An Opposing View

Today I have been reading an article in the Huffington Post entitled ' Stop Performing Random Acts Of Kindness!' see here.

The author, Jill Koyama, thinks that we should stop performing Random Acts Of Kindness as 'individuals' or RAKtivists and join together in more planned and concerted ways to make a bigger and more sustained impact. She is saying we should become groups of CAKtivists (concerted, planned act of kindness activists) as the impact of a group of people joining their resources will make a bigger change to solve local and national problems. She does not deny the benefits of performing Random Acts Of Kindness for the individual which I have talked about in an earlier post (see here).

She quotes Jonathon Haidt, a University of Virginia psychologist,

                "If you do a random act of kindness for a stranger and it's a one-shot deal, there's much less likelihood that you're going to see any benefit." 

She states that if all of the people buying coffees in Starbucks for strangers pooled their funds to donate to a good cause it would have more of an impact in trying to deal with issues such as hunger.

I do agree with this and the quote she cites by Margaret Mead,

              " Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." In fact, we know what groups of all sizes, organized through technology and social media, can accomplish."

However, I feel that kindness inspires kindness and that if we go out of our way to perform 'random acts of kindness' on an individual level we inspire others to do the same and the effect ripples. The very reason why I started this project was to try and spread a bit of kindness around me as I want the world to be a kinder place. This could mean just being nice in the office, being kind to a stranger, smiling and being courteous out and about. It is likely that if we live in a kinder society people will feel more compelled to join together and try and solve issues together. Therefore, this starts with the simple random acts and could evolve on to larger group acts! So here's to the evolution of random acts of kindness starting with those small acts that make a huge difference.