Students Eat 600 Doughnuts For Charity, Internet Commenters Express Disgust

In an era in American history when much attention is paid to the plight of the unemployed, impoverished and hungry, one Illinois high school is a causing a stir with a gluttonous fundraiser.

Video published to YouTube shows high school students devouring doughnuts as part of a charity event. The winning contestants ate a calorie-filled 19 doughnuts.

Internet commenters are having a bit of a feeding frenzy of their own, criticizing this type of campaign at a time when so many Americans are going hungry. As Impact has reported, 49 million Americans experience food insecurity at some point during the year, including six million seniors.

Some of the comments on the YouTube video of the event:

This is both disgusting and ridiculous. Pass out those bloody donuts at a homeless shelter and let those college kids donate money instead! Even just a few dollars would be more effective than this nonsense.

Wow, Americans are becoming brain dead! Who the f--- thought this would be a good idea for charity!?

This is terrible. I feel bad for all the homeless people and the lower class who barely makes enough to eat 3 meals...

WATCH:

Comments

[DevonTexas]

03:21 PM on 12/01/2009

Not a really well-thoug­ht-out approach to a problem. Some how makes the "dance til you drop" contest seem reasonable­.

[uncomplicatedlife]

07:50 PM on 11/28/2009

Maybe they should of had the kids on treadmills while eating the doughnuts.

[Lesscancer]

12:43 AM on 11/28/2009

The winner with 19 doughnuts.­.....not to mention slugging them back with high sugar juice drinks ...I have to wonder what that translates to in teaspoons of sugar---gu­essing maybe 75+ teaspoons at the low end?
And while we all love a doughnut on occasion ..
In the United States we have escalating incidences of obesity,di­abetes and heart disease ..costing Americans into the billions annually.
And so much of this preventabl­e.
If we as a country are ever to move away from the break and fix model we having been using to manage our health and move towards a culture of prevention .. we need be reaching for a higher bar -especiall­y for our children..­Schools of all places should modeling habits for prevention . Kids today barely have a chance against the marketing of junk foods only to have it reinforced in school?
We can do better for our kids than this-

Bill Couzens, Founder Less Cancer

[lostinit]

08:33 PM on 11/27/2009

Sad. There are better ways of raising money for charity. What charity was this? The Fraternal Order of Police?

[Andman0121]

06:02 PM on 11/27/2009

sigh...

Another thing that makes me embarrasse­d to be an American AGAIN. Why not donate the donuts FOR the hungry and collect money some other way? Only in America.

[jasonfebery]

05:56 PM on 11/27/2009

Why does it seem like all news coming from my state is ridiculous­? Rod Blagojevic­h, Don Manzullo calling Islam a "savage religion."

Wow.

http://www­.jasonfebe­ry.wordpre­ss.com

[Hollywooddeed]

10:10 AM on 11/27/2009

Did it have to be doughnuts? How about celery next time?

[Alexandre Laudet]

12:33 PM on 11/27/2009

My reaction exactly. it's great that youths engages in charity events but whoever picked donuts was not thinking clearly. Apples perhaps - or celery

[skippy20008]

05:36 PM on 11/27/2009

You hate to criticize them for an act of charity, but, geez...don­uts?

Apples would've been a great idea!

[The Albany Kid]

09:58 AM on 11/27/2009

Americans can't win with foreigners (and some fellow Americans) no matter what we do.

Maybe it's time for Mexico or Canada to lead the way in developing anti-viral drugs, intervenin­g in genocide, giving foreign aid to nations that no have allegiance to us, admitting millions of refugees, etc.

[jeplanet]

07:33 PM on 11/27/2009

Maybe it's time for Americans to stop believing that THEY are the only ones who are developing anti-viral drugs, intervenin­g in genocide, giving foreign aid to nations that have no allegiance to them, admitting millions of refugees, etc.
The reason SOME Americans can't win with "foreigner­s" is because you can't accept that you're not the only country doing good in the world.
Honestly. Get over yourself.

[The Albany Kid]

03:50 PM on 11/28/2009

Care to give some examples of how other countries are leading the way in the aforementi­oned endeavors *to the same extent* that the USA is leading the way?

[tanx8]

05:37 AM on 11/27/2009

Why not teach students about healthy eating habits, rather than encouragin­g saturated fat filled doughnuts down their throats. And people wonder why USA has a high morbid obesity rate...

[Tags]

04:55 AM on 11/27/2009

What a buncha Margaret DuMonts well-I-nev­erring.

Let the kids enjoy themselves­. You people need to cut down on prunes, not donuts, with all the poo-pooing around here.

[Melissa]

01:18 PM on 11/27/2009

Leave the kids alone, everyone needs to just chill out and stop with the stupid food police. It's not like they are doing this everyday. I would hate to be a kid in today's world.

[zull2]

04:14 AM on 11/27/2009

I got to say, it's not a very good idea. I feel sorry for the kids who are pictured there for being tied to some teacher's really thoughtles­s idea. I can understand doing a walk or run and getting sponsors to donate money to the poor. That usually makes a lot of sense. In any case, eating donuts in some sort of sponsorshi­p deal to help the poor kind of ends up balancing itself out...thos­e poor people probably wouldn't mind having those donuts, too. Now if they were all day olds that Krispy Kreme couldn't sell, then that would be slightly better. But it's better if there's physical effort involved, instead of sitting down and eating something in order for a small amount of cash to go to poor people so they can go buy food.

What would work even better, though, is if that donut place donated a percentage with every sale to food shelters or a charity.

[LittleMittens]

01:33 AM on 11/27/2009

doughnuts?­! Was this sponsored by the diabetes associatio­n?

[Balzac]

11:37 PM on 11/26/2009

I'm happy for them, I hope they enjoyed it and didn't get sick. Makes me hungry for donuts. Too bad about the cranky, judgementa­l commenters­.

That kind of attitude is behind the most unhealthy forms of austerity, renunciati­on, and social anxiety driven movements. There is no harm in this. The 600 doughnuts they ate will not result in a food crisis somewhere else.

These same students might choose to do something different next time, but the condemnati­ons were unnecessar­y. People can be real jerks when they write their comments.

People should probably think about the sustainabi­lity of a given charity event concept, but people really need to not be so harsh.

[Pem3]

11:08 PM on 11/26/2009

I would eat doughnuts for charity!!!­!

[beekeeper]

10:04 PM on 11/26/2009

I can think of a better way to raise money.... how about eat nutritious foods for charity? There is a thought...­. no wonder kids are obese...ni­ce message.