The World Changes Every Day

I nspired by a brief chat with a co-worker about food aid in Africa, I've started reading a fascinating book: Famine and Foreigners: Ethiopia since Live Aid by Peter Gill.  The book begins with Ethiopia's 1984 famine, and the reaction it inspired in western countries - including Band Aid, the charity created by pop singer Bob Geldof which made 5 million pounds for Ethiopia famine relief with their record 'Do they know it's Christmas.' "As Ethiopians have pointed out ever since,"Gill writes, "they did of course know it was Christmas because the starving were mainly Christian."  I wasn't around to watch pop songs in 1984, but did encounter the 2014 remake of "Do they know it's Christmas," which raised money to fight Ebola.   I came across the song  on the site of Radi-Aid *;  it was the winner of the 2015 "rusty radiator" prize which goes annually to " the fundraising video with the worst use of stereotypes. ”