Editorial: Response to Penn Township boy's need shows hope for us all

Sometimes it can seem as though the worst is happening all around us all the time.

Inflation, high gas prices, rising turnpike tolls are bad enough. Then there are the really ugly political divisions, especially in a midterm election year. War in Ukraine. Gun deaths. Violent crime.

Whether you are reading about it in a news story, watching it on television or having it pop up on your social media feed, it can leave you feeling a little hopeless. Is there anything good in the world anymore?

There is.

On July 30, a Penn Township family experienced a terrible tragedy when little Liam Lavelle, 6, was in a lawnmower accident. He was flown to UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh but still lost both feet to amputation.

Yes, this was bad, but just wait.

When Liam’s aunt Ashley Dimperio took to social media to find help for the family, there was no fighting, no divisiveness, no grumbling. There were only hands stretched out to help.

Dimperio hoped to raise $10,000 for her nephew’s family. The GoFundMe page she set up blew past that number in hours.

As of Monday, more than 1,700 people had stepped up to help a little kid whose life was changed in a heartbeat. The amount contributed topped $119,000.

Liam’s story is heartbreaking, but it also is hopeful. Part of that hope comes from the fact that communities stepping up to help when the worst happens is not unusual.

More than a quarter of the $9 billion or so raised annually in GoFundMe crowdsourcing campaigns is for medical reasons. Of that, 1 in 5 campaigns are for accidents or injuries. Then there are the people who contribute when the tragedy involves a death or a loss such as a fire.

The response to Liam’s accident isn’t just about medical bills. It isn’t even that there are still good people in the world. There absolutely are.

It’s that there are more good people out there than we think.