The Dark Side of Rich Kids Volunteering Abroad | Informer

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"What you're being sold is an opportunity to help a community. What you're really buying is an opportunity to help yourself." Well said.

I did a voluntourism "internship" experience in undergrad, and my entire 25 page final paper was ripping voluntourism to shreds lmfaooo. I resonate with her message. it's so sad.

At my university, there were flyers promoting this type of voluntourism to Latin America for winter and summer break. Pre-Med students were often interested in them as a way to boost their Med school applications, myself included. The fees they charged for the trip were so exaggerated to me. Still, I actually paid around $800 just to reserve my spot for a trip to Nicaragua to help distribute medical supplies and help the locals with essential primary care. The e-mails with the coordinators started getting kind of suspicious for me because they next wanted $1000 for something else and another $800 for ‘paperwork.’ I ended up pulling out because the trip was becoming unaffordable to me and my family had warned me about volunteering scams in Latin America, where none of that money reached the actual people. I volunteered, instead, at my local hospital for 2 years and had a rewarding experience.

As a Haitian, all she said is true. The amount of missionaries that have been arrested for sexual abuse and trafficking (ex: taking a kid and moving to the US with them without legal adoption). Every time I see them I feel so disgusted.

as a Nigerian teen, I get pissed off when I hear people talking about "volunteering in Africa" this is just one of them, coupled with the generalization of the continent and its inhabitants. they're basically just selling privileged kids a sense of heroism and a chance to look good on their college application. I just finished high school and I'm working on a bunch of things if it all goes well I have a charity plan that can actually change people's lives, it's a long-term thing. I don't do impulse charity it is a f up the world and people have been suffering, feeding a bunch of people might feel rewarding instantly but where is the next meal coming from? teaching people to fish and creating a conducive environment for them to do so is the ONLY way to bring change

I am from Kibera - Kenya, the largest slum in sub-saharan Africa. I see this sort of experience every other day. I can boldly confirm that whatever she is saying is absolutely true. So many rich 'volunteers' show up here to feel good about themselves yet the 'orphaned children' never get assistance. How can I be of help to stop this?

I am a doctor (general practitioner) from Indonesia, and I am so very sad to hear that such thing seems to happen a lot in different parts of the world. I don’t know if anything similar happens here as well, but let me share a story where I volunteered to a very remote area in Indonesia with a medical organization initiated by an Indonesian surgeon. It was short yet very rewarding as we managed to provide care for 900 ish persons by the course of only 4 days in a small island (Indonesia is an archipelagic country). It was obviously tiring, but at the end of the trip we didn’t even think about that. Most volunteers were doctors, nurses, and pharmacists. I didn’t pay a single penny as it wasn’t voluntourism. Bottom line, not every volunteering opportunity is a voluntourism. Please don’t be discouraged to do volunteer work, do your research and I’m sure you’re going to find an honest volunteering project. My heart breaks for the children involved in such practices like the one in the video. I hope those practices get shut down somehow.

This is so true. I did volunturism once, it was one of the most frustrating experiences ever. Most "volunteers" were just there to get drunk and destroy everything around.

Also, "volunteering" at orphanages is especially harmful because it reinforces to the children that adults will only always come and 'love' them for a few days, take photos with them and then leave. No adult will ever stay or care about them beyond those few days. The kids will stay there until they age out and instead of being given proper schooling and helpful education on how to thrive as an adult, they spent their whole childhoods being ornaments for people who are already rich. Truly sad.

Impressed with her level of honesty about what she saw but also her honest self reflection

there's so much evil happening around us that we don't have any idea, it's sickening :(

As a West African whose parents grew up in the age of mass "mission" trips pre- and post- Nigerian civil war, I'm glad this video came out. My heart hurts every time I see adds because the effects of voluntourism on the people we met while financially navigating immigration and the redlining that happens once you get more comfortable in a country-- those effects meant that I was always "impressive" in my English speaking, or school performance, or general intelligence, or memories of living in a home. The propaganda is hurtful on both sides.

A friend of mine was volunteering somewhere in Africa. He discovered the director had embezzled 5 million dollars. My friend carefully collected proof and then presented it to the headquarters in NYC. My friend was threated that he will be accused of it all if he came forward. He was then fired and the director got to keep his millions. To this day I refuse to donate money to any NGO intending to help others.

Two other important things: The rich children who get these experiences are also then further rewarded with prestigious scholarships etc for "saving a village before age 18". Also, the greenwashing of the companies who pay for these. I had a trip like this sponsored by TD Bank (I think) in University. It was like $2k per person they sponsored for 13 people to go to Mexico. We built like 1/2 of a water filtration system lol. They should have just sent them the cash directly.

This needs to be shared far and wide - and more documentaries like this should be screened on as many platforms and channels as possible.

I’m glad this was said, I felt that way about volunteering for a while and felt like these volunteering systems are fucked up and dishonest but didn’t think it went that far. I hope more people see this and realize the difference between what they think they’re buying to what they are actually being sold and who really pays the price for it.

That all happens here, too. I had the misfortune of ending up in a homeless shelter. I was allowed to "stay in" for a few days after a surgery. It was Thanksgiving time. A sweet family with small children unloaded and brought in a half of a friggin horse trailer of large turkeys. I watched all of the staff members put several in each of their cars. I saw their friends pull up and have turkeys loaded into their cars. They cooked 2 turkeys for us the next day. There were 150 residents there.

This happens in the states as well. I used to skip Sunday School and hide in the store room because the vibes from the people at the Salvation Army church were weird and creepy. Many times, I would see the pastor, his family, the church clerk and even the lady who played the piano come and raid the donations. My family was poor af. We would get the donation boxes and it would be canned cheese, canned beef, rice bags etc. All the good tasting and nutritious food went to the cupboards of the people in charge of getting it to the poor. We would get poorly fitting, out of style clothes and shoes while their kids would have Christmas every week. They took ALL the toys that were donated. All of them. We never got a single one. They would talk while I hid, saying things like 'they don't deserve that - go ahead and take that' and 'Just take everything you want - they don't need that'. I will never donate to an organization. Not. Once. Ever. Giving directly to the poor may not go on your tax returns but it sure as hell does more good.

I used to work at Habitat for Humanity and it was not uncommon for us to undo the work that volunteers had done and then redo it after they were gone, just like she describes. We also learned that after the cost of insurance, using volunteer labor to build houses (instead of paid contractors) doesn't actually reduce building costs; the cost of a volunteer-built home is about the same as a contractor-built home, but the quality is worse. The real value of having volunteers do the building is that they are a source of funding and free marketing.