Dan Joseph Isn't an Ice Bucket Follower, He's an ALS Educator

By Elizabeth Nelson

We've all watched dozens upon dozens of people take the ice bucket challenge in the last month, to the point where it's getting "old," about now.  However, whomever challenged Dan Joseph to the #icebucketchallenge, I sincerely thank you.  You have no idea what an amazing thing you did, not only for the challenge but for cause.  

You should have known that Dan wouldn't take the challenge, he's not a "follower," he's a leader that paves the way for others, of course he was going to see the hysterically obvious, that people enjoy making fools of themselves, usually for causes they know nothing about, because people hashtag it and challenge them to do it.  Instead of just complying, Dan explains what Lou Gehrig's disease is; what, you didn't know ALS had a name before the icebucket challenge rebranded it?
  

"Somebody nominated me for the ice bucket challenge, and if someone had nominated me three weeks ago, I probably would have accepted ... so I declined.  The ice bucket challenge has led to 2,5 million videos

and Raised more than $63 million dollars has been donated, this is amazing especially considering ALS only affects 13,000 people in the USA

But ALS is a horrible, horrible disease, and despite all the attention ALS is getting, I'm not so sure that all these People who are pouring buckets of ice water understand what ALS really is, I mean Tara Reid took the challenge

"I didn't want to look stupid here, I looked up sharks, and I saw there's this whale shark ... a whale and a shark have sex ... and I realize that a whale is mammal and a shark is an animal and they have nothing to do with each other..." (it only got worse from there.) - Shark after Dark, Shark Week 2013(vid)

I'm most concerned that the ice in that bucket hurt the hamster on the wheel that runs around in her head.

"So, in lieu of taking the challenge or making a donation, my contribution is going to be making a video breaking down the causes and effects of this disease.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Up until now, it's been more commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig's disease after the famous baseball player who died of the disease in 1941 at the age of 37.

I can't be sure if this was a planned thing, but one of the side effects of the massive popularity of the Ice Bucket challenge has been to rebrand from Lou Gehrig's disease to ALS, which is probably smart, since fewer and fewer people alive today know who Lou Gehrig is.

ALS is referred to as a Muscular degenerative disease, but it's not a muscle disease it's a Central Nervous System Disease." [pay attention now]

For most people, the brain sends messages down through the spine where these things called lower motor neurons are located, these lower motor neurons exit the spine, and transport the brain signals to the muscles  this allows all sorts of things:

walk, brush your teeth, do pull ups, golf, slap a ho who don't got yo money, run away from an angry dog.

But for people with ALS, over a period of time, ALS breaks down the cells that transport the signals between the brain and the motor neurons, as a result the signals that brain is sending to the muscles get weaker and weaker until they just stop all together. 

Over time, the patients lose the ability to walk and do basic activities.  

Once the disease really sets in, paralysis occurs and you lose the ability to do just anything that requires muscles, like talking or chewing eventually it results in complete organ failure and death.

Most patients die somewhere from 3-5 years after being diagnosed,  the disease is most common among people ages 60-69, but young people can get it too, and sadly there is no cure or treatment.   

The medical community doesn't even really know what cause ALS. There are all sorts of theories as to why people get it:

chemical exposures, athletics, military service, infections agents, nutritional intake, physical activity and trauma, which only makes it that much harder to find a cure.

This is where we stand on this disease. On the upside, this ice bucket challenge raised a lot of money for ALS, it's really even bigger then ALS because it may have changed the future of charitable fundraising forever.

On downside, from now on you're going to see all sorts of ridiculous copycat fundraising 'eat expired yogurt to raise awareness for Dengue fever', 'make out with a homeless person to help fight bird flu'

As long as we have suffering in the world, there will be insanely dumb and painful ways to Sacrifice your dignity  in order to alleviate the problems or to feel better about ourselves until everyone is sick of it. ad we will always have the internet to endlessly share it, until we are sick of it."

I couldn't agree with Dan more, even if some, half or even all of the people who took the #doubledogdare challenge and dumped a bucket of ice over their head to be part of the hashtag "cool kids" instead of actually understanding what they were fundraising for, they were still giving for a good cause. 

I personally had a friend in college that, by the grace of God, didn't last the year, after he was diagnosed with ALS.  Unfortunately, my professor's 43-year-old brother wasn't as blessed.  He was a prisoner of his own mind, before his disease finally claimed him.  Thank you, Dan, for educating the masses.  Maybe next time people will stop and educate themselves before they pick up that expired yogurt, kiss that homeless bum, walk across hot coals, or take that #boililngwaterchallenge for whatever bandwagon charity comes up next.