As an exchange student from England, I’m often reminded just how far I am from home when I log into Facebook. Recently, my news feed was infiltrated by endless amounts of #nomakeupselfies, the latest Internet sensation to sweep across the U.K. It wasn’t until I mentioned it to my American friends that I realized the campaign hadn’t made it across the pond.
The #nomakeupselfie craze began in defense of actress Kim Novak, whose looks were criticized at the Oscars. Women and girls all over the nation began ‘baring all’ by taking a selfie without wearing make-up, and posting it to social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
Since then, the trend turned epidemic. Taking what is now known as a #nomakeupselfie became connected to raising awareness of breast cancer, and female Facebook users would take a selfie of themselves without their slap on, and nominate their girlfriends to do the same, writing hashtags like #breastcancer #awareness and of course #nomakeupselfie alongside their snap.
Then came the onslaught of virulent criticism and debate. Selfies would be accompanied by hundreds of Facebook comments in which users would exhaust the question: How does taking a #nomakeupselfie add anything to fighting cancer? Feminists everywhere, myself included, were rolling their eyes and scratching their heads in sheer bewilderment that taking a picture of one’s self without wearing foundation was considered to be a courageous pledge to the dark fight against cancer.
The loosely based visual metaphor of “baring all” for breast cancer awareness did nothing to add to cancer research. As convenient as it is to pretend that you’re doing your bit by taking a natural selfie, cancer research needs cold hard cash in order to make progress.
As a woman, I found the epidemic to be highly insulting. Not only did it turn charity into self-indulgence — a transparent probe for compliments about one’s appearance over Facebook — but it sent out a damaging message about women. The trend made it clear that many women see wearing make-up like breathing air, and that giving it up for the sake of a picture was like making a dramatic sacrifice. Basing the selfie trend around make-up also eliminated roughly half the population and isolated women with an association to surface-level values. What’s more, connecting cosmetics to cancer is as insulting and degrading to women as it is to cancer patients themselves.
Thankfully, the weak and self-indulgent gesture of taking a natural selfie was soon vindicated by monetary donations. Selfies are now accompanied by screen shot evidence that the nominee had donated £3 to Cancer Research UK by texting “BEAT” to 70099. Within 24 hours, the Internet sensation raised £1 million for CRUK. Now, that astonishing figure has reached £8 million. What began as an individualistic, half-hearted attempt to “raise awareness” of one of the most widespread forms of cancer became an inspiring lesson that taught us of the wonders that can be achieved when fundraising via social media outlets.
Unfortunately, the trend appears to be dying down. The money raised from the #nomakeupselife campaign has reaped the benefits of technological fundraising, because like all Internet phenomenons, it went “viral.” But, like all Internet sensations of the same nature, such as Gangnam Style and The Harlem Shake (remember those?) — they always die out. Sadly, cancer hasn’t.
So while we can take a positive message from the story of the #nomakeupselfie and the way that it morphed, we must not forget about the danger of relying on technology in the name of raising money for charities.
Technology allows us to dip in and out of fundraising from the comfort of our couches. Donating a couple of quid on JustGiving or taking a #nomakeupselfie quickly became the standard means by which altruism is converted into money. But altruism must not lose touch of its original cause and become a hedonistic hobby of the middle-class. While couch-potato altruism is an effective way to raise awareness and money on rainy days, it must not become the only way that humanitarianism is transformed into money. The “old fashioned” methods of philanthropy like dancing for 24 hours straight, volunteering in a soup kitchen, or running a 10K must not be pushed off the shelf in favor of disconnected, remote and dispassionate forms of fundraising.