Time to give the Ice Bucket Challenge the cold shoulder

Daniel says...

I am the lowest of the low.

I'm the guy telling you what I think is wrong with the ice bucket challenge. At the moment, on the crest of a wave on social media, it seems everyone is doing it.

And because it's all in such a good cause, any dissent is treated with the equivalent disdain reserved for the sort of scumbag that would swear at a lollipop lady or pick up one of those charity bags of sweets and not bung a quid in the little cardboard box.

So let me start by saying I love the ice bucket challenge. I did one and sent a tenner off to help the Motor Neurone Disease Association. I think it's Comic Relief for the 21st century – as wacky as sitting in a bath full of beans – but spread instantly and constantly over the internet to raise a phenomenal sum of money for charity.

People who object to it because it's 'wasting water when there are people dying of thirst' or who object to the ALS Association testing on animals all have their reasons. It is the nominating others bit that follows the drenching that bothers me. It's the video equivalent of a chain letter, passing on an obligation to keep it going and spread the word. I've seen people pestered and heckled to 'get on with it' or worry about how they will come across if they choose to do something else.

If we really were so charitable, wouldn't we all be donating anyway?

Nomination is the reason this has been such an enormous success. But I wonder where it's going to end.

We aren't being inspired into charitable giving, we're being goaded into it, made to feel like party poopers if we don't take part unless we at the very least write a cheque (which you have to do whether or not you dowse yourself).

When you watch Comic Relief you can feel moved, guilty or generous and give. Or you can just watch the sketches and comedy and go on with your life. Nominations under the ice bucket challenge either demand a response or risk you looking like Ebenezer Scrooge with your surly silence.

Woe betide you if you pour cold water on it.

Keith says...

Waaaahhhh!!!" My mother sounded like a Street Fighter baddie as she got me from the side with all the venom of a woman who'd waited 46 years to throw bucket of water over my head.

My lad was tied to a fence while a giant tractor bucket delivered his drenching.

My other half 'borrowed' my best Specials T-shirt for her self-inflicted splash.

Mates dressed up in shirt and ties, onesies and, errrr, even ladies' underwear to film their fun.

And in the end we all had a good laugh and gave a bit of money to charity.

The End.

Let's not over analyse this. That's it. We all did something daft on camera and raised a bit of money for some great causes.

It raised awareness of the Motor Neurone Disease Association and also helped raise cash for other charities that wouldn't normally have received so much cash over a Bank Holiday weekend.

That's the important thing.

To answer young Dan's question 'If we were really so charitable wouldn't we have been donating anyway?, well, the answer is no.

How many people would have woken up over the past week or so and been suddenly struck with the urge to donate to charity?

If it takes a hook, a gimmick or, yes, a bucket of water to get people to reach into their pockets, so what?

True, there have been some unedifying sights: I've seen far too much middle-aged man flesh, the 'fails' at times have been scary for the people involved and I thought the footage of the Walsall toddler exclaiming 'f****** h***!' after being dunked wasn't funny – it was disturbing.

But at the end of the day, the cause justified the means.

Even those people who have refused to join in (fair enough, by the way, it's not compulsory) and given instead to Water Aid, or some other worthy charity, have been indirectly stirred to donate by the Ice Bucket Challenge, so how can it be seen as 'a bad thing'?

My theory is that a lot of the 'too cool to dunk' brigade are against the IBC simply because it has been so popular and anything that the masses like (X Factor, football, Fruit & Nut) is somehow 'beneath them'.

I could be wrong, but to me these people are taking it all far too seriously and I feel sorry for them.

Lighten up – have a laugh.

Free yourself from holier-than-thou lectures, agonising debates over the rights and wrongs and whiny online lectures.

And just get a bucket of water over your head.