Crowdfunding Self-Sufficiency

If only there were a way to crowdfund self-awareness for people. “Unconventional parents” Matt and Adele Allen, without a trace of irony, are raising money to “Help us achieve our ambition of being self-sufficient!” (https://www.fundmytravel.com/campaign/ng3EQl5kGR )

“Our ultimate goal is to become self-sufficient,” they say in run-on sentences, “the way of making that happen is by moving to Costa Rica and buying a big plot of land where we can grow food, and have access to wildlife and nature in it's natural state. That's where we need YOUR help, we would love if you could donate any amount and help us achieve our dreams.”

To sum up, they would like you to donate money so they will become self-sufficient, relying only on themselves (after other people pay their startup costs). Judging by their donations page, nobody is biting. They have raised £245 of the £100,000 they need to fund this journey of bootstrapping and ingenuity. The comments are closed now but I checked them a few days ago and they all were people asking if the Allens could really be so unaware of the irony of asking people for money for this.

The Allens believe in “off-grid parenting” with no rigid bedtimes, home schooling, indefinite breastfeeding and natural medicine. Fine, but so do a lot of people and I’m sure they fund all that without handouts from strangers. None of those things is terribly remarkable and certainly not some unique project worthy of giving them my credit card numbers.

These funding sites can be a great tool for good causes and I’m not going to tell people who to give their money to. Personally, my budget for charity is limited and I’d rather give it to someone with a disease or in some terrible circumstance rather than someone making an optional lifestyle change. This is a naked cash grab. These people want strangers to pay for their flights and new house on another continent. Hard pass.

Oh, but then after the checks for £100,000 clear, they’ll be self-sufficient. I see. Hey, somebody donate some money to us to pay off our mortgage! Then when Junior comes, we can stay home from work and homeschool him. And we’ll teach him a valuable lesson that the window to self-sufficiency is having other people pay the startup costs.

The Allens are living out that old adage: Give a family a fish and they’ll eat for a day but give them a six-figure donation and they’ll be self-sufficient forever.