The Who's Your Daddy, Do You Have Money, and What Have You Done With It Award

Whew! That's quite a mouthful! I totally respect what the future awards are all about but when I saw the description of the Best Use of Goodwill award, I had to say, "Give me a break, people!" Isn't that classism at its best? When will we ever evolve from being an elitist who is your daddy type society. Come on y'all! This is supposed to be a forward thinking group yet they come up with this type of thing?

When you first read the words "Best Use of Goodwill", this is certainly not what you'd expect - at least not all of it. Here's the description of the category directly from their website:
"Best Use of Goodwill Whilst we intensely admire those who have been able to do well in spite of their disadvantaged backgrounds, we also appreciate those young people who have been able to use fame, acclaim, success, popularity, achievement, love etc to achieve something great either for themselves or for their society. Children of accomplished and/or famous Nigerians who have used their parents’ name wisely and effectively for positive ends are those we seek – so this award is for young people from a famous and/or wealthy parents/families but who have been able not only to work hard via an active engagement with the Nigerian environment, but who have also taken advantage of their family’s goodwill to make a positive impact on society."

I don't know but if I were a child of Chief, Doctor, Honorable, Your Highness so and so and I were actively involved in making a positive impact on society, I would be totally offended by this award. I mean, if I worked hard and did my part to make things better for others, I would hate to be short-listed for this award simply because I was the child of Chief, Doctor, Honorable, Your Highness so and so and I did something good for my society. Those two things are mutually exclusive. I would want my achievements to be noted just for what they are and not because of my family's background. We need to stop putting people on a pedestal just because they come from a well-known family and/or have money. So many people who don't come from those backgrounds still give back. Where's their award category? Okay, don't go setting up an award category for the Your Daddy Ain't Got No Name or No Money But You Have Done Great Things In Our Society award. That would just be as offensive.