Remember my water bottle dilemma? My over-thinking is back, but this time with shoes.
(Update on the water bottle dilemma: I did get a new klean kanteen, I’ve been using my old sigg as a night stand caraffe, cause I figure a couple sips of bpa-laden water at night won’t kill me, one bottle has been turned into an car emergency kit, one has gone to Goodwill, and I will see my sister next week to return her bottle.)
I have a pair of Sperry loafers which I absolutely love. They are so comfortable, easy to slip on, look half-way decent with anything.
Mine don’t quite look like that anymore, and multiple comments from friends and family have led me to believe that my beloved Sperrys are past their prime. They’ve survived a good four (five? I forget), three states, and many adventures. Unfortunately, they look like they have too. So before people start refusing to be seen with me in public while wearing them, I’ve decided it’s time to look for a new summer slip on shoe.
This doesn’t mean I’ll be relinquishing my Sperrys. In fact, even just writing this makes me want to buy another pair. But they ain’t cheap. So, I’ve had my eye on another shoe recently.
TOMS shoes, in fact.
They are about half the price of Sperrys, and reviews from my sister ensure me that they are also super comfortable and durable (though I’ve heard mixed reviews from people on the latter front.
So here we have pros: 1) Have zoo animals on the inside, 2) comfortable, 3) cheaper than Sperrys, 4) slip ons that maybe you should, but don’t have to, wear socks with, 5) TOMS donates one pair of shoes for every one sold to children in disadvantaged countries.
Cons: 1) I hate buying stuff, 2) questionable attractiveness, 3) I would be inching ever closer to hipster-dom, 4) They aren’t free (though what is?) 5) TOMS donates one pair of shoes for every one sold to children in disadvantaged countries.
Wait what??? # 5 is is a pro AND a con? How can that be?
I have this ongoing debate with international aid, be it medical aid, food aid, or shoe aid. Is it helping or is it really hurting?
In my little anthropological circle, people tend to be big fans of talking about how international aid actually hurts developing countries. One example is of how USAid rice shipped to Haiti not only has put local rice farmers out of business, but is also a contributor to diabetes. Some suggest that foreign aid is really a more modern form of colonialism, giving money, exerting control over how it is spent, and promoting reliance on the developed country.
I get all this, but truthfully, I just don’t like it.
It’s like that little parable about how one day all these babies started floating down a river in baskets (like Moses.) The whole town came out to fish babies out of the river. But no one ever suggested going upstream to see where these babies were coming from in the first place.
My problem with this is – if everyone goes to help stop the flow of babies (yeah weird, I didn’t come up with it), then a bunch of babies are gonna get lost in the meantime. I feel the same way about aid. If we decide to take a hands off approach, let countries develop their own economies, then a lot of people are gonna suffer in the meantime.
So buying a pair of TOMS, and then sending a pair to a child in a developing country would mean that the local shoe market might be damaged. If that kiddo doesn’t get a pair of shoes, they might not buy one from that local shoemaker, and go without, thereby increasing their chances of injury or catching an infectious disease.
Maybe a hands-off approach would help economies develop without being artificially propped up, but on the other hand, many countries are in their situation in the first place due to the economic and political policies of western countries.
Do we owe it to developed countries to help make things right? Or should we just stop getting involved? I don’t know. I’m still conflicted, but buying a pair of shoes from any other company wouldn’t do much good either. I’m gonna end up buying a new pair of shoes from some where, so hopefully this will be the lesser of evils. (The other evil be the profits just go to some greedy corporation who is making shoes in a sweatshop). I’ll probably buy the shoes, and pray that they help a kid out.
What are your feelings on international aid? Do you have a pair of TOMS? What do you think of them?
One of my social justice-loving friends is obsessed with TOMS, and I’ve noticed them on a lot of undergrads at my school.
What troubles me is how TOMS is using their generosity as a marketing technique. They promote themselves as a social justice cause, even getting celebrities to endorse their work, but the bottom line is that they are telling you that to make the world a better place you need to buy their product.
That turns me off. Do they donate proceeds for schools or clean water in the areas where they bring shoes? I looked all over the website and there is no way to donate shoes to a kid outright – you have to pay for merchandise. I agree that just handing out supplies doesn’t solve the deeper roots of poverty.
Yeah, I definitely don’t think of them as a non-profit or a charity. I wonder if “you should buy this to save the world” is any better than other companies claims of “you should buy this because you need to buy new things to be happy.”
We love buying things to make ourselves feel better, and if we have something to show for our generosity then we don’t have to spend so much time telling people how generous we are. That takes too much time!
When I was completing my Public Health internship in Uganda, many of the schoolgirls that were menstruating didn’t have sanitary napkins to be comfortable in school so they stayed home. Thus missing days and sometimes weeks of school (because of falling behind). Should I create a “One sanitary napkin – for – One sanitary napkin” business and market my trendy feminine products here? They could have sparkles and polka dots and interchangeable jewels. OOOOOH!!!
I don’t know if the jewels would be necessary. Women don’t tend to think of their pads as accessories.
