The Directioners’ dedication, as a fandom, is exhilaratingly powerful. A collection of passionate girls (and some boys) rally together over and over to get stuff on the internet done, consistently using their obsession with the foursome (and dearly departed Zayn) as an outlet for all of that teenage energy and drive.
One Direction, though, have taken some smarter than smart advice and realised they could get their fans to put their efforts into something a lot more helpful: changing for the world for the better!
That’s why the boys launched Action1D, a charitable initiative to draw attention to things such as extreme poverty, inequality and climate change. It might propel them into the realms of Sting and Bono for its level of ‘do as I say not as I do’-ness (the boys, all millionaires and part of the 1%, use private jets).
But if their fans are going to be keen on them no matter what, the lads might as well direct (get it?) them to something helpful for the world and themselves – and helping out with a charity looks way better on a CV than being a Larry shipper, even if you’re the best Larry shipper ever).
Also, Action1D is part of a brilliant wider campaign called Action/2015 which is all about the fact 2015 is the year loads of global issues begin to get resolved.
1D say: ‘Time and again our fans have shown how creative and powerful they can be when they unite and that’s why we want to all join together to speak out and hopefully make a real and lasting change to the world around us.’
What do Directioners need to do to save the world? Create pictures, videos, whatever, telling the boys what they want the future of the world to look like. Harry, Niall, Liam and Louis will then help put pressure on our leaders…
Here’s what the responses look like so far:
Meanwhile, there are still a few Directioners not quite taking action and instead using the boys’ charitable efforts as an opportunity to… talk about the boys.
Oh well, we’ll get there in the end. And besides, you can’t exactly have a go at young people for being more into boybands than charity when that’s what they’ve always been told to be into. Well done One Direction (and their people) for getting the ball rolling on Action1D!
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.