Feeling pressured to make a donation
1. I live in a community of mobile homes. We all get along well. Lately, one of our neighbours left each of us a package. Inside was a self-addressed envelope, a donation card for the MS Society (a worthy cause) and a note thanking me in advance for my “generous donation.” I felt I had no choice because I didn’t want her to think badly of me. But it made me furious because I already have charities I give to. Would it be rude for the rest of us to send her a donation card for our own charities? 2. Recently, the son of a co-worker was injured in an accident. Our boss decided it would be good if we all donated money to offset some of the cost of caring for the child. A brown envelope arrived on everyone’s desk, suggesting we each contribute $50 and return it by Friday to the boss’s office. I am one of the lowest paid employees in the company; while I agree that we should help, it’s not fair that we should all be asked for the same amount. Those with higher incomes should give more. Agree?
There’s something sad about both letters; it’s the sadness born when a gracious opportunity is transformed into a dreary duty.
These situations start out with someone trying to do a good thing. Both correspondents, to their credit, acknowledge that.
Unfortunately, both campaigns derail the same way; instead of building a case for generosity and inviting people to be supportive, they use the language of obligation and presumption. In the first case, sending a “thank you” note in advance is coercive; it’s a pressure tactic designed to take away the neighbours’ right to make their own decision.
In the second case, assigning a “suggested amount” and demanding the envelope be returned to the boss at a given time is a similar gambit; the un- spoken threat is obvious.
During my years in the church, there were people in every congregation who wanted to use tactics like these. Some wanted to “publish” the donations of all members, so that others would feel pressured to live up to their neighbours. Some wanted to divide the budget equally among the members and assign everyone their “fair” share. Still others wanted to “suggest” an appropriate amount to each member-family based on their “standard of living” — presumably whether they drove a Kia or Mercedes.
All these strategies are wrong, both practically and ethically.
Toronto is full of genuinely good causes: hospital foundations, religious communities, arts groups, refugee projects and so on. And beyond the city’s boundaries there’s another whole list: Doctors Without Borders, Amnesty International and countless more.
Each of them has the absolute right to build a case for support and invite us to respond. And each of us has the duty, as members of civil society, to consider those invitations seriously and give as generously as possible.
But when the language of invitation is replaced by the semantics of coercion, everyone loses. Falling in love with a cause, and therefore giving graciously to it, feels wonderful. Being pressured to respond feels lousy and leads to the resentful reactions found in both of these questions. Send your questions to star.ethics@yahoo.ca.