Who doesn’t love Ryan Gosling?
With dreamy eyes, good looks and amazing acting chops — it’s hard not to fall in love and fast with the charming actor.
So get ready to fall even deeper into that crush of yours for him…
The 38-year-old is a private person and it may come to a surprise to many to find that charity work is a major part of Gosling’s life.
While the actor supports a wide variety of non-profit organizations like PETA, Invisible Children, ONE Campaign, Mercy for Animals and The SickKids Foundation to just name a few — he was worked closest with the Enough Project.
Since, 2007 — Gosling has helped play a major role in the project. The goal of the Enough Project is to end genocide as well as crimes against humanity in various areas of conflict in Africa.
Gosling along with the Directors of the Enough Project, John Prendergast, have worked together on quite a few initiatives as well as campaigns.
The two have traveled to Uganda in 2008 as well as eastern Congo in 2010 to meet with human rights defenders and survivors of ongoing violent conflicts.
Once they returned to the States, both parties would share these stories told to them to the U.S. Congress as well as the United Nations with their own stance in the name of human rights.
And while he was in Congo seeing the conflict first-hand, Gosling documented his time there interviewing survivors and filming the scenes around them.
The documented footage was named Raise Hope for Congo and was later used by the Enough Project to help raise awareness of the conflict Gosling described at the time as the ‘the deadliest war in the world’.
The video, unfortunately, does not exist anymore but after coming back from Congo, both Gosling and Prendergast created an article together about their time in Africa for the Huffington Post on calling an end to the use of conflict minerals which are natural resources that inspire conflict.
They shared:
“It’s a war which most people know nothing about, despite the fact that we’re all directly connected to it. Armed groups are fighting over the lucrative minerals that power our cell phones and laptops, leaving a trail of human destruction that has no equal globally since World War II.
The conflict in Congo has left millions homeless, fleeing from their villages after they have been burnt to the ground or looted by armed groups.
The truth of what we heard from survivors is rooted in simple economics. Profits made from this illicit minerals trade arise from market demand for such minerals. If consumers demand conflict-free products, then companies will eventually meet that demand, in turn cratering the market for minerals mined through violence.”
The pair’s footage, as well as words, encouraged many to contact electric companies to ask them to consider Congo and the effects they are having there.
And after spending ten years partnered with the Enough Project, it is very apparent the cause is something that is close to Gosling’s heart.
In an interview with JoBlo back in 2007, Gosling shared how his trips to Africa led him to realize how destructive the conflicts in Africa actually were.
And deciding to use his platform, he went on to say how something needs to change.
“Two years ago I went to the Darfur refugee camps in Chad and I was shooting a little piece of a documentary on the conditions in the camps. And I think with anybody who goes to Africa, the experience never leaves, certainly, the kids don’t.
It was there that I learned of the whole phenomenon of child soldiers and night commuters, and this whole situation in Uganda of a 20-year conflict, with 30,000 kids abducted and 1.5 million removed from their homes.
It’s gruesome. It’s like a Grimms Brothers’ fairy tale, you can’t believe it. I for myself, I need to know what I was hearing was true.
I’ve been sitting down with people who have been involved for the twenty years. I get to learn from them and spend time with them, and then I’m given a platform to talk about those experiences. Some people find it irritating but I don’t think we have a choice. If you see those things and you’re given the opportunity to talk about them, you have to.”
And Gosling did just that — by raising awareness, aiding others to be educated about the conflicts in Africa and most importantly, creating a call to action.
I didn’t think it possible, but it’s true — I love Ryan Gosling even more.
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