My awesome wife Karen nominated me for the ALS ice bucket challenge. This blog post is going to serve as one third of my response (I will of course douse myself in ice water, but being a nerd, I feel as though I need to add a little sciencey pizazz to it and it may take a short period of time to prepare!)
I'm responding via blog because of two others' words. The first widely read criticism of the challenge written by Scott Gilmore for Maclean's Magazine. I'm responding to Scott because of his three considerations when donating to charity. Scott says that we must consider the following:
1) Where is the greatest need?
2) Where will my dollars have the greatest influence?
3) What is the most urgent problem?
Aside from the fact that 1 and 3 are basically the same question, I think Scott misses a point. Not that the considerations aren't important, but they are purely from a pragmatic and statistical point of view. Here's the problem... charity is a human system. Human systems can't be isolated into one or two variables. It doesn't work that way. For example, how do you define greatest need? For a family struggling to make sense of ALS as it slowly takes away a loved one, there is likely no greater need. If my friend or loved one is suffering from a rare disease should I not support their cause with my whole heart simply because it's not the greatest need? Last I checked we weren't Vulcans.
To illustrate my point in a different way without rambling too much, I'm going to highlight a charity that by Scott's limited analyses, would not serve any need. My wife used to be a wish granter for the Make a Wish Foundation. By all medical and scientific accounts, they are a useless charity. There is no link between wishes granted and kids getting better, they don't cure diseases, they don't extend lives. They simply give a bit of joy to a child and a family who is having more than anyone should ever experience in terms of heartache and challenges. I had the honor of attending a celebration put on by the Hyatt hotel chain for a wish recipient that they were sending to a special village that Disney built just for such kids and their families. What I witnessed was a community coming together to support, uplift, and bring joy to others for no other reason than to share joy with them. The witness of that event and the work Karen did opened my heart to them as well and we used our wedding as a venue to raise a donation to them, which by Mr. Gilmore's criteria, didn't do anything that was necessary.
The problem with taking a human system like charity and trying to reduce it so much is that it dehumanizes it. Not that looking at massive epidemics like HIV/AIDS, or working on diseases like cancer or heart disease which claim so many lives, isn't necessary. Not even that things like that shouldn't be our focus. What the armchair social critics are missing though, is that we give more when we have a human connection. Charity is about human connections. That's why we give to causes that harm us more closely, or that our firends are connected to.
Mr. Gilmore also used the terms narcissism and slacktivism. Quite frankly he's looking at the whole viral movement and missing the best part of it. The acts of charity that our friends, loved ones etc. are challenging us to by getting us to pay attention to them for 30 seconds while we get to revel in their momentary discomfort are inspiring our own acts of charity. In his own blog, Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs fame points out that 50% - 70% of the money that goes into something like this is typically money that would have already been donated to another cause. But hold on... that means that up to 50% of the $94 million (reported 11 hours ago by the Boston Globe) is new charity money. That's going to be in the neighbourhood of $50 million charity dollars generated by this so called narcissistic slacktivism. We witnessed the same at our wedding. One guest making a show of a large donation in return for forcing us to kiss (we did that instead of clinking glasses) inspired others among our family and friends, and some of the money that would have been spent at the bar went to bring a child a little piece of a wish that brought them joy amidst their suffering. If 50 million new charity dollars is what a few small acts inspiring a few other small acts cascading around the world can do over a couple of weeks in the age of social media, imagine what would happen if we looked at every act of charity, whether it fits our personal connections and charitable inklings or not, and let it inspire us to our own act of charity, and let it inspire others too. I don't care how cynical or critical you are (and I'm right up there with the best of them) that's an amazing thought.
To show what this can look like, I'm inspired by my life long friend Jennifer, who posted a much more succinct message on Facebook highlighting the need for regular, planned giving, to a charity that is personal to her in response to her ALS challenge. Jenn, your message inspired me. I will be earmarking a portion of my budget that would normally go to non-charitable things like shiny pieces for my motorcycle, and donating it to charities monthly for the next year. My first in the spirit of medical research which is what started all of this, will be to the JPII Medical Research Institute, which is a secular organization dedicated to ethical and cost effective research for treatments and cures of various diseases. That's the second third of my response to the challenge (The third will be when I figure out how to science up dumping ice water on my head)
My three nominations for the challenge are
1) Writer Scott Gilmore to find some charitable cause that he cares about and meets his criteria, and donate something to them that he otherwise would not have spent on charity
2) Col. Chris Hadfiled because he's awesome and I want to see him doused in cold water
3) Anyone who has responded in any way to the challenge, positively or negatively, to find an extra act of charity, a gift of time, talent, or treasure, that will take any accusations of slacktivism and kick them out the window, and inspire more generosity.
Thoughts on matters of faith, education, and whatever else sparks my interest.
