Dear Bono....

Dear Bono,

We are writing to let you know that we believe we have the solution to the extreme poverty crisis in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. We are a group of journalists across the world who have followed your humanitarian work since the late 1990s. We have since  become familiar with the efforts of the great economists Jeffrey Sachs and Amartya Sen, philanthropist Ray Chambers and the numerous United Nations agencies involved in making poverty history.

We are certainly fans of U2, but must admit have not listened to much of your music since the last CD presented no instructions whatsoever on how to dismantle an atomic bomb. Just a small joke to break the ice.

We wish to bring to your attention how horrified we are of the complacency of the people in the world we live with. The rock and roll persona of Bono, however, tends to represent a handful of people in the public spotlight with the common sense to acknowledge third world famine as the emergency in which it is. But unfortunately, we're afraid this is all the praise we have time for.

What we wish to present to you is not an economic thesis, nor is it a university paper commended by university professors; this is merely a print journalist’s answer to the long and no doubt, frustrating journey you have ventured and contributed to in giving a billion starving people – a seventh of our planet – some sort of future.

Having read Mr Sachs’ bestseller, The End of Poverty, and having become familiar with the Millennium Development Goals and The Millennium Promise, I am afraid 20 years might still be too long a period to wait for seeing an end to the unnecessary deaths from extreme poverty. And with the way our global economy has deteriorated and our administrations failed to meet their pledges of gross national product, even this 20-year deadline is appearing far from realistic.

If the casualty rate caused by famine remains consistent, it would indicate another 200 million lives being lost between now and the time the project is expected to be completed. Without sounding too ambiguous, and without criticizing too heavily on what has been a relatively slow campaign, considering the severity of the issue, we sincerely believe the sheer optimism of this goal as being a feasible target is interfering with the success of its outcome.

Throughout the past ten years you have met with dozens of politicians, bureaucrats, diplomats and heads of state from all over the world. You have received praise for your accomplishments and criticisms for your politics. The reason why we are writing to you is to advise that while these meetings have not been in vain, they have been a serious detour from the path that truly holds the key to making poverty a thing of the past. We believe the path where these powers lie is right in front of us. We believe the path is obvious. We believe the path is via the media.

As you rely on the media to broadcast your message in good faith it will be relayed accurately and effectively, our news mediums' business is to merely act as a type of modem. They generously have the power to print a story and they ever so dangerously have the power to omit it. We believe it is okay to omit stories from our daily bulletins on trivial and even not so trivial events – we do not, however, believe it is okay to omit a story on 25,000 unnecessary deaths each day from extreme poverty. We also do not believe the entitlement of a 'free press' should trump the severity of these deaths. We believe this type of news omission to be criminal.

News omission on extreme poverty – therefore, leaving out daily, the news story of the 25,000 unnecessary deaths caused by the developed world’s sheer neglect – is maintaining and contributing to this unbelievable body count. This outrageous figure should not only make the news on TV, radio and our metropolitan newspapers daily – it should qualify as the leading and front pages news stories. This omission sends a message out to its audiences that extreme poverty is not an important story; extreme poverty cannot be avoided; and that the leading news stories that do make it into our newspapers and news bulletins each night outweigh the issue of extreme poverty in terms of importance.

Extreme poverty has become too serious an issue to be left in the hands of the politicians. Fewer people and non-government organisations in first-world countries are lobbying our politicians to increase overseas humanitarian aid because they are unaware of the severity of the issue. They are unaware of the seriousness due to the lax manner of our media. Meanwhile, these political parties fail to use humanitarian aid as a backbone for their policies or for becoming re-elected due to (a) an ugly truth that people believe extreme poverty is a hopeless and unavoidable situation and (b) their chances for re-election rests in campaigning for voters’ issues rather than the issues of distant peoples. It has nothing to do with people being mean-spirited but it has everything to do with people being ill-informed.

In March 2007, as part of the Project Red campaign, you were fortunate to land the role of the first guest-editor of the July edition of US fashion magazine Vanity Fair. You were also guest-editor of the UK newspaper The Independent, which for both publications you managed to do a good job bringing attention to readers on the current devastation in Africa. It must also be commended that, at least for the case of Vanity Fair, you managed to raise awareness on extreme poverty in a publication that would not normally receive its dose of world news.

