Kaylen Ward, known as “The Naked Philanthropist,” on Twitter has estimated to raise over 1 million dollars for Australian bushfire relief in a matter of days. The 20-year-old Los Angeles based model and sex worker tweeted on January 3, “I’m sending nudes to every person who donates [atleast] $10 to any one of these fundraisers for the wildfires in Australia”.
That tweet went viral and three days later she revealed that they had raised an estimated 1 million dollars. Ward also revealed that she could no longer keep up with the number of DMs she was receiving and even hired a four-person team to help sort them. Eventually, she had to stop altogether because of the massive influx of people sending their proof of donation.
Ward encouraged people to continue to donate and even set up a GoFundMe page that is almost at $15,000 of the $250,000 goal. Because of the massive success, many women have taken after Ward and posted their own incentives for people to donate. Models Jenna Lee and Emmy Elliott are also participating in the effort to help Australia according to Buzzfeed.
Ward has made it clear that she isn’t receiving a penny of the money donated, however, she has made a greater online presence with 424k followers on Twitter. Unfortunately, her activism may have come at a cost. She tweeted two days after starting her campaign “My IG got deactivated, my family disowned me, and the guy I like won’t talk to me all because of that tweet. But f**k it, save the koalas”.
Ward’s most recent campaign is to help those impacted by the deadly earthquakes in Puerto Rico. Under the same rules as her last campaign, you must donate at least $10 from the list of charities she provides and then provide proof. It is unknown at this time how much money she has raised for this cause.
To learn more and donate to Australia, you can read this article by the New York Times which provides organizations and other ways you can help those impacted by this horrific event.