I’m not sure where is the best place to share this, but I just received a message from GD that made think of Wenar’s piece: John Cena warns us against giving cash with conditions | GiveDirectly (by Tyler Hall) Ricky Stanicky is a comedy about three buddies who cover for their immature behavior by inventing a fictitious friend ‘Ricky’ as an alibi. [...]
When their families get suspicious, they hire a no-name actor (played by John Cena) to bring ‘Ricky’ to life, but an incredulous in-law grills Ricky about a specific Kenyan cash transfer charity he’d supposedly worked for. Luckily, actor Ricky did his homework on the evidence.
So I just replied GD asking: Did John Cena authorize you to say things like “Be like John Cena and give directly”? Or this is legally irrelevant?
D’you notice that you’re using a fraudster as an example? Even if one accepts that what Cena’s character (Stanicky-Rod) is true, he’s misleading other people; so the second thing that should come to mind when one reads your message is “so what makes me confident that GD is not lying to me, too?”
At least add some lines to assure your donors (maybe you see them more as customers?) are not being similarly fooled.
I’m possibly biased, but I do see that as an instance of an EA-adjacent collaborator failing to put himself in the donors shoes. But I guess it might be an effective ad, so it’s all for the best?
I’m possibly biased, but I do see that as an instance of an EA-adjacent collaborator failing to put himself in the donors shoes. But I guess it might be an effective ad, so it’s all for the best?