QuoteReplyTopic: Locks of Love Exposed (Finally!) Posted: September 15 2007 at 3:54pm
The New York Times reproval was much too mild for my liking, but I'll take it after all these years. It can be found at http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/06/fa...=1&oref=slogin. It explains, as many of us have suspected that LoL has become a "monster" that the staff has no power to control. They indeed discard or sell the vast majority of hair donations.
If anything, the writer takes the word of Madonna Coffman at face value. But even if the 2002 figures are approximate (2000 tails per week-I've heard it's over double that now), in ten years they have only produced about 2000 wigs total! Ms. Coffman rationalizes the low usage rate by sheepishly asking, "Would the donors get out of it what they do? (by merely writing a check) No." You know, she explains, "that warm and fuzzy feeling. They *feel* they're going to help a child." (Emphasis mine.)
So, the charade goes on. Ms. Coffman may not wish to contemplate how the "warm feeling" has turned to sorrow for those women who discover that they have been duped. I personally know several who were terribly upset to find that their sacrifice most probably was transferred to some socialite or trashed. The heartbreak that LoL has created, *needlessly*, for many women, and in some cases, their s/o's, leave Madonna Coffman with some heavy explaining to do. I believe that at this point she is a disgrace. Potential donors are *entitled* to full disclosure, whether or not it brings her fat nest egg to an end. Infuriated, Bob
P.S. Thanks to our own Dave Decker and long-time hair enthusiast Heidi Woeller for adding their formidable input to this article, which is many years overdue!
There's also more to the story. There's a site called Charity Navigator and one of the people from it has a blog. There's He said she said going on between LOL and NYT.
These links are in order of first / earliest to latest.
Wow--Purplebubba, thanks for linking all of those. That was some fascinating reading, though I'm not sure how to tell my daughter (who recently cut & donated her hair) about this. I thought the comment telling about schools where the teachers arranged for all the girls to chop their hair off was particularly horrifying. Now, I think I will go call a cousin who was thinking of donating her hair...
31"!!
Bob S
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Thanks, PB! The bottom line: Madonna Coffman is not about giving folks a "warm and fuzzy" feeling; she cares not an iota about a woman's treasured locks being shorn if the publicity attached to the cutting brings her scam "charity" publicity and more dollars. So what if years of sacrifice go to waste, so long as Ms. Coffman's banker keeps smiling? Bob
Thanks for keeping us updated, guys. I'm glad that a big-name media outlet finally got the point so many people have been trying to make about LoL.
These lines really stood out to me as I was reading the article:
“We created this monster because people get so much from it,” said Madonna Coffman, the president of Locks of Love. “They get the attention. They get a warm and fuzzy feeling. They feel they’re going to help a child.”
Is she admitting that people do this because they enjoy the attention they get from it?! They do it to make themselves feel good as opposed to helping someone in need?
The donations keep rolling in, perhaps because cutting off one’s hair for charity is an altruistic deed that doesn’t require a financial contribution, which may be why it appeals so much to children.
It really bothers me that children seem to be targeted as potential donors, using it as a sort of guilt trap, making them feel selfish for not helping another child.
“A check would be easier for me,” Ms. Coffman said. “But would the donors get out of it what they do? No.”
Why does LoL not make this information public? Are they afraid they couldn't handle the truckload of checks they might receive? (haha)
If nothing else, maybe this article will make donors want to do more research beforehand. Although, in my experience, they simply do not want to listen.
Edited by hairbraider - September 17 2007 at 6:32pm
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