It’s been twenty years since Live Aid. Some say it wasn’t enough, others say it did no good at all, but either way, it’s about to be repeated in the form of Live 8:
The “Have your Say” comments (link at the bottom of the page) vary quite a bit in terms of rating such benefit concerts in terms of their effectiveness. I have to say that I agree that feeding the starving millions for a few days is far from logical. The roots of the problems have to be addressed if these people are ever going to be lifted out of their misery, but I would think it’ll take a lot more than a benefit concert to do that, and it will certainly take decades.
Does anyone know for sure how much good, if any, Live Aid did for the people in Africa?
As a Philly area native, I will be in Ocean City, Maryland that weekend. I can’t imagine the headache of attending this show. How does a free concert raise money anyway? Or is this, God forbid , to “Raise Awareness”? Never have more pointless deeds been perforformed than in the service of “Raising Awareness”.
This is a hazy recollection, but didn’t the live aid money buy a bunch of trucks for relief that local despots burned? That may be mis-membered, but I did hear it once.
What exactly is the point of Live 8? Is it (shudder) to raise awareness, or is there a tangible goal?
Actual Republican WASP here, so I’m not just jumping on the bandwagon of feel-good poor-hugging.
If Bono’s involved, there’s a good chance that the project is aimed at something that’s got a shot at being productive. He’s on record as understanding the problems with old school charity that never demanded results and often helped the wrong people.
The point of these concerts is to pressure the G8 into doing productive things about Africa (IIRC). Geldof was just quoted in the local paper as saying that only political action can do something, that throwing money at the problem just doesn’t work. That’s what they’re trying to do.
I have my doubts. I just see another Seattle nightmare with people smashing Starbucks windows and not accomplishing anything except being “angry.” The goal of the Live 8 concerts is to encourage people to protest the G8 meeting.
I must be missing something. Why is it called Live 8?
Is it a play on both Live Aid and the G8 summit which happens over a month later? If this is the case, please excuse me while I bang my head off of a wall repeatedly as I make this face: :rolleyes:.
I mean, come on, how seriously should we take this if one of the biggest stories of the show will be “Spice Girls Reunite”?
On the other hand, I sure hope Duran Duran plays that one song they do. I can’t think of the name off the top of my head. You know the one…
Not a month later, I think. Isn’t he G8 meeting on 6th - 8th July in Gleneagles?
I confess I haven’t been paying too much attention to this concert business. I suspect, though, that there will be a whole lot of conert-goers who couldn’t care less about world poverty.
Spice Girls?! EEK! :rolleyes:
I wonder how much chaos will be caused in Edinburgh though.
Check out the documentary Food, Trucks, and Rock & Roll which is on disc 4 of the Live Aid box set. The documentary doesn’t give much information on actual dollar amounts raised (I think the number is around $100 million) but most of it was spent on establishing a transportation network of trucks and cargo ships, which then gave free transport to other relief agencies that had plenty of donated food & supplies, but not enough cash to pay for shipping rates.
