Holidays are a time to give, a time to be grateful for what providence has bestowed on us and do our bit for the less fortunate. We in America are givers. We gave $260 billion or more in charities for the year 2005. In our family we do our bit and ensure 10% of our earnings are earmarked for philanthropy. We deal with some very good charities, but there are some that leave a lot to be desired.
A few days ago a routine stop at the mailbox started a mini debate between the wife and me. It was about my dumping of a bunch of charity-based mails into the trash without bothering to open them. I had my justification, but to my wife, when it comes to helping the needy and given the holiday season and spirit, no reason was good enough. I see her point, but something had to be done.
We moved to our new home six months ago. Soon after we moved in, we got a nice set of address labels, courtesy of March of Dimes, and a request for a donation. We gave a $25 donation for the year as we had committed to other charities before hand; more so as a reciprocal gesture for the thoughtful address labels. Three weeks later we received another set of address labels with a donation request. We ignored it. We repeated the same treatment for the next couple of mailers and then came a polite emotional taunt of a mail. "Now that you are enjoying the labels and the notepad, have you thought of donating yet?" Though it irritated me I decided to ignore it as well. It was a charitable organization, after all, and not a big bad corporation. I would ignore it. To my dismay, my wife fell for the emotional blackmail and promptly sent in a check; a case in point that the emotional pulling of strings works.
I had to take action. I called them up and requested they remove us from their mailers, as we were not planning on donating anymore this year. I was promised the mails would stop. All would be well, or so I had hoped. It has been three months, and now we have mailers from the American Heart Association, American Lung Association, and a couple of others apart from March of Dimes. Great, they decided to share my information! Now I need to deal with a bevy of them.
Article comments
1 - Dave Patterson
I suggest you add Heifer International, www.heifer.org, to your list of the good guys, and yes I work for Heifer. But we truly are the good guys giving domestic animals and the training to care for them to poor people in the US and around the world. Plus we have a pretty neat alternative giving program with our catalog. It's the old "teach a person to fish" theory, and we've been at it successfuly for more than 60 years.
2 - Chanakya
Dave,
Thanks for the info. We will. My wife being an animal lover is sure to jump at this..
Chanakya