| Description |
White saviorism -- the phenomenon whereby White people lend assistance to non-White people and either see themselves, or are encouraged to see themselves, as "saving" those people -- has slowly gained more public awareness in recent years. There are many fields in which White saviorism arises, such as in humanitarian aid, film, social media, books, celebrities, study abroad programs, and voluntourism. There are various accounts of White saviorism in these fields. I will draw on these fields and their accounts of White saviorism to pull out the shared morally problematic features. I use this approach because White saviorism has a decidedly negative connotation, and finding what exactly these negative qualities are tells us when ethical help turns into unethical help. Having this account will help guide both how we conduct humanitarian aid and how we portray this aid. I have made these accounts into two flowcharts (one for the aid itself, and the other for the portrayal of that aid). A flowchart helps accommodate the complexity of this ethical phenomenon, while allowing for easier information dissemination due to the simplicity and digestibility of the tool (rather tan a 30 page thesis). |
