The movie, Evan Almighty (which wasn’t as famous as Bruce Almighty) left a very heart touching message- the ARK philosophy or as Morgan Freeman had put it- the life of doing an “Act of Random Kindness”. While the movie had Steve Carell trying to save the nature from the commercial encroachments, in our daily lives, even the smallest of things as helping out the ones who need, patting a dog maybe, giving food to the hungry- even those basic things count.
While the little acts of kindness matter, there are some people who take major steps in the direction and make a difference in the world as a whole. The Kindness Trust has been known to promote and support such people who have been, in their own ways trying to make a positive difference to the environment.
It is under this initiative that the Trust awards one distinguished person of international standing with the Winsome Constance Kindness Gold Medal.
The award of International standing has had some of its previous recipients in Sir David Attenborough, Mrs Maneka Gandhi, Captain Paul Watson, Dr Christine Townend, Dr Ian Gawler, Dr Jill Robinson and Dame Dr Jane Goodall among others
For the year 2019, the Winsome Constance Kindness Gold Medal along with its cash prize of $20,000 has been awarded to Mr Damien Mander from Australia. The award was to honour Damien’s indomitable spirit and efforts to protect endangered wildlife in Africa and to promote vegan ethics.
About the Winsome Constance Kindness Trust
The Winsome Constance Kindness Foundation was founded by Philip Wollen and his wife Trix. The Foundation believes that in their capacity to suffer, a dog is a pig is bear is a boy. The foundation has been supporting initiatives such as Schools, hospitals, orphanages, clinics, shelters, sanctuaries, research, plant-based diets, ambulances, animal birth control, Anti-Rabies programs (Catch, Neuter, Vaccinate & Release), anti-whaling, anti-hunting, anti-bush-meat campaigns among many others
The WCK Gold medal is awarded every year to people who have put in extraordinary efforts towards promoting humanitarian causes. In addition to the WCK Gold Medal, The Kindness Trust has also conceptualised the Kindness House Initiative. The Kindness house is an incubator which provides state of the art facilities to the NGOs working in the domain of humanitarianism and who do work which the Kindness trust isn’t doing directly.
Knowing Damien Mander- The WCK Gold Medal 2019 Winner
Damien is the quintessential Australian. Heavily tattooed gentle giant who has been a hunter, poacher, navy diver and special operations sniper and mercenary in the Iraq War. Deeply moved by the atrocities he saw while on work, he left it all and set up the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF) in 2009.
IAPF aims at bringing men, women, veganism and economics together and set up a sync in all of them so as to bring them to the forefront as a whole and not in silos. Under IAPF, Damien and his team have been working towards developing a workable economic model to the trophy hunting industry.
The model has been put to work in rural Africa, helping the most determined and capable crusaders to protect the ecosystem while generating alternative revenue sources for the people to lead a healthy life.
IAPF was founded in 2009 and operates mostly in the southern and east Africa. The organisation focuses on ecosystem preservation through training and operation. IAPF runs a community driven conservation program which aims at empowering the local women to manage and restore the wilderness areas.
IAPF has the Platinum Seal of Approval from GuideStar- an independent charity evaluator.