Dooce just returned from an awareness gathering and raising trip to Bangladesh and is blogging about her experience in installments...the most recent post is here, and speaks to some of the complications I personally see in "doing charity".
Heather is finely attuned to the realities of blogging on a popular site, and I think it's plain in the rather preemptively defensive tone of some of her comments, and this need to be defensive is one I find especially tragic and problematic.
Just by bringing the name "Bangladesh" and a general awareness that women in less developed areas struggle mightily with childbirth to a larger audience, Dooce has done a valuable thing.
I have no doubt that many will criticize her for being wealthy, healthy, and famous while other people are not, but I think she rightly notes that there is little she can actually do to help with the reality on the ground there. I'm sure Heather will make personal financial sacrifices based on what she saw, but she could not "save" Bangladesh with the sum total of her financial net worth.
Heather's husband John posted some interesting thoughts about this whole issue here:
ReplyDeletehttp://blurbomat.com/2011/06/30/flexing-against-trolls/#more-5394