Dear Volunteers,

Thank you! You have sacrificed your time, money, and talents to help make the world a better
place. There are so many ways to get involved in your community, and I hope that you chose to
help in a way that was particularly meaningful to you. Maybe you read stories to children in the
hospital. Maybe you played chess with the residents of a nursing home. Maybe you mowed the
lawn of your sick neighbor. Or maybe you thought bigger. Maybe you organized a coat drive,
because you are worried about the more than 9000 people that the Utah Road Home will serve
this year​[1]​. Maybe you fundraised for a community member with a life-threatening illness,
because you know that the average cost of a hospital stay per night in Utah is $2500​[2]​.

Maybe you even traveled out of country to volunteer, pairing up with corporations like HEFY or
Volunteer Forever to spend your time building homes or teaching English in impoverished areas.
If you did, you must have been so eager to share your experiences when you returned home. In
your time volunteering, you ate new food, heard new languages, experienced new cultures, and
met new people. It can be tempting to flood your social media with images from your trip. You
want everyone to know that the best kind of change happens in us when we work to change the
situations of others for the better.

But volunteer, please refrain.

Please refrain, because that picture of you surrounded by a village of Zambian children is
damaging. It perpetuates something called the “white savior complex”. The white savior
complex refers to a white person who acts to help non-white people, but whose help is ultimately
self-serving. How can helping others be self serving? Teju Cole, the man who coined the phrase
“white savior industrial complex” explains how the pretense of service can be a backdrop for
self-indulgence, “​Africa serves as a backdrop for white fantasies of conquest and heroism. From
the colonial project to ​Out of Africa​ to ​The Constant Gardener​ and Kony 2012, Africa has
provided a space onto which white egos can conveniently be projected. It is a liberated space in
which the usual rules do not apply: a nobody from America or Europe can go to Africa and
become a godlike savior or, at the very least, have his or her emotional needs satisfied. Many
have done it under the banner of ‘making a difference.’”​[3]

According to Cole, the simple act of extending humanitarian aid to African countries can be
considered a symptom of the “white savior complex”. During Africa’s long colonial history,
there is a distinct pattern of white outsiders making decisions on behalf of Africans, which such
decisions ultimately causing financial, political, and social ruin. It is with this history still
looming in the collective consciousness of the African people, that Cole asks the white
humanitarian to refrain from offering unwanted help. His plea seems to say, “Stop infantilizing
us. We are a continent of intelligent, capable individuals who don’t need to be ‘fixed’.
Sometimes we will need help, and when we do, we will ask for it. Shouldn’t it be our prerogative
to choose when and how we receive your help?”

This is a hard idea to sit with, and some people disagree with Cole’s call for inaction. The
Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist, Nicholas Kristof states, “There has been a real discomfort and
backlash among middle-class educated Africans, Ugandans in particular in this case, but people
more broadly, about having Africa as they see it defined by a warlord who does particularly
brutal things, and about the perception that Americans are going to ride in on a white horse and
resolve it. To me though, it seems even more uncomfortable to think that we as white Americans
should not intervene in a humanitarian disaster because the victims are of a different skin
color”​[4]​. Kristof’s opinion is shared by many.

The truth is that there is no right answer to the question of whether white humanitarian work is
helping or hurting Africa. History tells us that those with privilege have a tendency to drown out
the voices of those who lack it. If we want to change this pattern, we must listen to the voices of
those like Teju Cole, who are imploring Europeans and Americans alike to examine our reasons
for serving. However, our innate humanity drive us to act when others need help. I think, dear
volunteer, that this innate humanity is what drove you to leave your home, spend your money,
and give your time. I cannot condemn you for that. However, it seems, to me at least, that in the
realm of social media, there is no question.

Pictures that glorify the white volunteer reduce Africa, as Cole stated, to a mere, “​backdrop for
white fantasies of conquest and heroism”. This. Must. Stop. If we really want to help our fellow
humans in Africa, and I believe that we all do, we must show them that their suffering means
more to us than a like, and our efforts to help them are not just a mad grab for “brownie points”
among our friends. By all means, do not stop your activism, but be careful the next time you
post.

Your friend,
Abigail Jacketta
_____________________________________________________________________________
[1]Schulzke, Eric. “Is Utah Still a Model for Solving Chronic Homelessness?” ​InDepth​, Deseret
News, 27 Apr. 2017, 10:05 pm,
www.deseretnews.com/article/865678779/Is-Utah-still-a-model-for-solving-chronic-homelessne
ss.html.
[2] Rappleye, Emily. “Average Cost per Inpatient Day across 50 States.” ​Becker's Hospital
Review​, ASC Communications, 2018,
www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/average-cost-per-inpatient-day-across-50-states.html​.
[3][4]Cole, Teju. “The White-Savior Industrial Complex.” ​The Atlantic​, 21 Mar. 2102,
www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/03/the-white-savior-industrial-complex/254843/
.