• Newsfeed
  • viral

Matt Damon Uses Toilet Water for His Ice Bucket Challenge

2 minute read

When nominated by his pals Ben Affleck and Jimmy Kimmel for the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, Matt Damon faced a bit of a dilemma.

The challenge requires participants to either donate money toward amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) research or dump water over their heads (or, as many celebrities have done, both, helping the campaign raise about $80 million.) Damon was down to contribute to a good (and massively viral) cause, but didn’t want to waste clean water, as he’s the co-founder of Water.org, a non-profit dedicated to providing safe water and sanitation in the developing world.

Damon’s solution to this conundrum? Just use toilet water — and also consider the video an opportunity to raise awareness about the lack of clean drinking water across the globe.

“This is truly toilet water. I’ve been collecting it from various toilets around the house,” he says as he fills his bucket. ” For those of you like my wife who think this is really disgusting, keep in mind that the water in our toilets in the West is actually cleaner than the water that most people in the developing world have access to.”

Then he dumps the toilet water over his head and nominates George Clooney, Bono and Tom Brady. We have a feeling those guys will just use regular water though.

More Must-Reads From TIME

Contact us at letters@time.com