Fundraising is frequently ＂reversed＂. Can’t you start crowdfunding if you have a car and a house？
Can you launch crowdfunding with a car and a house? Recently, a fund-raising event for a burned family in Shunde, Guangdong Province caused controversy. The two families traveled in the same car, and they were taken to the hospital for emergency treatment after an accident of car fire on the way. Faced with huge medical expenses, he initiated a fundraising request on an online public welfare crowdfunding platform and quickly completed the fundraising goal of 6 million yuan. Subsequently, Liang’s burned family, who received a donation of 4 million yuan, was exposed by netizens as having a house, a car and an industry, and some netizens questioned it. (Voice of China, August 13th)
In this controversy, both the burned family and the questioning netizens have reasonable points. The brother of the injured said that the younger brother’s family had a workshop, a self-built house and a car. The family situation was not bad, but it was not rich. "Paying millions of yuan for huge medical expenses is still far from enough." In the eyes of some netizens, their previous practice of not telling their families the real situation blurred the boundary between giving timely help in the snow and icing on the cake, and they also felt cheated.
The most critical problem is the asymmetry of fundraising information. Because the donors can’t truly and comprehensively understand the basic family status of the fundraiser during crowdfunding, once this information is exposed afterwards and it is found that they are not so difficult, it is easy to have a negative feeling of being consumed in good faith. In fact, looking back at the controversial cases such as the Rohr incident, the death of Xiao Fengya, and the "selling miserable anti-cancer up owners", the absence of key fundraising information is the important reason why the incident has been "reversed" again and again and the parties (families) have been bitten back.
On the one hand, in order to get more donations, some help-seekers will deliberately make selective presentations, deliberately highlight their particularly "miserable" and "difficult" side, and conceal personal information that is "not conducive" to sympathy. Especially in the story-telling and emotional expression from the media, the softest part of the public’s heart is easily triggered, and it is generous after the "tears" are accurately hit.
On the other hand, such concealment and misleading are likely to lay the groundwork for this later "reversal". When the situation of help seekers becomes the focus, the lack of relevant information will leave too much room for "brain supplement" and even become a hotbed for rumors. In the Xiaofengya incident, the parents of the sick girl were once accused of using their children’s illness to raise money and then gave up treatment. With the repeated doubts about fraudulent donations, unfounded statements such as "Xiao Fengya was abused by her parents" and "son preference" became popular, making the fundraising activities that were originally full of goodwill eventually become a chicken feather.
Truth is the basis and premise of developing public welfare activities. In the case of a burned family in Guangdong, only when the real economic situation of the family is known can people make judgments according to the necessity and urgency of the matter, so as to decide whether or not to donate and how much to donate. If the information is not fully disclosed, it will actually hurt the authenticity and disrespect the right to know of caring people.
Many times, some help-seekers have concerns that they can’t get social sympathy after they announce that they have a house and a car. As Wang Zhenyao, a public welfare expert, pointed out, the public generally has a particularly miserable and helpless imagination of the recipients. We should also realize that with the improvement of the overall living standard of society, the background and actual situation of help seekers are also very different. In the face of unexpected disasters that cost millions of dollars, not being "poor" at home does not mean that there are no difficulties. Especially in the case that a large amount of money is needed for medical treatment in the short term, even if you have a house and a car, it does not mean that you can get the money at once. In this regard, the public’s charity concept should also keep pace with the times, and be more understanding rather than demanding of those in trouble.
In recent years, the development of Internet public welfare crowdfunding platform has indeed provided an important channel for the public to convey goodwill and help the poor. However, similar cases in which public welfare is marketed and goodwill is used also put forward higher requirements for the professionalism and scientificity of platform operation. To effectively solve the problem of asymmetric donor information, we should start with the system design.
For example, for key information such as the basic situation of the family, users can’t just fill it in truthfully at the front end, and the platform should also do a good job of fact checking and do its duty of prompting for information risks. For the flow of donations, we should also try our best to achieve openness, transparency and earmarking, so as to avoid making the money a confused account.
The goodwill of the public is an expression of good feelings. However, such feelings should not be intentionally incited or abused casually. It should be a consensus to return public welfare to a rational and professional track and reduce misunderstandings and injuries caused by information asymmetry.
Ren Guanqing Source: China Youth Daily