We’ll all done it in some way, shape or form – sponsored the child in Africa, bought the TOMs shoes, signed the change.org petition to hopefully exact social er, change. But how much good are we actually doing, or are we just making ourselves feel better about our own comfortable situation in the world? Are we smugly gifting to the charity du jour just so we sleep easier on our 400 thread count sheets?

We’ll all done it in some way, shape or form – sponsored the child in Africa, bought the TOMs shoes, signed the change.org petition to hopefully exact social er, change. But how much good are we actually doing, or are we just making ourselves feel better about our own comfortable situation in the world? Are we smugly gifting to the charity du jour just so we sleep easier on our 400 thread count sheets?

And as if poverty wasn’t a challenging enough phenomenon unto itself, history has revealed that good intentions by outsiders can in many cases make the problem worse. It’s this cruel irony that serves as the basis of Michael Matheson Miller’s POVERTY INC., the easy-to-understand doco that comes with a pretty hard hitting message.

The problem, Miller cautions, is that few of us pause to think what happens after we have dropped the cash in the donation box, never stopping to fathom that the mere act of giving can actually have a detrimental effect.

Drawing on perspectives gathered from an incredible over 150 interviews shot over four years in 20 countries, POVERTY INC. explores what it calls the “hidden side of doing good”. From tsunami relief to TOMs Shoes, from adoptions to agricultural subsidies, the brilliantly crafted documentary follows the butterfly effect of our most well intentioned efforts and pulls back the curtain on the poverty industry. It exposes the multi-billion dollar market of NGOs, multilateral agencies, and for-profit aid contractors, asking: are we activating development or are merely propagating a system in which the poor stay poor while the rich get progressively more smug? Just like the debate around should we or shouldn’t we support the manufacture of goods in third world markets, it comes with its pros and cons, and plenty of puffed up CEOs along the way.

It’s not all bad news though, especially when Miller actually focuses more on those who are thinking outside the box when it comes to tackling poverty and those affected by it. The film features inspiring self-starters who have succeeded despite the odds in otherwise impoverished countries, including African entrepreneurs Herman Chinery-Hesse and Magatte Wade. I love the fact that they don’t mince words when it comes to talking about annoyingly smug (there’s that word again!) anti-poverty crusaders like the irritating Bono and aforementioned brand TOMS Shoes’ founder Blake Mycoskie, who both focus purely on hand-outs, rather than giving those in need a leg up. And don’t even get me started on the fact that TOMs profits thanks to a marketing campaign that is literally costing them nothing, mainly because we are so eager to write off our consumerism as being beneficial for the less fortunate.

So called “poverty porn” isn’t an attractive or effective solution whichever way you look at it, and if this documentary does anything it highlights how much of it is out there. We need to pause and ask ourselves whether it is ethical to depict the graphic qualities of a starving human being to Western audiences for the sole purpose of eliciting an emotional experience and ultimately, cash. The practice of poverty porn does almost nothing to address the real structural problem of poverty, no matter how much Bono and his pals try to tell us otherwise.

So next time you want to feel good about doing good try looking a little deeper into the background and motivations of those who are courting your cash and your goodwill – preferably BEFORE you open your wallet.