John Oliver has helped secure scholarship money for some future female engineers — and these women didn’t have to parade around in a bikini to get it.
During a recent episode of “Last Week Tonight,” the funnyman delivered a scathing commentary on the annual Miss America beauty pageant (covering topics such as the objectifying nature of swimsuit competitions to the absurdity of answering complex questions domestic violence or foreign policy in 20 seconds).
However, Oliver exposed something about the organization that’s more eyebrow raising than butt glue (yes, that’s a real product). According to the show’s research, it appears that the pagent’s claim to be “the world’s largest provider of scholarships for women” is incredibly exaggerated — the organization says it gives $45 million a year, but it appears to be more like $4 million. Not only that, the only women who are eligible for scholarships are pageant contestants between the ages of 17 to 24 who’ve never been married or had a baby. (The Miss America pagent has since responded to Oliver’s report in a blog post.)
At the same time, Oliver listed off other female-only organizations that he felt could use a little more funding, including the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), the Patsy Mink Educational Foundation and the Jeannette Rankin Women’s Scholarship Fund.
MORE JOHN OLIVER: Watch What a Climate Change Debate Should Really Look Like
After the episode aired, donors decided to open up their wallets for these organizations. According to the Chicago Tribune, SWE received $25,000 in just two days (about 15 percent of its expected annual donations) as well as wild jump in web traffic.
“This has been huge for us,” Peter Finn, deputy executive director of SWE, tells the publication. “It’s tremendous.”
Additionally, the Jeannette Rankin Foundation tweeted, “Came to work this morning to find many more gifts; $2,800 in total donations since @LastWeekTonight mention! You are all so great!” NationSwell reached out to the Patsy Mink Foundation to see if they’ve received a similar windfall, which is now referred to as “the John Oliver bounce,” but has not received a response.
If you’d like to find out more or donate to any of the organizations, click on the following links:
Patsy Mink Foundation
Jeannette Rankin Foundation
Society of Women Engineers
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Tag: Last Night Tonight
Watch What a Climate Change Debate Should Really Look Like
Mountains of scientific evidence shows humans are indeed warming the planet.
But the way major news outlets present this very serious issue can be scarily misleading, especially when climate change “debates” give equal airtime to scientists and climate change deniers. A Gallup poll recently found one in four Americans are skeptical of climate change — maybe this is partly why?
“Last Night Tonight” host John Oliver is doing his best to rectify that. He counters the all-too-even debates in the hilarious segment below.
“You don’t need people’s opinion on a fact,” he says. “You might as well have a poll asking: ‘Which number is bigger, 15 or 5?’ or ‘Do owls exist?’ or ‘Are there hats?’ ”
MORE: These Scientists Were Fed Up with Climate Change Deniers. Here’s What They Did About It.
When 97 out of 100 climate scientists agree that humans cause global warming, a one-on-one cable news channel debate doesn’t seem like the most accurate way to present the issues surrounding our changing weather. Perhaps the structure of the debate should represent reality in the balance of pro and con climate change believers, to give viewers a truer representation of what the Earth is going through.
That’s precisely why funnyman Oliver staged a mathematically balanced climate change debate featuring Bill Nye the Science Guy and his team of 96 climate scientists against three deniers.
As Oliver says, “It’s a little unwieldy, but this is the only way you can actually have a representative discussion.”
Safe to say, there’s really no debate at all.
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