“But we’re not celebrities,” I tried to argue, yet Summer, post-VeeV, wouldn’t be dissuaded — so we took pictures on the green carpet at the Social Atelier launch party last night.

Social Atelier, a self-described, “larger ethical collective of artists, musicians, business professionals, and philanthropists all working toward improving the global state through creative expression” founded this year, launched a new “socially active” organic clothing line at Fred Segal Man yesterday, then threw a large Darfur benefit party themed “An Ethical Night Out” at the Tandus Design Center in Culver City last night.

All the money from the launch-party sales of the Social Atelier line — showcased in a Fred Segal “pop-up” store at the event — went to the Solar Cooker Project, a nonprofit that provides solar cookers to refugee camps in Darfur, thereby eliminating the need to hunt for cooking fuel outside the camps and putting people at “severe risk for assault, rape, and even death.”

A great cause, for obvious reasons. In fact, a portion of all the proceeds — a woman working the Fred Segal booth said 15%, but was fuzzy on whether that meant 15% of the profits or sales — from Social Atelier’s first season will go to the Solar Cooker Project.

But about the fashions: The entire line consists of organic cotton tanks and T-shirts — and very expensive ones at that, at $88-$98 a pop.

And to be honest, I found the designs to be a little too — blatant. Case in point: Check out this T-shirt emblazoned “STOP GENOCIDE.”

I am all for the stopping of genocide, but look how incongruous my VeeV‘d, grinning face looks atop this explicit — and rather depressing — slogan. The tee might be appropriate wear at, say, a march against genocide — but not really great party wear if you plan on smiling from time to time….

Another design imprint is 39″ 19″ 33″, which, according to the video showcase of the collection, asks: “are our exteriors becoming more important than our interiors?”

Which, okay — I totally agree that body image is an important issue of our time. Yet the message gets more than a little lost when the thin female bartenders wearing the 39″ 19″ 33″ tanks look so — 39″ 19″ 33″….

Not that I’m complaining about the beautiful bartenders we have in Los Angeles, thanks to Hollywood. The launch event even had half-naked, cause-painted “protest models” — who were v. amenable to posing for photos. In fact we all had lots of fun — especially with VeeV. Lots of VeeV.

And I don’t want to dismiss Social Atelier’s efforts. After all, the lil Fred Segal shop was hopping the whole night — meaning the event likely got a good chunk of change together for a great cause, and let people enjoy themselves while at it.

I do, however, have real reservations about the “shop for charity” type stuff, mainly because it’s impossible for the consumer to figure out how much of the money plunked down actually goes to the cause.

If $80 of my $88 went to Darfur, and I had plans for a Darfur march, I may v. well buy a T-shirt. But for all I know, only $5 is going to Darfur — or even just 50 cents. This lack of transparency, I think, is the main reason we have groups like Think Before You Pink, which I wrote about here, popping up.

Take the (RED) campaign, for example. We don’t know how much of of the $28 spent on a Gap tee goes to the Global Fund, though we do know that the campaign’s only raised $18 million to fight AIDS in Africa while spending $100 millions on advertising and promotion. That’s prompted new campaigns like Buy (Less) Crap, which asserts emphatically that shopping is not a solution.

I’m more amenable to efforts that’re more clear ’bout who gets what. CertainTees, for example, provides a nice eco-friendly product while letting you know straight off the bat that $5 of your $50 purchase is going to exactly what charity. This way, you can decide more clearly whether your cute bamboo T-shirt is worth the $45 or not….

Raising money for important yet overlooked social causes does indeed seem a v. complicated and difficult task, with the sad Darfur fundraiser I went to last year being a case in point….

In closing I’ll note a current cool effort: Bloggers for Darfur, started by our own Jill Davis of Eye Level Pasadena and a friend of hers. Read one of Jill’s latest posts to find out how you can combine your love of John Lennon with your passion for ending genocide.

More party pics — taken by me, Summer, Matt, PB, or the random guy we enlisted for help — here.

Update, 6/25/07: Some more deets on Social Atelier’s donations, which come to somewhere between $0 and $13 per shirt –