Four Million Followers

MD wildflower--the ripe seed pods look like a red raspberry.

This is a response I left in the comment section of the World Wildlife Federation.  Other readers were discussing the salary of the charity's CEO.  They thought that his mid-6 figure salary was way out of line--and that they shouldn't advertise.

Maryland wildflower

   Depending on where the CEO lives, he may bring home 50% (or less) of his stated salary after Federal, State, property etc taxes.  Since the headquarters are in DC, his housing costs are outrageously expensive.  He is married with three children.  He graduated with MBA and BS from two great schools--and worked at several large corporations before coming to WWF.  It is because of this work history that he was able to accept a huge pay cut and invest his time.  In this job, he receives no stock options or yearly retention bonus.  I would image that he also contributes to charities (WWF, for one). 

Sunset clouds, FL

 As the face of the World Wildlife Fund and intimate involvement in its fund raising activities, he has to look the part (no suits from Walmart).  With the salary he is paid, he needs to support his children in school--he may even be paying off student loans himself.  Perhaps he is independently wealthy--or his wife is--or he may face high medical costs from an elderly parent or one of his children.  

Vinca, MD

   Living in Minnesota or Montana or Oregon or Texas--places with a much lower cost-of-living--would give his salary more purchasing power (Texas does not have a State Income Tax, for example, and housing costs are some of the lowest in the nation.).  
   You can't tell anything from just a number . . . especially if the number is way under a million--and does not include a yearly bonus (which is sometimes equal to or more than a year's salary for an incredible number of much less qualified CEOs and business executives across the nation).

Black crowned night heron, waiting.    FL

    As for cutting out the advertising (which is less than the 20% of the total operating budget quoted below):  you are either reaching more people every day or you are fading from public view.  Doing nothing means that you are losing potential new donations and failing to retain present contributors.  There is no standing still.  

Florida water turtle

   Compared to "charities" such as the United Way, I believe that WWF uses less money on managing personnel salaries and office costs than any other organization with such a world-wide and diverse reach.  

Coot.  Such a short, silly name for such a creative, amazing bird.  FL

   I live in a place where the student parking lot at the nearest high school is full of BMWs, Porches, sports cars and fully-loaded Ford and Chevy trucks.  The teachers' parking lot, on the other side, is populated by older, economical cars.  The local grocery store parking lot has Lamborghinis, Bentleys, a bright orange Lotus, Cadillac trucks, Humvees, and Lexus cars.  It is an unreal place.  People here do not have children--they have dogs . . . animals that they put through the hell of chemo when they become old and feeble enough to get cancer . . . and should be allowed to gently pass away.  

Cactus flower, UT

   It is all this money that is ill-spent.  Working for a mindful, organized charity that seeks to maintain a balance between preservation of our animal and natural resources--and our collective inability to see past our own self-centered noses (who do you know who would forbid the public from visiting the Galapagos 

A young pine tree frog, I think, at dusk inside a Allamanda blossom.  FL

Islands or Antartica or Australia's Great Barrier Reef because they are delicate ecosystems).  The only way to preserve as pristine the earth we live on is to live as Castro's Cuba lived for decades.  The people had nothing, no one was allowed to visit--Cuba's tropical forests are in amazing shape because the world was prohibited from developing their natural resources--everyone left them alone.
   I have not felt this strongly about anything in years.  I appreciate this forum and its space where anyone can express their opinion.

Hibiscus, FL

   I am also grateful for organizations like WWF--that seek to manage our remaining wildlife and wild lands by balancing the human need to exist and to explore in places that would be much better left untouched.  We are on this earth to learn, explore, expand and create.  It is in our "nature."  Some do it on a cosmic level--others on a microscopic level--most of us simply do it in pursuit of daily living. 

Wasp after the rain, FL

For the first time, yesterday I heard of a man who has 4 million people following his every selfie and 6-second looped movie.  He is living in response to the question:  "You are on your deathbed, you have the chance to come back to right now . . . what do you do?"  He is single, without commitment, openly avowing that he is living according to that creed.  He has no wife, no children, no job that helps society to be better educated, better fed; freer from want, freer from disease.  A company offered him $1,000,000 to hawk their wares and he dismissed them (which I think he should have--dumb to hook your star to a corporation that has even less scruples than you do) with the public statement that he did not want anyone telling him what to do.  
   To be a father, you have to keep a job.  To be a mother, you have to wash dishes and read to your children.  To be a teacher, you have to prepare lesson plans.  To build houses, you have to put on roofs when it is hot outside.  To be a grocer, you have to go to the same place everyday and stock shelves. 
   You get the simplified idea.  

Graphic of photo I took.  Half-circle of Ibis.  FL

   I like the question that this man related about the deathbed ability to come back and go in another direction.  I have thought about the same question every day of my life since I was a child.  It is why I practiced the piano.  It is why I never smoked or drank.  It is why I went to Church.  It is why I went to college.  It is why I served a mission.  It is why I fell in love.  It is why I got married.  It is why I had children. It is why I sang and rode horses and did homework with my children and taught school and went back to graduate school and do laundry and pay bills and plant my gardens.

Stag-horn beetle, FL

    It is why my husband has gone to work as a contract lawyer to supported me and our three children for the last 32 years--when he would much rather have painted and sculpted and sketched out the visions in his head.  
   Were I on my deathbed and had the chance to go back to today and live my life again--I would do the same things I have already done and hope to continue to do.  When I die, I want to feel that I have done all I can to love, to teach, to encourage, to inspire, to discipline, to support, and to cheer everyone who I have every met or known.  

Red-bellied woodpecker.  One of a mating pair.   FL

  I do not want to be like the man with 4 million followers who is tromping throughout the world doing what he likes.  I want to be more like the people who work with the WWF.  I want to leave this earth better than I found it.