A lot of what has been written so far, we understand is no news to you. Nor would it be news to many advocates for the goals of the Make Poverty History campaign. It is little secret that extreme poverty deaths go unreported every day ─ people like yourself and Jeffrey Sachs have acknowledged this on many occasions. But the reason it does go unreported is because there is nothing new about it. Each and every day people die from a number of conditions including hunger, chronic malnutrition, infant diarrhea, AIDS, cholera and infection and each day the media fails to report on any of these tragedies, individually or as a whole.

But let’s not forget, the word ‘new’ makes up three quarters of the word ‘news’. In addition, the press councils (the audience’s complaints body) do absolutely nothing to improve media structures – when they are bound by a series of ethics codes imposed on them to regulate the media and make sure their actions are ethical and responsible.

We have been writing to the press councils of the world for a number of years now, trying to gain an answer as to why news omission on extreme poverty continues. In the past six years not one press council has disagreed that a seventh of the world’s population dying unnecessarily does not warrant the term ‘state of emergency’.

Most of them even admit that the continued lack of news coverage on this state of emergency is irresponsible journalism and not in the spirit of what the councils are trying to achieve. And not one press council has disputed that the reason its committee was set up in the first place, was to help preserve ethical and responsible journalism. All recognise this as being a press council’s founding objective.

So it is frustrating to continually see the overall lack of wit exercised day after day, year after year, through the media’s sheer apathy by not providing proportionate news coverage on these deaths. And not all press councils remain on the defensive. Many want to use the authority of the councils to actively influence change. But most are caught between wanting to intervene and also wanting to uphold the fundamental principles of the inevitable 'freedom of the press'. 

Then there are some councils who do not want to get involved with any matter unless a third party decides to make a complaint, as establishing any opinions on news omission by the councils would not only be interfering with the almighty rights of the free press, but also be making more work for oneself.

So an upfront approach towards the plausibility of reversing extreme poverty from more news coverage needs to become acknowledged and it needs to become real. We think it is safe to say Amnesty International won’t be suing the World Association of Press Councils for $50trillion in lost revenue if this is proved to be the case.

Again, not to confuse the topic, I am not saying the answer to extreme poverty lies in civil litigation – but I am saying that the answer lies in appropriate and responsible news coverage. And when the media is supposed to be considered the Fourth Estate, its imposing power on society is common knowledge these days. But when have we seen this imposing power being used for any sort of change, rather than merely showing us or not showing us what is going on in the world?

I like the idea of the Millennium Development Goals but I think its delivery to the mainstream world has been far too complacent. A projected target to make poverty history by 2025 is admirable but unimpressive. Poverty might never be history if our deadline is long enough to have another generation take care of it if ours fails. If the press councils bring in mandatory reporting, then the momentum is already there.

The problem with extreme poverty lies in the messenger. The messenger is unreliable. It is disloyal, sensational, capitalistic, bias and by the amount of press releases thrown together as news these days, at times lazy. But we understand, the idea of taking on the media can be in itself, a suicidal task. This is why we need your help.

And the media is more powerful than the parliaments, the courts and the churches put together. The media is like a spoilt child getting whatever they want or destroying the source that doesn’t deliver. And who can blame them? Ultimately all news mediums are just businesses. An avenue for putting food on their kids’ tables; roofs over their kids’ heads and decent medical attention for those same kids when they get sick. And when you break it down to that level - it is these fundamental elements that should bring the empathy needed to make poverty history.

We understand taking on the media will be a dangerous endeavour. This is why only Bono has the potential to survive the battle and come out the other side. The trick will be not to have it look like a battle. But only Bono has the power to win.

You are a hero to many people. Targeting the media can only be the right decision. But it needs to be done smart. Target those responsible for the media and with some form of influence over the media and its policing of the ethics codes and we have something to argue.

Freedom of the press should not supersede news which can ultimately give a billion people food, clean water and medical attention. Don’t forget the original message is that we are in a state of emergency, not a world on the way to recovery in x amount of years.

