Hey SpaceSleepers (29): The vlogbrothers & Monetary-based Activism

Something that a video from a week ago did make me think about is how they (vlogbrothers) have a video on the genocide in Palestine in CC History that perfectly covers the 75 years long genocide and the fact that they work with a lot of orginizations that work on ground in Palestine. All of this and yet John Green very hesitantly made a video in February (4 months afte Oct. 7th) about proposing a ceasefire and still fed into the colonial narrative that this all began on October 7th. He had said he lacked information on this genocide although he was the one who was in that CC history video, but even so you do not need to have all the information in the world to have known that what is happening to the Palestinians is wrong. They work with Doctors Without Borders, for instance, an organization that has been sending aid to Palestinians for years and even work with a separate organization that reported that 2022 was the deadliest year for children in Palestine before October 7th even happened.

I am not upset about this, but they are public figures and they do have a lot of power as shown by their very short-term work only months before to lower the cost of tuberculosis treatment. In just September, John Green had attended a UN conference to lower the cost of the Tuberculosis medication and before that even had Nerdfighteria (the name of the vlogbrother fans) participate in getting Johnson & Johnson to withhold their patent on lifesaving medication. Thus, seeing people tell me that they’re just online 

figures and they can’t do anything is preposterous. If even five percent of their fanbase donated to any of the numerous charities or organizations that have been on ground (that they again work with) or any GoFundMes to help people evacuate, it would do so much to aid people there. It’s not that they are misinformed, that they don’t have the power, or it doesn’t fit their brand, as those reasons are very clearly untrue, it’s that the money would have gone down from investors if they said anything. It’s that they didn’t want to take even a fraction of the risk that would have very easily aided Palestinians. It’s that as much as they work with Partners in Health to help increase Maternal Health in Sierra Leone, it is just performative. (07/05/2024).

— Mars ᓚᘏᗢ

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