Written by Paige Tamasi
As of the publication date, Insanity Radio’s Jingle Jam Wrap-Up raised £2110.0! For the uninitiated, Jingle Jam is a large charity fundraiser that occurs annually in December. This year, the organisers of the Jingle Jam chose to raise money for eight charities: War Child, Cool Earth, WDC, Sarcoma UK, the Trevor Project, Autistica, CALM, and the Grand Appeal. To read more about our approach to this fantastic opportunity, go here!
Insanity Radio chose to raise money for all eight charities, so as we wrap up our campaign we are proud to have raised £263.76 per charity. These funds will go to fantastic causes like providing humanitarian aid to children in wartorn countries, building the UK’s first patient hospital, raising awareness for suicide, protecting rainforests, and researching the very rare and dangerous cancer Sarcoma. This is not an extensive list of the beneficial projects these charities are doing, but it is a bite-sized idea.
But what happened during Insanity Radio’s 72-hour dual broadcast and livestream? Well, we hit the £500 milestone before we started streaming, so we started off strong and only got stronger from there.
We had wonderful guests join us on stream and radio: Little Miss Cadaver discussed her music career, Tubbo discussed the reality of being a content creator before DJ-ing for us, and Eoin Moffatt, Haslem Stroud, and Philipp Barth rocked out in the Insanity Radio Jingle Jam Jam Session!
This isn’t even mentioning the many interviews conducted and published during these hours. Natalia Lech discussed adopting cats with Bridie Williams (Rehoming & Welfare Manager (Cattery) Battersea Dogs & Cats Home); and she talked to Dr Sorrell Brickley (Director of Research, Policy and Support for Sarcoma UK) about the specifics of Sarcoma. Kayla Delaney chatted about War Child with Georgia Paton (Senior Gaming Partnerships Manager at War Child). Eleanor Partington-Lane talked with Sally Ward (Digital Partnerships Manager for the WDC) and Bianca Cisterino (Bycatch Coordinator of the WDC) about the specific projects the WDC is working on. Paige Tamasi learned about various charities when interviewing Stephanie Benson (Community Fundraising Manager) and Sarah McBride (Head of Philanthropy) from the Grand Appeal, Michael Jarvis (Digital Partnerships & Communications Lead) from CALM, Rebeca Leach (Partnerships Development Executive) from Cool Earth, and the very own Julian Barrell (Charity Manager) of Jingle Jam.
Now for the stretch goals and forfeits that we reached. Starting strong and opening the stream with the very first stretch goal of a live TikTok. We continued to play catch up on our goals (due to starting the stream with £500 already raised and four forfeits unlocked) with ASMR hour and the accent challenge. We then began the shock collar. One of our members got shocked for every full £50 and every £100 milestone reached. In total, 31 shocks were received and the member described it as “everything going from a solid to a liquid”. The Modern Foreign Language Challenge and exercise stretch goals quickly followed as we continued to raise money.
At £900 the On-Air Dares began, quickly leading to a freestyle rap and the consumption of raw eggs. The idea of eating suspicious foods continued when we hit £1000, seeing two of our members doing the Cinnamon Challenge; they said it was “bad…very bad” while coughing up puffs of brown dust. As the night of the second day began, so did the video game speedruns! These helped keep our members awake during the dark cold hours.
But they were in for a rude awakening when we hit £1500, as they underwent the Ice Bucket Challenge in the middle of the evening, amidst the winds of Storm Darragh, and were sleep-deprived. The benefit was that they were once again wide awake!
Then the final day began, Sunday, December 8th. Starting bright and early with the “Roger Roger” Challenge, Insanity Radio spoke as if they were communicating through walkie-talkies while discussing various subjects with the live stream chat.
Ending strong, we changed into silly costumes to fulfil our £2000 forfeit. We have raised the most money for charity that Insanity Radio has ever done, beating the previous record of £1640. Sleep was refused, money was raised, and fun was had all around.
For our Jingle Jam Wrap Up, Insanity Radio is excited and proud to have left a mark on this national event and continue our charitable traditions.
If you would like to donate to Jingle Jam or learn about it you can go here and here respectively.
Written by Paige Tamasi. Edited by Paige Tamasi. Photography by Kayla Delaney & the Insanity Radio Publicity Team. Published by Paige Tamasi.