When people start to hear things will be okay they breathe a sigh of relief and worry about recycling or saving the whales instead. I know you have not been advocating this attitude of complacency but unfortunately this is the general message that comes across, from an outsider’s perspective anyway. The general message should not be to remain calm; it should be to become emotional; and ultimately keep moving.

To give an example of the media putting the wheels of progress in motion on a smaller scale, in Australia over the past five years there have been an increasing number of deaths of young provisional drivers on our roads. Factors contributing to these deaths include speed, high-powered cars and drink-driving etc.

News Limited’s major Sydney metropolitan newspaper, The Daily Telegraph, admirably went on a fervent campaign to help the State Government bring in laws to help reduce the number of young deaths on our roads; and respectfully to much avail. The campaign involved front page news stories of every fatality that would take place, at times on a daily basis, with emotive images of drivers’ mangled cars wrapped around mangled telegraph poles. A crumpled plastic P-Plate, indicating the driver’s status as a provisional driver, would also make the shot.

In June 2005, the New South Wales Government passed new P-Plater restrictions that would continue to be reviewed and updated over the following years. Those laws all dealt with further restrictions on provisional drivers relating to alcohol, high-powered cars and the number of passengers. How effective those new laws were in curbing the tragic death toll, time will only tell, however the Telegraph’s influence on the State Government in stimulating political change was a triumph for advocacy journalism.

But this is just a simple example of advocacy journalism. Traditionally opinions stem from topics where the newspapers' stance safely reflects the general opinions of its readers. The newspaper can then come out the hero fighting against injustices and helping save lives whilst gaining the kudos for embarking on a humble crusade.

But what cannot be dismissed is the power of the media is immeasurable. How do we even choose to talk about it without its permission? Even within the boundaries of news stories on media personalities covered on opposing networks, the ‘honour among lowlives’ code comes into play like a scene from Pulp Fiction. They are untouchable, unaccountable and ruthless. They are those who give us the peace of mind to consider ourselves up-to-date, yet they tell us nothing.

Omitting stories and omitting hard news on extreme poverty is not unethical, it is criminal. The needlessness of starving children is the number one priority this planet should be fighting to eliminate today – not in 20 years time. It should be treated as a humanitarian disaster. It should be treated the same as a tsunami-affected village needing relief; a terrorist attack on a national icon; or a hurricane wiping out a people.

This website is mainly the answer to extreme poverty based on the findings illustrated in Special Advisor to former UN Secretary Kofi Annan, Jeffrey Sachs’ book The End of Poverty. You know this book well having written the forward. A landmark and groundbreaking piece of literature, The End of Poverty is a fascinating, inspirational and at times, complicated ray of hope shining on the prospects of a planet where everyone is granted their basic human rights.

Its discussion of a massive tsunami-powered increase in humanitarian aid needed from the world’s richest countries in order to hurl the developing world onto the bottom rung of a ladder of self-sustainability is a plausible scene. This increase in aid would allow people living on less than $1 a day the basic needs for survival and the resources to grow crops, buy cattle and farm land to work their way out of aid-reliance.

Sachs tells us that the reason we have little to show for the humanitarian aid we have already given Africa over the years, is because we haven’t given much at all. The startling truth that the United States spent $450 billion in one year on its military for its war on terror and only $15 billion on humanitarian aid illustrates exactly how much more we are capable of giving.

This website has been developed as simply and as easily to understand universally as we could possibly endeavour. The writings go into the observations seen; motivations needed; and plan of attack required in order for revolutionary change to take place and extreme poverty to be a thing of the past.

We have attempted to use humour and ingenuity to stop the message from emerging too mind-numbingly boring as the subject matter at hand (press councils and media moguls) we have no doubt, can become quite tedious. But these institutions are imperative to cross examine, as the world knows very little about them. They exist all over the world and have some fairly commanding powers over the most powerful industry, yet they have successfully blended into the background of everything.

