Skald, I’m an atheist.
I’m not a believer, but I do think that Moses Maimonides had the right idea about charity - namely, that the best form of charity (aside from helping someone to become genuinely self-sufficient) is where the giver does not exault him or herself by making themselves (or their cause or whatever) known, and the receiver is not humilated by making the fact that they are recieving charity known.
To my mind this applies to religious and non-religious alike. Giving for the sake of raising your status (or the status of the group or sect to which you belong) is a lesser form, not as worthy as one who gives without expectation of such reward.
What’s really sad is that was actually the first one that came to mind. That, allied with the fact that I am still not entirely certain what quarterbacks do, is the heart of my contention that I am the board’s most egregious geek.
Please note that I explicitly said in the OP that rehabilitating the unfairly bad reputations of atheists is secondary. I was soliciting opinions on how to most effectively be charitable, not on how to spread the gospel of atheism.
That said I have a problem with Maimonides’ thesis as quoted above. I think all acts are basically selfish. When I help strangers, anonymously or otherwise, it’s as much because I enjoy doing so as for any other reason. I’d argue that the practicioners of matan b’seter are doing likewise.
But that’s another thread.
I give loans through http://www.kiva.org/. I’m a member of a non-Christian group there - you don’t have to join a group; you can just give to any of the entrepreneurs on the planet who have signed up.
If I get a holiday bonus, I’ll do another loan or two.
I agree that giving is selfish - I feel much better after I give.
jali, Kiva looks fascinating. I’d be interested in any details you’re willing to share about how the loans have worked for you, etc.
This is the group I joined (I just like the name) Kiva Lending Team: Atheists, Agnostics, Skeptics, Freethinkers, Secular Humanists and the Non-Religious. I’m also a member of the* Obama *group.
My loan went to a fishing group in Uganda. They’ve recieved their loan and should begin payback soon. I’m not too worried since I want to help, so a return of the money isn’t important to me as an individual - just to show that they’re succeeding and so that others are encouraged to give. I chose the group from the front page that day.
I’ll probably try to eventually give to groups on all the continents. I need to feel that I’m doing something and pooling money to help people who are really trying to improve their lives makes sense to me.
I think a lot of you are being too hard on Skald. He’s not trying to make a big deal of publicizing how great atheists are, or giving only if it’s part of publicizing our atheism. He’s asking that if we’re going to give anyhow, is there a way to let people know that it was from an atheist, to show that we aren’t evil and that we care about people. Religious people have their way of donating or doing work for overtly religious charities. Is there an atheist charity out there somewhere?
C’mon, Sunspace, you just have to read the Constitution Act, 1867:
Does this mean you believe that all acts are inherently just as “selfish”? If not, there is a hierarchy of selfishness if you like - some are more so than others - and this, more than anything, is what Miamonides is discussing.
To my mind it is clearly more “selfish” (or at least in bad taste and less worthy) to make a receipient of charity beg and crawl at your feet in gratitude and post a big sign with your name on it celebrating your benevolence [not that I’m suggesting you would do that - but that is the sort of thing Maimonides was against]. Getting that righteous glow on may indeed be part of the reason one gives, but there is also the notion of fulfilling one’s duties to others. In any event, he wasn’t interested in whether people were inwardly 'selfish" or not, but in social behaviour - a very different thing.
Note I’m not singling out atheists for a Maimonides reminder - to my mind it is just as much contrary to his hierarchy to plaster the name of a religion all over a charity (and far, far more common).
I’ll agree that there’s a hierarchy of selfishness, and some acts are so low on it that they’re all but altrustic.
But that is not charity.
One can argue that all charity is selfish; we are social creatures; charity benefits those in our society; what benefits our society, benefits us.
I think the requirement for modesty in charity is aimed at another human characteristic: we like to share our experiences.
God, do we like to. If something makes us happy, we want to share it; makes us sad, we want to share it; makes us think, we want to share it. (Give us the slightest excuse to talk, we share it.) Charity makes us happy we helped, sad there was a need to, and reflect on the socio-political economic structure that create the need. Hell of a lot to talk about there.
Any topic that can lead to a two hour discussion over dropping a dollar in a coffee cup should be severely proscribed. Some pleasures should be private; often, charity is one of them.
However, charity is a good thing, and people do like to be charitable. Unfortunately, many public charities are religiously based, and a religious charity, by definition, has a religious agenda, even if it is secondary and only public relations.
I’d like an aggressively areligious, highly effective, fundamental needs charity.
(Skald, how are things going with Non Fundie Foods? Will I be able to make a donation in my relatives’ names this season? )
I assume you’re kidding rather than thinking I am so efficient as to have organized something already.
What I’ve done is buy some cheap blankets & other necessaries for surviving cold winter nights, along with the fixings for breakfast and so forth. Mrs. Rhymer, my not-exactly-stepdaughter Liz, & I will be making the latter on weekends and giving those out. Last night was especially cold (freezing rain was forecast but never materialized), so I gave out some of the blankets, gloves, & such last evening.
One can certainly argue that; but I’d agree that the target of Maimonides is not “selfishness” in and of itself, but certain expressions of selfishness - to others or to oneself. The harm that this can do is obvious - the use of charity as a method of promoting an agenda unrelated to the allegedly benevolent aims of the charity itself.