' exhibit towards the smallest perceived 'slight' of their 'icon', would combine for a drastically worse set of takes against her than the latter on its own.
The VERY least Mr. Beast could do is viciously condemn the people attacking her. Will he? Will it just be a gentle "Hey don't do that", instead of dedicating time to talking about it? Will he take the opportunity instead to target his followers with anti-racism and attempt to de-radicalize followers? I don't know of him well enough to know his attitudes other than those god-awful thumbnails. One hopes he'd use his position of prominence to condemn the vicious and speak more to what she DID say, and work to ensure they'll be maintained for decades to come! But I'm so used to being let down by popular white men giving a tepid or vicious-but-brief response to things like this that I'm already primed to assume he won't, and by proxy perpetuate doubt of Black people, women, and especially Black women. I hope he'll prove me wrong.
@ShadSterling @mekkaokereke
It actually bothers me when very rich people do charity work. Bloody hire some people to do it and just call it work. Pay them well and lift them out of poverty, rather than sort some clothes into bins.
Poor people give the most and they give time because it’s all they have to give. Very rich people can give money. The best thing a rich person could actually do is lobby for fair taxes.
It may or may not be for show. They might actually want to get hands on. But, with the great power of wealth comes the great responsibility to do something with it. But they generally don’t.
Wait, what? I'm with you on 1 and 3, and possibly the second half of 2, but — UNICEF absolutely does not spend 90% of its money on overhead. It's almost exactly the opposite. According to Charity Navigator, 86% of revenue goes to the program. https://www.charitynavigator.org/ein/131760110
You're misunderstanding my point. I didn't say "overhead." I said "expenses."
https://hachyderm.io/@mekkaokereke/111381029274664521
For a non-profit with only two employees, whose main work is going to Africa and coordinating with and providing expertise to local authorities on how to dig wells, the work of those employees is not "overhead."
Think of it this way: Imagine if Saran paid herself zero dollars, but hired two employees to do the work instead of just one today. Her second employee is herself.
You can see the ProPublica filings for UNICEF, the American Red Cross, Face Africa, and Mr. Charity here. Why is "Face Africa" the grift one? Why is the CEO pay for Face Africa considered "excessive?" I view it as underfunded. Not overpaid. Her work is consulting. She could do more with more. UNICEF: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/131760110 American Red Cross: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/530196605 Face Africa: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/261443101 Mr. Charity (Mr. Beast's Charity) https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/852067214
I see what you mean but I don't think the way you put it communicates the point clearly. I don't want people to read that and think UNICEF isn't an efficient charity (it's quite good in this aspect).
But also, even if you count her 50k salary (how does she live in Cambridge, MA on that???) as all admin, from the 2022 filing, 61% went to programs. That seems really quite good for a tiny charity.
And, just looking at that number doesn't give a good assessment of the impact of a donation. If I give $1000 to UNICEF, it goes into a giant pool and it's likely that, yeah, 86% goes to programs.
If I give $1000 to FACE Africa, I bet she's not gonna go "oh, sweet, I'm going to get a bunch of lobster dinners". That $1000 will probably go almost _entirely_ into program work.
Very fair. UNICEF is on the better end of charities in my mind. Red Cross is on the other end.
There's a running joke in many majority Black countries, that white Americans will donate to the Red Cross without thinking twice, but when asked to donate to a local charity, will start asking questions about if it's well managed, and will the funds actually go to help people, and how efficient is it. 🙂🙃
And yet...
This is a bit tangential, but I'd consider that more a failure of our capitalist system than anything else.
She only pays herself 47k\yr? That's quite low, isn't it?
She only raised about $200K last year, as donations have been cut drastically, and non-profits and business run by Black women tend to have the money flow cut off first. She has one employee, and rent / professional services to pay.
You can click through and see her breakdown.
You can see the ProPublica filings for UNICEF, the American Red Cross, Face Africa, and Mr. Charity here. Why is "Face Africa" the grift one? Why is the CEO pay for Face Africa considered "excessive?" I view it as underfunded. Not overpaid. Her work is consulting. She could do more with more. UNICEF: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/131760110 American Red Cross: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/530196605 Face Africa: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/261443101 Mr. Charity (Mr. Beast's Charity) https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/852067214
@mcmullin @mekkaokereke I have covered nonprofits for years (association side, mostly, but some charitable) and I would like to emphasize this point as well. I went to a nonprofit tech conference last year and it felt like the overhead point came up constantly.
Websites like Guidestar really had a strong negative side effect on the field initially because of this.
[Image description: A greyish-brownish squirrel, standing on a stump, looking directly at the camera, their hands touching and resting on their chest. This squirrel is not happy about the messaging…
@lakelady @Habigelo @mekkaokereke
That’s the way to do it—God bless you!
I agree. I've been told, give to this person I know in the conflict zone, it will get straight there. Silence for nine months, because turns out not that simple. Overhead zero, effectiveness zero
@mcmullin @mekkaokereke The food donations should be assessed with a dollar value, which goes on the balance sheet as (in-kind) donation and mission expenditure. That lowers the overhead percentage by a huge amount.
Likewise, volunteering is an in-kind donation that should be assessed at least at minimum wage, which goes right back out as mission expenditure for worker wages.
I’ve certainly seen cases like that, where someone’s grown children all get 6-figure salaries to check a post office box twice a year.
But a lot of wealthy people, through family foundations or otherwise, really do a lot of good with their money. This is what makes the whole non-profit sector possible, and I’m sincerely grateful to them, though that may be an unpopular take here on the eat-the-rich fediverse.
A belated follow-up to this thread…
https://www.bizjournals.com/boston/news/2024/02/16/nonprofits-overhead-costs-changing-views.html
And he still doesn't give all that away either! Which is fine! 👍🏿
Mr. Beast hired and paid an Executive Director for his charity too, and his charity has other expenses as well. His expense ratios are about the same as hers. 🤷🏿♂️
People pointed to her Pro Publica filing, calling her a grifter, because 90% of the money her non-profit takes in, goes to their own expenses! 40% of it is her own salary! Mr Beast gives 100% away! But, a few things: 1) She works on this full time all year. She's a consultant. 2) 90% is the same expense ratio as UNICEF and Red Cross, and... Mr. Beast's charity, (called Mr.Charity)🙂🙃 3) Saran is a Harvard grad who left a job in private equity, and only pays herself $47K a year 🤯
Of the total expenses, zero percent was allocated to fundraising and only 9.6% was allocated to administrative functions. It is highly unlikely that this is accurate. Grantors and knowledgeable donors don’t look at total expenses anyway - they look at the percentage spent on each of three categories (program, administrative and fundraising).
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