If only one key idea is taken from this website, it is that too much emphasis has been placed on the powers of politicians as the sole avenue for generating change. Few people realise that politicians tend only to remedy the issues of the majority and remedy the issues that they can afford to. It isn’t the minority groups or minority’s issues that re-elect a government back into power. I mean, let’s face it – you cannot expect the leader of a State to embrace gay marriage if his or her voters are 90 per cent straight, conservative and married to some sort of relative. Even gays wanting to be married could appreciate this. It might make it frustrating, but it just means the homosexuals in the analogy have to lobby the public before they lobby the politicians.

So how can we expect a government to use humanitarian aid as a platform when its voters do not care for it or are unaware of its capacity? And how can we expect voters to care about humanitarian aid when they are not being informed of its urgency. This is why the media must take responsibility for the grand scale of disproportionate news coverage and why members of the press councils must be held accountable for failing to address this behaviour by their peers.

The reason we am writing to you, is that the answer we have, needs the recognition for it to work. The people who need to be spoken to are the members of the world’s press councils. They are the media moguls, the CEOs, executive producers and numerous owners of the newspapers, radio stations and television networks from all throughout the developed world. They are the world’s richest and most powerful people yet they are neither bureaucrats nor politicians. And the fact that we believe they are not entirely bad people makes us feel more than anything that they it would not be impossible for them to cooperate.

For extreme poverty to be addressed seriously, the world needs to see 12-months of proportionately published and broadcasted news stories on extreme poverty. And when we use the word proportionate, we are saying that the body count of the day should equal newsworthiness.

While it sounds an incredibly crude way of putting it, there is nothing more crude than leaving 25,000 people to die each day. A body count of 25,000 people every day should equal a front page news story and a leading radio and television news report each and every day. It should require this treatment in every edition and in every bulletin until the situation is no longer. After just a week, I believe the public will get the message (and the novelty) that this is an issue of extreme importance vastly due to it being an issue that can plausibly be fixed.

We admit, the whole idea might sound a little far-fetched but it is the quickest and most realistic way to go about things. Plus, the whole project would be a glorified global endeavour reflecting the media’s dedication towards righting civil wrongs. Even if only one newspaper or one network jumps on board from each country – an aura of competition would prevail where one media corporation would appear more humane than its competitor – and inevitably they too would join the campaign. Soon the gap will close as more and more media groups become involved. However, we believe if an effective conference is organised raising the details of the project in a professional and pragmatic approach – and the appropriate representatives from the specific mediums do actually attend – then our gut feeling says there should not be the unfortunate slow start anticipated.

We are convinced, however, that what is being proposed is not an unreasonable ask, simply due to a logical and implemented policy of body count equaling newsworthiness. Extreme poverty does not have to be a front page story if another tsunami hits and kills hundreds of thousands of people. Who knows, with a third of the world at war today anything might take the lives of 25,000 people in one go; the dropping of a bomb perhaps. An event such as this would of course, not happen often.

Sir Bob Geldof said on his documentary Geldof in Africa:

"Twenty-years after Live Aid and I am ashamed to admit that hunger kills more people in Africa than AIDS, malaria, war, TB and polio combined."

He is right – but we should all share the shame with him. The Millennium Development Goals look at inevitably having another 20 years of devastation ─ and even that is budgeted with hope. It is not a prediction that the developing world will be a better place in 2025 – only an aim. And we can’t be sure and keep relying on discussion with politicians to make outlandish decisions that would not affect their voters’ key issues. And massive increases in humanitarian aid are outlandish policies when it is something voters are unaware is necessary. It should be set as a priority by the media to unmake such policies appear outlandish and start painting them as necessary; more crucial.

Dear Bono, you have done a lot so far – but you need to know that you are currently preaching to the wrong people. The people with the power are the moguls who are, in turn, semi-accountable to the press councils. And assuming that the politicians are accountable to no one is incorrect, counter-productive and destroying numerous lives.

So I ask that you read and consider the proposal and plan that has been written. From yours and Mr Sachs’ work we have placed our trust and with your help we place our hope. And we ask now and with the help of our media audiences to help make the actual news story of making poverty history, in itself, history.

Yours sincerely,

Shannon McErlain

Chair

Project Dear Bono