The grateful and the ungrateful

[Jamie (K)]

Christmas is coming, and Americans are thinking more about charity than they usually do. This means, among other things, that there will be more food collections than usual for people who don't have enough to eat (at least by US standards, since most of these poor people have cars, TVs, DVD players, cell phones and other things that are luxuries in other countries). And some of the people are fat, sometimes because they eat too much, but very often because they eat all the wrong foods. (The lady next door to one of my friends never gave her children fruit, for example.)

When I was in high school, and the students would collect and donate the food throughout the year, the reactions of the recipients were very different when the food was delivered. Usually the people were very grateful. Sometimes the people weren't grateful, because they thought they were entitled to the food and that the people should be giving them even more. Some people were not only ungrateful, but they were downright angry that anyone was giving them anything.

Sometimes people need our charity and we give it to them. Either we give them something material, or we give them some kind of help that they need. Sometimes these people are grateful, and sometimes they are ungrateful, even though they need the help.

If you had to look the people in the face, would you help the ones who aren't grateful, or only the ones who are grateful?

[Boke]

On my 12th christmas my mom started an unpopular tradition in our family of going down to the soup kitchens and handing out food, at the time I hated but now I think it was a good experience. We were pretty poor ourselves but I got to see what true poverty was, no house, no food, no nothing. Anyway everyyear we would get some young middle to upper middle class college kids come by to help out, they would bitch and moan about the smells of some people , their clothes ,ect, and they would constantly tell themselves how they were such "good' people for helping out, I'm sure they went and told just about every person they know "yeah, I passed out food on thanksgiving!I was helping POOR people!", but it was the most selfish thing I saw, they passed out food not because they cared about the people who weren't lucky enough to have any, they passed out food because they wanted to feel good about themselves, they wanted a story to tell their friends. Those one timers never came back the next year, they got what THEY wanted.

If I had to take food at a shelter I don't think I would feel so great either,how about yourself? Whether their grateful or not doesn't matter, its not about making you feel better , its about helping people.

[Jamie (K)]

I agree with you. There's a certain primitive type of charity that isn't charity at all, but is all about the giver's ego. That type of person needs gratitude, and he gets in, does the "work", and gets out. You see this in nursing homes every Christmas. People come in in organized groups, sing Christmas songs to the people to "brighten their day", and then the little philanthropists dart off, all freaked out by Alzheimer's disease, impending death and other things people don't want to see. Few of them would think to come back in a day or two and make friends with some lonesome patient who has no visitors.

The really tough charity is the charity that DOESN'T make the giver feel good! Maybe the task is disgusting, or the people receiving the charity are disgusting and won't help themselves, or the recipients are ungrateful or even hostile. It takes real commitment to do that work.

One company where I worked used to press us to make donations to one particular charitable organization that funds other charities. I did not give, so I received a visit from a lady from human resources. I told her I wasn't giving because I already gave to different charities. That was okay with her, but out of curiosity she asked me what charities they were. I told her the names. "What do they do?" she asked me. As I explained their work, she started to gag and didn't want to hear any more. I told her, "I know it's disgusting, but those people need help. People don't want to hear about it, and that's all the more reason the organizations need my donations."

[Ralf]

[Jamie (K)]

[Ralf]

[Prezbucky]

this reminds me of an old saying:

"Beggars can't be choosers."

In light of the discussion, do you agree with that statement?
_________________
Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee.

[Ralf]

[Prezbucky]

Yeah.

Some homeless folks are homeless by choice, it seems -- they are perfectly mentally/physically able to support themselves, but they seem to not want to have to handle the responsibility of handling bills/job etc.

Others want to get out of it. Those are the ones I'd most like to help.
_________________
Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee.

[Jamie (K)]

[Jamie (K)]

[Prezbucky]

"There are some people who say they're not homeless by choice, even though their homelessness resulted from a series of bad choices. I know of a family who wouldn't sell their two expensive cars or move into a smaller house, so they were crushed under debt, and that's how they wound up homeless. Their refusal to scale down pushed them down to the ultimate bottom of the scale."

Jamie, yeah, that's tough. How do we respond to them?

"Sorry, dude, but you f'ed up!"?

hehe
_________________
Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee.

[Ralf]

[Jamie (K)]

[Jamie (K)]