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Your Mission Trip Selfies Aren’t Helping Anyone

Your Mission Trip Selfies Aren’t Helping Anyone

Ah, the summer missions trip. In the last couple of months, church teams of young and old donned matching t-shirts and boarded planes to some far-off place. And this is a very good thing. As we all know, there are a lot of needy people—who need physically and need the message of Jesus. This trip, when done properly, can be important for both those going and those being served.

But whether you are building houses in Mexico or volunteering at an orphanage in Guatemala—there is one item in your need to just leave in your backpack: The selfie stick. Or rather, all that it represents.

You see, a selfie photo generally has one purpose: to capture an image that will then be posted on Facebook or Instagram for the digital applause of our “followers.” It’s the 2016 version of a postcard home, a modern way of communicating something about our identities to our circle of friends. But when used in the context of mission among the poor, it has the power to undermine our best efforts to serve.

We can all laugh at the worst excesses of this trend, as captured by Humanitarians of Tinder and Barbie Savior. But if truth be told, we’re all susceptible to the pitfall of serving in a way that looks good online. I know I’ve gone there. And maybe you have too.

The problem is, the situations that make for the best photos are usually the very situations that make for the worst kind of service. So here are three selfie scenarios that might look awesome on Facebook, but in reality are dis-empowering, dignity-stripping or dangerous for local people.

The Dis-empowering Selfie

One of most common missteps in short term mission trips is for outsiders to do things that can and should be done by local people. We routinely break the golden rule of community development: “Never do something for someone that they can do for themselves.”
Selfies encourage us to flout this Golden Rule, because we are tempted to capture photos of our practical actions for the poor to show people back home.

Orphanage needs repainting? Houses need to be built? Let’s roll up our sleeves! Dental care? Medical care? No need to train up local people; we’ll come back with a team of outsiders every year!

These photos communicate something about our identity as “good citizens” to the wider world. But they do little to strengthen and empower those we are supposed to be serving.

Alternative: Instead of featuring your own efforts to help, take photos (with permission) and celebrate local people who are faithfully working for change in their own neighborhoods over the long haul. Go simply to learn and communicate rather than to portray yourself as part of the solution. They were there long before you came, and they will be there long after you leave. Remember the Cambodian proverb, “It takes a spider to repair its own web”—and use that principle to underpin the stories you tell about what is happening in that community.

The Dignity-Stripping Selfie

Selfies too often communicate a single characteristic about the people we meet. “Here’s a photo of me with a miserable beggar,” or “Here’s a photo of me with a prostitute we rescued from sex slavery.” Selfies that portray us as the humanitarian hero with our arm draped around some impoverished victim do a disservice to the dignity of those people—and actually tell a false story about their humanity.

When we present local people in a one dimensional way, emphasizing only their helplessness and victimhood – rather than their resilience, we contribute to the myth that they can do nothing but wait for an outside savior.
We fail to portray them as people made in the image of God.

Even the angle you use for the photo communicates something about the subject. A photo taken looking down on a local person, communicates that they are small and helpless. While a photo angled upwards towards the subject emphasizes their strength and power.

Alternative: We need to take care to name both the tragedy and the resilience in any situation—the fragility of a local person, as well as their assets and skills. Both angles are true. Both presented together will more fully represent who a person is. A person’s story can be told in multiple ways—but how you tell it makes a big difference to everyone’s understanding of the truth.

3. The Dangerous Selfie

The temptation to get good selfie photos, can lead us to serve in ways that are not only unhelpful, but harmful. For example, orphanage “voluntourism” can be deeply meaningful to those who engage in it, but it’s also intrinsically damaging for the children in the orphanage.

What could possibly be wrong with spending time playing with children in an orphanage and taking a few fun selfies along the way? Children can and do form close attachments to volunteers, only to lose them when their stint ends. This cycle of short term caregivers causes further emotional damage in children who already suffer abandonment and attachment issues.

Selfie culture emphasizes adventurous, hands-on experiences that place foreigners at the center of the action instead of in support roles at the periphery. It’s time to challenge that and find a more biblical role as outsiders.

Alternative: Do you have the humility to serve behind the scenes? Then consider how you can serve in more appropriate, but less sexy ways. Grant writing, responsible fundraising and even plain office work are areas that local people who don’t speak English fluently might be able to use your help. A selfie with a laptop won’t look as cool on Facebook, but it is probably a lot more responsible in the long run.

This post appeared in an earlier form on Craig Greenfield’s weekly social justice blog. Used by permission.

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