This blog is normally more fixated on white people problems — like UI design, typography on crappy pulp TV shows, and the manifold stupidities of Everett Bogue — than cataclysmic human tragedies, and many of them go by daily without remark. Its author is also strongly against shallow “clicktivism” (“Massive Human Tragedy‼ Click the “Like” Button to “Help” the People Affected‼ — Also, Please Look at, and Click on, the Ads We’re Showing You”).

The unfolding devastation in Japan is enough to shake me out of this bourgeois complacency. Whether it’s motivated out of my deep admiration for the Japanese people, a sense of white guilt, or even just ennui isn’t important — what matters is at least trying to do something to help. Since I can’t be there in person to help clear the rubble or search for survivors, I fall back on the classic Western response: firing money at the problem. It’s not much, but it’s something.

And in that spirit, I ask anyone reading this who hasn’t already donated to please do so. It doesn’t need to be much, and it isn’t hard to do, but the money is better spent on a Red Cross donation than a Starbucks coffee. (And for those without an iTunes account/with an ethical-moral-philosophical problem with Apple, there are plenty of other ways to donate.)

At this point, I should probably warmly thank you, but that wouldn’t be in character. Instead, I’ll close by saying this: don’t tell me if you donate or not; either do it, or don’t.