Investigating Charity

Do the recipients of charity genuinely benefit from that generosity?

This is an outgrowth of a previous thread that was addressing compassion. It quickly became apparent that compassion and charity are quite different subjects. So this thread is intended to focus on charity.

It has been suggested by the author Harold Bloom that charity is not entirely beneficial. Charity can be used by the giver to shame the recipient. Which can lead to the question, Is charity really a compassionate action?

Also if the giver of a gift gets more out of that action than the recipient, then is gift-giving a self-less act?

Then this points towards what might be called “tough love” where instead of trying to give, it is more compassionate to help a person work for their own gain because of the additional benfit of self-empowerment that comes with achievement.

I don’t know. What’s your take?

I have mixed feelings about charity.

I think that the quote that you mentioned is from a sinister capitalistic perspective. The fact is that lots of people could benefit from charity and that the religious subtext of western civilization demands that one be charitable. The capitalist twists this and reports that they don’t want to make anyone feel bad and that’s why they don’t give up the money. I don’t think that anyone would feel badly is we weren’t brainwashed to think that we all need to be competitive conquerors or losers.

However, I do think that there is a kind of negative charity. It is frequently seen, as well. There will be a drive to provide a million homes with a can of corn. Hats for the homeless! Give us your used eyeglasses (a real one)! Every kid gets a golf ball! Those kind of events, although they may be successful, do not do much to raise the standard of living of the people served. However, I do think that they serve to make the givers feel like they’ve done a lot.

I’m not saying that little things don’t count, but I always think of Oprah when that kind of giving comes to mind. It’s the here’s a Hermes scarf and a Starbucks for victims of rape kind of thing.

I just noticed that Donald Trump gave a million to some random person and I also know that Bill Gates pays for college educations. That kind of stuff is real charity as it allows the person to gather enough resources to possibly change their life. It can’t all be like that, but it should be significant enough to be useful.

Yes. to get something you need you would have to benefit in some sense… even if the other person gets something as well. Say for example if a bum is begging for money, and a rich snob burns 100 bucks infront of him before tossing him 20. The snob may have gained something in his own mind by excersizing his wealth, but he is generous enough to give the bum 20 dollars.

I think it can be compassionate, without being entirelybeneficial, mostly for the reasons stated above.

Like Ad said, these things vary… i’m speaking in technical terms.

I had a post in the other thread too, delimiting help as charity from help as in lending a hand.

To cut a long story short: if you feed a man today, he will be hungry again tomorrow. But if you give him tools and instructions, he will grow his own food and live happily ever after.

I, for one, would incline in favour of a dynamic type help, rather than plain charity. I myself don’t stand to be a charity benefactor, both on material and especially spiritual and intelectual grownds. I prefer to be stimulated and put on the right path.

But, on the other hand, we can never do too much for the needy ones. Giving money to a begger may not be as grand as finding him a job, or paying for his school taxes, but it is never an unworthy thing to do. Unfortunately, we live in a much too real world, that sometimes takes its toll brutally. There are cases (e.g. natural catastrophes -this on a large scale, but also at the level of the individual), when every effort counts. When you are desperate, the stringent needs take place of personal pride.

As for egotistic motivations, I guess anonimity is recommended, as the Adlerian pointed out in the other thread. Inermediaries like charity fund raisers methinks are a pretty efficient buffer for any unworhy motivations like social status or image in the media.

Now, of course, it is hard to tell of each person what his true reasons were. Is Gates well-intentioned or not ? Is Donald Trump just a gimmick ? Hard to tell. Kids receiving medication or food don’t give a damn about Gates’ ethics, likewise victims of the tsunami about Trump’s motivations.
But, as while at the receiving end reasons are non-important, at the giving end they become essential. I do not venture to say that a good deed is rendered useless from an objective point of view if the one who did it had something else in mind, but, seen in a subjective manner, it is. The interiority of the good deed is eesential only for its generator.

In the end, it remains a problem between Gates and himself. Only he and God know what his mind is up to. If he values morality in any degree and has a set of clear principles, he will know if his act was or was not moral, deriving conclusions from here. If not, then screw him.

This is sort of a toughy. Whether a charitable act is compassionate is locked into the intent of the person giving. For the most part, I’d sday that most charitable giving doesn’t include compassion - I don’t care how many pictures of starving children you’ve seen. Among professional fundraisers for charities, it is well known that Americans are among the most generous in charitable giving. Does this mean that Americans are more compassionate? I hardly think so, just better ‘trained’ to give to charity. Of course, this doesn’t mean that some of those who give aren’t giving out of compassion.

For me, I make a distinction between charity and compassionate giving in the following way: Anything I do publically is to be considered charitable - My intent is perhaps compassionate, but because it is public, the recipient is put in the position of acknowledging (publically) having been helped.
it may be charitable, but it definitely steps outside what I consider compassion. IMO, compassion is simply doing what is heartfelt and doing what I can within the limitations of what I have to offer. I’m compassionate when I immediately forget what I’ve just done. I’m not looking for thank you’s. I’d rather not hear about it again. I did what my heart told me was right and it’s done and over with. It’s about helping, not obligating…

JT

How about if someone I never met is robbed and left beaten up with no bus fare home , so if I give him money to get home , money I wont get back , Im being selfish am I ?

Some people will waste or destroy what you give them,
and also they may not need it.

When your mother fed you as a child, and took care of you,
it was charity.

Imo, the perfect charity, is to know what others need,
build up an abundance of this if possable,
then give this to them.

VERY VERY many people focus alot on what they dont realy need,
but what they want.
Teaching someone how to help themself is also an act of charity or a gift.

If ur mom was sick and in pain and old and weak and going to die… in the hospital or somthing, and then God cured her and cured the old age and things like that, that would be charity aswel.
Charity is when the more powerful beings give to the less powerful ones when they are in danger or fighting for life or having hard times and weakn in spirit…

This sort of principal developes through life.
When we are young, hopefuly we realize that we were weak and would have died without charity from our perents, and hopefuly we will learn that the strong should protect and look after the weak, because of honor…
but honor is not as fun as worshiping pleasure…
The harmonic vs the useless way of using abundances.

Judging anything in an absolute sence,
is usualy an imbalance, and the judge was lacking in knowlage before the judgement took place.
Chatiry can be good sometimes, or it can be bad sometimes.
Learn, learn, learn!