In Socialist America, Charity Lessens
February 27, 2014
TED D. writes:
After Obama won re-election, Sam Donaldson stated: “It’s their country now.” Increasingly, it seems white Americans are in agreement, and are withdrawing from civic institutions and public spaces. This article about falling volunteer levels mirrors what I have observed among friends, family and co-workers; a sense of alienation from their less fortunate countrymen (whom they identify as Obama voters), and a subsequent lack of empathy. For example, my father used to give generously to Toys-For-Tots. This year, in his own words, he decided to “let Obama buy their kids Christmas gifts.” I have also curtailed my charitable giving for similar reasons; I get the sense that the people I would be helping most likely hate me, so why bother. The comments that follow the above article match these sentiments.
I have also noticed that my local mall, which is in a predominantly white area, is mostly filled with blacks and Hispanics nowadays. Judging by the lack of bags, they don’t come to shop, but to meander. Where have all the white folks gone? Well, according to retail surveys taken during Christmas, mall traffic has declined significantly, with online shopping picking up the slack. I believe whites are cocooning within their own communities and purposely avoiding public spaces with any sort of diversity. I wonder if our ruling class can sense any of this growing alienation? Do they care that the people who pay the taxes and make the country run are turning their back on America?
— Comments —
Hannon writes:
Many Americans do not realize what an aberration American volunteerism is on a worldwide scale. It is not a social norm in Europe, where economic constraints are greater and unionized work forces regard volunteering as a threat to regular paid positions. I’ve encountered this attitude in the British Isles first hand.
The growing social animosities in the U.S. seem to revolve largely around issues of race and class, areas that liberals are only happy to exploit. Their hatred of “white culture”, the foundational culture of our country, is encouraged by a development such as waning volunteerism, a white thing if there ever was one. Another opportunity for discrimination turned over to race-blind USG!
Laura writes:
Forced charity poisons the real thing. Socialism — and its attendant industry of racial grievance and envy, which is stoked by powerful forces — creates a demoralized, selfish and heartless society.
Karl D. writes:
One of the reasons people don’t volunteer anymore can be expressed by a comment that was left at the linked article:
“Gee I wonder if the background checks, fingerprinting and the credit checks required to volunteer have anything to do with it? When I saw this requirement for a local museum not only would I refuse to volunteer but I would never step foot in that museum. It’s looking a gift horse in the mouth, it’s elitist.”
This is very true. I have experienced this as well and I had the same reaction as this commenter. Not to mention that many people who volunteer are expected to perform and are treated as if they are highly paid employees! Often long hours are expected as well as numerous duties with a mere pittance offered in return for the time and money personally invested. Last summer I seriously considered volunteering out West for the summer at some National Parks and monuments like Yellowstone or Mt. Rushmore. As soon as I took a look at the requirements and what was expected I blew that idea right off.
Pete F. writes:
Back in late 1990s/early 2000s, I was employed on a long-term contract as an R&D scientist at a Fortune 100 healthcare products/pharmaceutical firm. I remember much complaining by permanent employees that they were required to perform “community service” time – working for Habitat for Humanity, as it turns out – as part of their annual performance review. Of course, employees were told they could opt out – but it was widely-known that personnel who chose to do so risked unfavorable ratings by their superiors and all which that would entail. In other words, do it – or else. Much to my relief, as a contracted employee, I was not permitted to take part in this escapade.
The phenomenon of compulsory volunteerism is not limited to corporate America, either. A few weeks ago, a friend of mine told me that his son – a senior in a local public high school – was required to perform 40 hours of “community service” at a location designated by the school – in order to graduate.
I will leave to you and your readers to ponder the Orwellianism of a “volunteerism” which, instead of being freely-undertaken, is compulsory!
It should be noted that the sort of charities and volunteer organizations once common in traditional America – which provided everything from soup kitchens/food banks to aid for the poor to helping the unemployed in finding work – represented an existential threat to the new order. Why? Because private, non-governmental charities performed many of the services now provided by government – more-effectively, more humanely and for vastly less money. As if these weren’t enough to threaten the secular left, the churches, social clubs (Kiwanis, Knights of Columbus, Rotary Club, etc.) which formed the backbone of this informal but highly-effective social network – also provided Christian values alongside their more-tangible benefits. This the powers-that-be could not abide.
As has already been noted, one of the many deleterious effects of the growth of the government-corporate leviathan has been to discourage private charity. Why serve as your brother’s keeper when big government is there to do it instead, and may even penalize you for doing so?
Hurricane Betsy writes:
Thumbs-up to Ted D. for his concise and excellent comments. I fit right in with the slice of the population he describes. Nobody had to tell me to think and act this way; it just kind of gradually happened. Especially the charity part. Why donate to organizations whose primary beneficiaries wouldn’t give you the time of day to save your life? Thanks, I’ll hang on to my few pathetic dollars and shop on the world wide web as necessary.
Laura writes:
We have to give to the poor. It’s a question of finding the right charities or needy individuals.
Jeanette V. writes:
My husband and I stopped giving to private charities a long time ago. But we do help individuals who we happen upon in our lives who either have suffered misfortune or who use a hand up. My husband paid for the treatment of a friends dog who was suffering from heart worms
The latest is a loan to a Christan who is trying to get a new bushiness going and is stopped by silly EPA regulations. He would never get the kind of loan we are offering at a bank
Also I have NEVER traded in my used car and have given everyone away. The last one I gave to a poor priest.
March 2, 2014
Alan M. writes:
There is a surprising historical precedent for this strategy….
Emperor Julian (the Apostate), after many failed attempts to reduce the imfluence of the Christian cult, arrived at a strategy to replace Christian charity with state charity:
Unlike Americans, however, the people of the Roman Empire only took care of their own. Charity began and ended with one’s own group in society, whether it was national or religious. A citizen of Sicily considered other Sicilians to be his neighbors; the problems of Gaul were of no concern to him. Pagans would never have fed the Christian poor either.
Against this backdrop, the Christian practice of universal charity was surprising and attractive. So Julian wanted it demolished. Instead of resorting to the harsh methods of his persecuting predecessors, Julian channeled imperial resources into an emulation of Christian charity. He ordered his pagan hierarchy to establish hospices for anyone in need, not only those of our own number, and to provide wine and wheat to the poor for free, He further instructed his priests to accustom Hellenes to acts of good will of this kind. The fractured multicultural world of the Roman Empire, in which everyone cared only for his own, was to be reconfigured into an imperial welfare system for the purpose of imitating the hated enemy.
It was an act contrary to pagan tradition and to the diverse Empire Julian governed. Julian did not claim it was an inherently good idea: He reassured his priests in the text of his letters that his purpose was only to take from the Christians the credit they had earned from their good works. He wanted to wipe them out, and he assumed that once an imperial system for feeding and housing the poor had been established, the Christian charitable societies would die out. It was a very clever idea: to beat the Christians by appropriating one of their most appealing practices.
That this idea was ever Christian has been lost on our society. We are daily casting off the restraints of Christian morality, and regular church attendance is limited to a small fraction of our population. Yet we hold on to the idea that the poor should be clothed and fed, having largely rejected the religion that produced it.
The parallels are amazing. So much for progress by the “Progressives.”