While I also agree that handing out supplies doesn’t solve the deeper roots of poverty, I don’t think that *avoiding* the passing out of supplies does either. If a person buys a pair of Tom’s shoes, pats themselves on the back, and then struts around with their questionably attractive badges of philanthropy on display for all to see, then I don’t see it as a true good. On the other hand, if you happen to buy Tom’s shoes for various reasons *in addition* to your/our other responsibilities in the world, I don’t see it as an absolute detriment.
I’m reminded of some “grown-ups” when I was little who argued that people shouldn’t be organ donors because if we give our kidney to someone and then they live to sin, then their sins are our responsibility. So play it safe and don’t save people so you can avoid being implicated in their transgressions.
Sick, right?
BUT….I probably wouldn’t buy those. The perceived philanthropy allows them to market an fugly-ugly. Have you ever tried Dansko clogs? Check on Ebay. Tons, barely worn at all. 🙂
Loved my TOMS, for the look and comfort. Wore through them in a year, but wore them often.
+1 for ebay
I am soooooo glad that you are getting new shoes!
Don’t get your hopes up too high…I will still be rockin the loafers this weekend!
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I’m with you on this. I often feel that it’s a mistake to give in a material way.
While there are immediate needs that need to be assessed in the case of a catastrophy, I feel that on the long term it is not the best approch.
Is it better to dig a well and leave or teach how to do it and leave?
I feel that a better approach is to teach skills because that way even when the helping countries leave, the skills remain and they can help themselves.
I have this same approach to unemployment. I see how abused it is in my home country and I feel that past a certain amount of time financial help should come with mandatory community service. For one thing one should give back to the community. Also I remember my mom being unemployed and how hard it was on her not to work, the longer you are without a job the more useless you feel. Giving back gives you a sense of pride.
Hey there!
You might not remember me, we met when I came to visit Kelly in October 2008 at the JVC house, when I was passing through Spokane for a night! Anywho, I came accross your blog via Kelly’s facebook and I’ve really been enjoying reading about your wedding and your journey with IC. Thanks for sharing with us!
I really appreciated this blog post, because it’s something I’ve discussed a lot before with other friends. I guess in summary, I feel like TOMS is really no better than buying any other shoe. On their FAQ, they say: “TOMS is a for-profit company with giving at its core” and that just about says it all for me; ultimately, they are a business. I think they are totally right that private business can accomplish a lot more than non-profit NGOs – having the capital, social marketing knowledge, and organization to to do it- but it seems evident to me that the 1-for-1 thing is clearly a marketing tactic rather than a solid approach to development.
As a volunteer in Guatemala I see constantly how the donor-beneficiary thing works. People come down for a few days or weeks or a month, pick out what they see people’s needs as based on their own cultural biases, then offer to “help”, giving away stuff or giving money to a project whose implications they hardly understand. They don’t take the time to really understand community, regional, and national dynamics or the root of the issues their project or donations are supposed to address. A lot of times there is no evaluation or follow-through, if there was any real analysis of community needs to begin with.
In my observation, those types of donations can certainly have short-term benefit, but on the long term are usually of neutral or negative benefit. Those sorts of no-strings-attached donations allow people to expect less from themselves and their own community or government, strengthen dependency on outside agencies, and do not address fundamental issues of community development.
So, that’s to say, with the amount of money they have, I think TOMS could do a lot better. Why not put more of that profit margin to use on local capacity building? Why not try to support small businesses selling their shoes at affordable prices at a subsidized cost?
I understand why TOMS takes the approach they do: it is really easy to go somewhere and give some stuff away to relative strangers, and much, much harder to create long-lasting changes in a community or country.
Steph
I wholeheartedly agree with you here, Steph-
“they don’t take the time to really understand community, regional, and national dynamics or the root of the issues their project or donations are supposed to address. A lot of times there is no evaluation or follow-through, if there was any real analysis of community needs to begin with.”
Much of my graduate work, my thesis, and my post graduate degree continuing studies/volunteer/internship work has dealt with the thorny issues of aid, and honestly I’ve come to the conclusion that I every single situation has to be looked at individually, at the smallest community level. I can no longer say that I think certain types of aid are bad or good, but unfortunately the kind of fine tooth comb, uniquely tailored to local needs/desires kind of aid that is shown to work is also the kind of aid that no one donates to, in general. Big donors and countries giving tax money in the form of aid payments want structure, they want reports and charts and graphs, they want to hear that 500 children were immunized, 25 birthing packets were giving to village women, so many nets were handed out, so many pounds of food given, etc. They don’t want to hear about how someone partnered with a community for 5 years and have just begun to build long term, unique plans for that community to thrive in its own way after gaining local trust…
I embrace community based, sustainable development principles, especially appropriate technologies and partnering *with* communities. Because of this, I am a bit wary of broad programs like “give children shoes!”. I agree with you, however, that in the end it’s hard to decide what is “right”. As you said, perhaps giving those shoes to children cuts into the local shoe market, but perhaps those children would go barefoot otherwise.
The genesis of development work, as it is known in America, is so fraught with ulterior motives based in fears of communism and a selfish desire to create capitalist trading partners that it is so hard to tease apart the good from the bad anyway. Throw in corporations trying to make money but also getting into the aid game, and it gets even more fuzzy…