So I'm skeptical. On YouTube we've seen clips of death match duels between guys jousting on rickshaws, short clips of college kids mooning the camera in an alcoholic rage ... and a poor sucker being gored during the annual running of the bulls in Pamplona. YouTube, Facebook and Twitter give us immediate bursts of shock. I think people are becoming numb to surprise. I find it sad somehow, and I don't know why.

I brace myself for the inevitable crash of immaturity that we've come to expect from the wide-open world of the web. OK, many web videos are funny -- often warped -- and sometimes tasteless. What my girls had cued up was something with purpose, something innocent, something pure.

When HIV/AIDS began its brush fire across Africa in the mid-1980s, Michael Jackson and Lionel Ritchie collaborated on "We Are the World," the signature song for the USA for Africa charity events. Big names in popular music from the '70s and '80s came together to raise money for an HIV/AIDS cure. Ray Charles, Kenny Rogers, Paul Simon, Tina Turner, Willie Nelson, Bruce Springsteen, Diana Ross, Huey Lewis, Cyndi Lauper, Stevie Wonder ... and everybody's favorite recluse, Bob Dylan. They performed as a group and in vignettes -- and it's magnificent. It's the biggest-selling single release of all time.

In February -- 25 years later, Quincy Jones and Lionel Richie collaborated on a remake of that smash hit a month after the Haiti disaster. Today's top pop performers were in the spotlights this time, with some of the gray-haired stars from the original. This viral video features appearances by Jennifer Hudson, Jamie Foxx, Adam Levine, Jason Mraz, the Jonas Brothers, T-Pain, Miley Cyrus, Randy Jackson, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Lil Wayne and -- to somehow tie the two versions together -- Tony Bennett. Tony Bennett!

Coming together for a charitable cause is indeed a tribute to pop music, the celebrities and pop culture. It warmed my spirit that an industry too often tarnished by drugs, sex, money, misogyny, violence and racial discord could join in solidarity for a common cause: to help suffering people.

Charity calls most loudly when colossal tragedy hits. When the need is so massive, a $25 text message donation is easy; we feel guilty if we don't reach into our pockets, however deep our pockets are.

We all know it, but seldom do we see the tremendous need all around us -- here in our own backyard, in Frederick. We just can't hear it. I'm not laying a guilt trip on anyone -- but we really should volunteer and donate locally.

I approached this column knowing that I'd have an obligation. Not just to write about it, but to volunteer for something ... maybe spend a Saturday morning licking envelopes for a nonprofit fundraiser. Or helping a local charity put together a newsletter or sending that $25 to a nonprofit organization in Frederick. There are plenty of opportunities and they're easy to find. So take an hour, visit a nursing home and talk with someone who can use a smile ...

in times like these.

bluepoint1@comcast.net