(FYI--this is triggered by my last blog post, my bringing up of my "moral failings," and a little sidebar conversation I had about it.)
If you were to ask me, "Andrea, are you a good person?" and the definition of that was not a bad person, my answer would be "yeah, pretty much." I try my best to follow my own moral code in the ways that are important to me. I try to treat my family and my friends and my patients with kindness and respect and consideration and acceptance. I try to take good care of them in whatever ways I can see they need or want. (Sometimes I guess wrong.) I try hard not to be selfish, without going too far in the opposite direction and becoming a martyr, which is just as bad. I try to keep people's confidences, listen when they want to talk, and mind my business if they don't. I try not to lose my temper (not always successfully) and I try not to be a miserable cunt (also not always successfully.) I don't lie for nefarious purposes.
But if you were to ask me, "Andrea, are you a good person?" and the definition of that was you do good things that are hard for you, my answer would be "not so much." The whole tithing thing in "The Year of Living Biblically" is a perfect example of that. (I will say that A.J. Jacobs, the author, also found it awfully tough.) I am in awe that some people really do give ten percent of their income to charity. The amount of discipline and sacrifice involved in that blows me away. And what I see as one of my moral failings is that I'm not even close to being able to sacrifice monetarily or effortfully in that way for charity for strangers. I'll give my money and my time to the people I care about because it *doesn't* feel like a sacrifice. It feels good and right and natural. I am too selfish and too spoiled to sacrifice for strangers. Buying an overpriced (product)Red sweatshirt at the Gap so you can feel self-righteous that you're helping the poor while whipping out your credit card isn't charity. Going to parties that raise money for a cause or participating in charity fun runs and bike-a-thons with your friends isn't charity either. Those things are doing stuff you'd want to do anyway and then patting yourself on the back about how philanthropic you are.
Okay, maybe it's somehow better than buying a non-charity overpriced sweatshirt, going to a party whose only aim is getting people drunk or laid, or participating in athletic events just for fun. But it isn't what I'd call true charity. True charity means doing something someone needs even at a cost to yourself and doing it anonymously (if possible) or at least without self-congratulations. And, to me, true charity is something that people are really "good" as opposed to people who are--like me--simply "not bad" do.
I've got a long way to go in my selfish and spoiled life before I'm good.
xoxo
6 comments:
I don't buy into "until it hurts" or the litmus test of anonymity. I'd say charity is best done until it feels GOOD, (i.e., if you don't feel good, you likely aren't giving/doing enough), and I'd like to think it's best to do it in a way that doubly serves as a positive example to others.
People certainly shouldn't feel shamed by a sense of social propriety about acknowledged giving. (It's not like bragging if you aren't bragging about it). Having the new dorm named after you is vanity and hardly charitable. Signing a check and having somebody choose to write about it in the newspaper isn't.
Guilt is the enemy to charity, not its friend. It's been a tool used by parasitic clergy to perpetuate their ideology businesses, and tithes are simply their vehicle for outsourcing your guilt to somebody else, while they skim the profits off the top.
It never motivates us to do our best charity, and what, indeed, should we feel when we come across someone who needs our help?
Good. And good about ourselves if they should be thankful, and resolved to pay it forward.
Funnily enough, I was just reading in the blogosphere this morning a whole bunch o' controversy about Donald Trump apparently leaving a $10,000 tip for a guy who waited on him the other night. Amongst the people who can't bear to admit Mr Trump might have possibly done a nice thing the two refrains are "he's just doing it for the publicity" and "why didn't he give that money to charity instead?"
Well, even if he did just do it for the publicity, his waiter can, I'm sure, find some bill to pay or some nice thing he needs to buy that would've been impossible without it, so how's that bad? And if he did give it to charity instead, he'd get the same shit from people that he was just looking to do it for the publicity.
And I've just totally undermined my own argument. hahaha
My feelings are very convoluted about this topic, obviously. But I still think the *purest* form of charity is both incnvenient for the giver and is, at best, done without wanting acknowledgemt.
I can buy the lack of acknowledgement, but the inconvenience angle seems more like the Pharisees than some of the better examples of charity I recall from religious education. The most spectacular example of giving I ever saw was modest, certainly didn't cost the givers until it hurt, but was a completely spontaneous sharing and reaching out from one human being to another to meet a need. Some of the faithfully flawless happened to be standing by when this happened, and this act of charity did not occur to them.
"I still think the *purest* form of charity is both inconvenient for the giver and is, at best, done without wanting acknowledgement."
You're sure you don't have some secret Jewish ancestry? Cause you just hit on the third (or second) highest levels of Tzedakah that Maimonides enumeratid in his 12th century commentary on the Talmud's "Laws Concerning Gifts to the Poor". You can find it translated and paraphrased in different ways, not knowing Aramaic I don't know which is most accurate, but here's one that sounds reasonable:
"Maimonides defines eight levels in giving charity (tzedakah). Each one is higher than the other. On an ascending level, they are as follows:
8. When donations are given grudgingly.
7. When one gives less than he should, but does so cheerfully.
6. When one gives directly to the poor upon being asked.
5. When one gives directly to the poor without being asked.
4. Donations when the recipient is aware of the donor's identity, but the donor still doesn't know the specific identity of the recipient.
3. Donations when the donor is aware to whom the charity is being given, but the recipient is unaware of the source.
2. Giving assistance in such a way that the giver and recipient are unknown to each other. Communal funds, administered by responsible people are also in this category.
1. The highest form of charity is to help sustain a person before they become impoverished by offering a substantial gift in a dignified manner, or by extending a suitable loan, or by helping them find employment or establish themselves in business so as to make it unnecessary for them to become dependent on others.
I knew that. In fact, I was tempted to call you into this discussion and say "Mr Indemnity, am I not espousing the Jewish position on charity?" I'm sure I read it at one point or another and just internalized it because it struck a chord with me.
Of course, I've also internalized the Catholic position that sacrifice is worthy and hard is better than easy. I mean, you don't give up Cheetos for Lent if you can take or leave Cheetos; you give up chocolate donuts because you know going forty days without 'em is gonna be tough.
I dunno. I would probably need my brain wiped to ever believe that doing something that's easy and effortless is morally superior to doing something that's a struggle.
Moral superiority ought to be somehow connected to effectiveness, wouldn't you think?
I like soccer coaching. I'm pretty good at it. I don't like painting. I'm not very good at it.
Why would it be more charitable of me to make a hack job on the walls of the new rec center just because I'd hate doing it, as opposed to getting out there on the field with some kids a couple of days a week and teaching them something I'm good at, and that they might enjoy too?
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