Charity, yay or nay?

#61

We learn the benefits of helping others when we’re young so we might help people when we’re older. If you didn’t get help by anyone when you were young is it really that difficult to imagine that this person will not help others later on?

A different situation might be when you’re a parent and you want to give them everything you never had. But these are your children, not some strangers.

There are people who helped me when I needed help and there are people who didn’t, to the former I’m very sympathetic and I’ll help them in turn, to the latter I say piss off and I hope you die in a gutter!

Vicious circle? Possibly. Justified? Certainly!

#62

Bolteh, if you’re going to troll, just leave the thread.

You’re wrong, by the way, charity is the “voluntary giving of help/money to those in need,” and has nothing to do with people trying to convince you to become a half-decent human being.

#63

Well, I voluntary give help/money to those in need. Only one requirement: they have to be friends or family of me. So yes, I guess in a way I participate in charity.

But my initial point of this thread was about the charity for causes like the Tsunami, Haiti, WWF, ALF, Oxfam, Unicef, Doctors Without Borders, etc. The kind of charity that sends people out on the streets to steal (oh sorry, “persuade to give money”) for their “noble” cause. The kind of charity that gets media attention and a whole bunch of rich fuckers that make a song about the disturbing situation on the other side of the world. The kind of charity that wants to give you the illusion that you’re making a difference.

I hold no sympathy, compassion or any possible emotional bond with anyone that I don’t know. Do I care that farmers in Africa are getting ripped off and have to work in dire situations? Hell no! Why would I care anyway? And if I don’t care, why would I aid them?

#64

You could have just said you were emotionally stunted at the beginning: you’d have avoided this whole argument.

#65

I am not. I just lack any care for anyone I don’t know. If I was emotionally stunted, I wouldn’t even care for friends and family.

#66

I said stunted, not utterly lacking in basic feeling.

#67

Charity, yay or gay?

Do not reply this post.

#68

I am most definitely not interested in most forms of charity.
There is so much corruption and so little accomplished by it that it is a total waste of time and money.
I will never understand why people continue their quests to help starving nations. It just perpetuates a failing system.
I do participate actively in folding though. It’s directly contributing to research and bypassing the possible hang ups of change donation, which is very ineffective at actually benefiting the causes they claim.
Folding also goes towards research to help find a cure for some ailments I know are going to be shitty if I live long enough to suffer from them. Helping others while also helping myself. Yay!

#69

The only thing I ever donated money to is this:
https://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/STAR-WARS-EP-V-REVISITED-EDITION-ADYWAN-NEW-TRAILER-AVAILABLE-NOW/topic/9060/

That’s what I call a good cause :smiley:

#70

You’re still doing some good though. Sure, it’s depressing that it’s nowhere near its full potential, but helping in spite of that is so much better than the lazy apathy position.

What’s folding, by the way?

EDIT: Also, the whole “OOH, I NEVER GOT HELP WHEN I WAS A KID, NOT NO HOW” argument is completely and utterly childish. It’s taking toys away from a younger child just because your parents refused to get you them. There not one single person on this planet that was baby walked through their childhood - even in the rich families, you have fucked up systems of competitiveness and projected ambitions and such. Doesn’t sound like much, but it only takes a basic understanding of people to work out that shit like that when you’re a kid does not go towards developing a balanced human being.

#71

Protein folding, with the Folding@home project.

#72

Charity, yay.

I’d have to say that helping others does count. Even if they were someone I didn’t know, hospitality is the first thing on my mind whenever anyone is in trouble or in need of assistance. Refusing someone makes me feel like an bad person. :frowning:

Though I don’t have enough money to donate to any cause right now, I will do so when I have sufficient funds in the future.

#73

PRO-TIP: That’s not “charity”.

#74

All your need to know about folding is found here

#75

Oh, please. That’s what you’re happy with? That’s your big contribution to the world? A piece of software that you just run?

I realise I’m overacting. I honestly wouldn’t care if you guys had just said “I can’t be bothered”, but seeing you all act as if you have these grand reasons for not being charitable is enraging.

#76

I think most of us started in this thread saying that we just don’t care, but then we were pushed into explaining why.

So you literally asked for it :expressionless:

#77

Well I’ve spent about $3000 in hardware over the past two years, and dedicate entire machine arrays to the cause. So yeah, it’s a significant contribution. 7 High end GPUs doing nothing but folding isn’t exactly easy on the hydro bill either. I think that is far more charitable than most peoples half assed donations

#78

It might not be the perfect description of the term "charity’, but it sure comes into play most of the times when something related to “charity” happens.

As I said in my original post. If I wanted to participate in this whole “charity” story, I’ll do so myself. I’ll go to the respective websites and contact organizations. I do -not- want some git to block my path, potentially causing me to miss my bus, just to make me aware that some poor kid in Ecuador could get “proper” education if I donate €200 a year.

And hey, so far, about 9 out of 10 of my experiences with charity involves people annoying me and blocking me. Can’t blame a guy from making conclusions out of personal experiences.

#79

You bought the computer for yourself, you didn’t buy the hardware with the primary aim being that one program. That’s like saying you drove tramps to the soup kitchen once so the $100,000 car is part is part of your contribution.

You can blame a guy for randomly deciding that those people that annoy him on the street represent all charities.

#80

Yes I did. Those computers do nothing but fold 24/7.
I have two other separate desktops for gaming.
The folding nodes never ever do anything but fold. It’s all they are designed to do, they aren’t much use for anything else.
So if I bought a $100,000 vehicle that does nothing but transport the less fortunate, and is that expensive because it’s primary design is to perform this tasks. I’d say that is a more accurate comparison.

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