Reddit’s #WallStreetBets community has spent a combined $300,000 dollars on endangered wildlife conservation.
It all started when members began suggesting they adopt a gorilla through the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund, which operates in the Virunga Mountains of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda.
The original idea was an off-shoot based on an inside joke of those in the group - an internal moniker for the subreddit—The Ape Gang—reflecting their wild button pressing and mob rule strategy of stock investing. After the Fossey Fund took notice, they updated their homepage with a banner that quoted Planet of the Apes, and which read “Apes Together Strong.”
“The money these individuals have donated is an investment, not just in the Fossey Fund’s mission of Helping People, Saving Gorillas, but in our planet’s future,” Dr. Tara Stoinski, the director of Fossey, told Insider in a statement. “We rely on individual donors who give to us year after year because they know we can be relied upon to be careful stewards of their donations, no matter how large or small.”
The Fossey Fund was created in 1972, and is one of the oldest and longest-running primate-conservation organizations, helping to track and protect gorilla populations. Gorillas protected by the fund are considered adopted by donors supporting the organization.
Many of the gorillas were adopted under names like "Gamestop" and “Jim Cramer’s Tears,” and other names relevant to #WallStreetBet's impact on the markets. For those unaware, the group has been responsible for serious upsetting of the existing power structure in the markets, and making headlines and history by leading their members to truly shake things up. Seriously, just google it.
this story and the names of these gorillas - incredible.
