Much like most slacktivist movements these days, many people participating in the ice bucket challenge have kind of lost the point of what it’s all about.

The Telegraph has posted a column which explores the idea that the ice bucket challenge has now become about vanity, rather than raising awareness for a worthy cause.

Nowadays, what’s the point in doing something if you are not prepared to share it with your 536 Facebook friends or your 3,754 Twitter followers? It’s the tree falling in the woods theory, writ large: if you donate money to charity but nobody sees it, did it really happen?

Before we had the internet, people who wanted to donate to a good cause had to fill out a standing order form or write a cheque that no one bar an office administrator would see.

The article also references other recent trends, such as the no make-up selfie, which seemed to quickly drift away from the purpose once it hit its real popularity on social media.

This year, the charitable challenge has truly made its mark. Remember the “no make-up selfie” campaign, which involved women posing without their mascara on as if they were brave game-changers on a level with Emmeline Pankhurst or Amelia Earhart? Though the lemming-like uptake of this “challenge” earned a reported £8 million for cancer charities, there was something awkward and uneasy about it all. It was vanity, pure and simple, and even worse, it was dressed up as humility, as if going lipstick-free was somehow an act of solidarity, or even vaguely comparable to losing your hair through chemotherapy.

As with that campaign, every nomination I receive for the ice-bucket challenge annoys me intensely – because if you don’t do it, you end up looking mean-spirited and nasty, even if you’ve spent your entire adult life quietly donating half your wages to a homeless cats’ trust or volunteering at the local soup kitchen.

Check out the full column on the Telegraph.