This article was sent to me from one of my penny collector friends – Thanks Linda!
OK, I’m not knocking philanthropy or student involvement, but this ‘Stop the Bop!’ thing is just lame. Yes we’re all glad they are raising money for the Children’s Miracle Network and Little Lebowski’s Urban Achievers or whatever, but couldn’t they find a better way to do it?
For those not familiar with ‘Stop the Bop!,’ Knight-thon plays that annoying tune you love to hate by the Hanson boys, ‘MMMBop,’ in order to solicit donations to its charity. When they reach a certain goal they stop (not sure if its a daily goal or a larger goal). It’s sort of like torture, you know that thing that America does not do.
The problem is this, the people they are trying to annoy into donating are jetting through the common area of the Union. Most of them will only hear the song once as they dodge the gauntlet of posters and 2-4-1 Scoops fliers. The song only really gets to you the second or third go around so the only people they are truly annoying are the other students tabling in the area and they are the least likely to get up and donate money.
To be honest, I get a little nostalgic when I hear the song. It’s like watching VH1 during during their “I love the [insert decade here]” shows. Sure you would never listen to or watch any of that stuff habitually again, but hearing it once in a while isn’t all bad.
I know the ‘Stop the Bop!’ thing is just a small part of the Knight-thon fund raising machine, but it seems trite and a little pointless. It was fun the first time but now it seems like an exercise in futility. I could be wrong, they might be raising tons of money unbeknown to me, however I don’t exactly see people rushing the donation can or anything.
Then again, the whole endeavor was annoying enough for me to snap a picture and spend 20 minutes writing this post. Maybe it is working after all.
‘Stop the Bop’ seems to be a popular fund raising idea in schools, did your school do something like this? I’m not sure that hearing MMMBop over and over again would really bother me that much, when I was younger and got in trouble I would put my 4-track MMMBop single on repeat in my room in an effort to piss off my parents. I think I’ve desensitized myself from any effects of going insane from hearing it over and over. (Unlikes the guys in their SNL skit, lol)
If you school did anything like this over this year and there are articles from your student publication – please send them in.