In 1984 on this date (December 15), the song "Do they know it's Christmas?" was released and hit the UK charts. This song was followed by two others by artists in Canada and the USA. What initiated this outpouring of charity? Earlier in Nov, CBC network news aired the first ever images of the famine in northern Ethiopia. This story was heart-wrenching. With the Marxist regime of Mengistu in place, reporting internal situations was forbidden. Journalists often had tourist visas. One of these men left the country with the tape strapped to his back. Luckily, he got through security and the story became part of history.
Advocacy and charitable work via music had begun a few years earlier with George Harrison's organizing of the Concert for Bangladesh. Others have followed this major outpouring of 1984-85. At the time, I was a grad student who worked on data analysis for a large national nutrition survey of Ethiopian households. I did this from Canada while my supervisor worked with a UN joint task force (joint between WHO and FAO) in Ethiopia. During the time before hard-drives we worked through letter mail where each outgoing or incoming letter had to go through government censors. It was a slow process, but it worked. <smile> The level of global donations from countries and individuals had never been seen before and were never greater until 20 years later with he Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004. This global collaborative work seems to be happening to some degree now as the vaccines are being produced, transported and administered. Communications between nations have shared best practices throughout the pandemic to date. I find it heartening that we can come together in times of crisis.
Since much of the global response for Ethiopia began during the holiday season 36 years ago, I chose to share all three songs here today. The first of these may seem ethnocentric in current times, but I include the original here for historical reasons. The video quality on the second one is not great, but one can still recognize the singers. Stay safe. Enjoy!
Do They Know it's Christmas? -- Band Aid 1984
Tears are not Enough -- Northern Lights
Feed the World -- USA for Africa
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