Movember is an annual fundraising event organised by the Movember Foundation Charity. In November, men are invited to grow a moustache in order to raise awareness in their surroundings about masculine health issues (prostate cancer, testicular cancer, mental health, and suicide) and to help raise funds for research. This is a worldwide movement in which many countries take part every year, including Spain, the UK, the US, Japan and maybe France soon, who knows?
According to the Movember website, 12.8 million pounds were raised in the UK in 2019 and 64,2 million pounds worldwide.
The website contains information such as the annual report but also testimonies and details about each of their causes. Movember is a huge success that you can be part of!
The Dolphin Thames was honored to have feedback from Mati KAIM, Academic Lead, English and Communication in Dauphine London, who grows a mustache for Movember every year since 2012.
What is Movember and what does it mean to you?
Movember is the contraction of "moustache" and "November". Mati contributes to it by letting his moustache grow throughout the month of November. If you haven't had the opportunity to see how Mati’s moustache growth is progressing, don't hesitate to check out the photos on his page!
When did you start participating in this movement?
First, it is important to recall that Movember is a rather recent movement as it began in 2003 in Australia. After a few years, Movember expanded in the entire world and since 2007 many other countries joined the movement such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, the United states… Mati decided to join the movement for the first time in 2012 with some friends and colleagues. However, he did not actually join the website and organize the fundraising process himself until last year.
Is Movember a famous fundraising event in the UK?
In the UK, people are definitely aware of what Movember is even if according to Mati, not that many people participate. However, Mati finds it interesting to be part of Movember while teaching at the Dauphine London campus because it is an environment dominated by french culture, and it raises awareness about projects in different cultures for students.
What have been the impact so far?
So far, the impacts of this movement have been quite significant. For instance, in 2018, the UK branch of Movember raised over £10 million from more than 50,000 participants. Worldwide, more than 300,000 participants raised £57.6 million in 20 countries. This year, Mati has decided to dedicate his Movember and the money he collects to mental health and suicide prevention: one of Movember’s goals is to reduce the rate of male suicides by 25 percent by 2030.
Does a community or a group with all people doing Movember exist? If yes, do you meet with them? Or is it more of an individual action?
Movember is a movement that began as a collective action of a group of men. Indeed, As Mati explained, even though there is not a physical global meeting of all people participating in the action, there is a strong sense of community spirit with a common aim.
Furthermore, most of the time, Movember is done within a group, often with friends or in the workplace. To enhance the community spirit, people who participate are formally called Mo Bros for men and the Mo Sisters for women. Indeed, there is no gender requirement, both women and men can take part in the event, but of course not in the same way. Mati also underlined the fact that the moustache growing is how it originally started but you can also for example run 60km during the month for the 60 men who are lost to suicide every hour in the world.
Did you feel Dauphine students and staff were invested and interested in Movember?
This year is a bit trickier than last year because of the masks. Indeed, people are not able to see the moustaches. For Mati, it would definitely be more enjoyable if more people could participate in growing mustaches.
Note for future second year students: “ grow a mo, save a bro”.
In general, people are interested and intrigued, students and teachers have donated both this year and last year. Last year Mati raised 550pounds. For this year’s Movember edition, he already raised 460pounds and is hoping to do better than the previous year. For Mati, there is no unique way to participate in this movement. All contributions count, whether it is by growing a moustache, donating, or having a look at the Movember website.
What is your best memory linked to Movember?
For Mati, Movember is a good memory in general as it is a funny and simple way to raise money for important causes. For him, growing a moustache is an easy action that everybody can do, and which helps great causes. So, as Mati said, why wouldn’t he do it?
However, Mati also had some challenging moments related to his Movember experiences. Indeed, growing a moustache is rather unusual nowadays. During one of his Movembers, Mati told us that his girlfriend at the time wanted him to shave his moustache and stop the Movember. For Mati, the whole point is to do something that you might not particularly like or that you would not normally do, otherwise, why would people give you money. Making this unusual effort encourages people to contribute to the movement.
A Snapchat filter was created in order to support Mati and more generally to promote Movember. You will find the Snapchat filter below :
Feel free to use it!
Mati’s fundraising page is also linked to this article if you are curious to see:
Marie-Sarah KERNIN, Noa FALVERT and Victoria DOUINEAU