We do! We support/donated some money to an online ranching forum. Yearly, we support the Pro-Rodeo Hall of Fame and go to their one major event. We subscribe/support The Cowboy Channel that shows many "live" rodeos. We've support The National Senior Pro-Rodeo Association. We support the Friends of Rodeo. We give to the Fireman's Boot at Christmas.
Yes, we make contributions to a few charities. Most recently I changed my Amazon Smile donations to go to the "Knitted Knockers" organization, who provide FREE knitted breast prostheses to breast cancer patients. It costs me nothing, but Amazon makes the donations with every purchase I make.
I also donate through Amazon Smiles, mine to Doctors without Borders. Can't remember where exactly, but have often rounded up various online charges to support some cause or another. I've done a few GoFundMe campaigns and other donation requests via Facebook. Some years ago I loaned a small amount to borrowers through a 501(c)3 called Kiva.org. It's not quite an outright donation, except to the voluntary additional amount given to Kiva to continue their operations. I like this organization because borrowers from around the world can ask for hundreds to thousands of dollars to purchase equipment for their business, improve living conditions for their family, afford medical care, etc. They do repay the loans, tiny amounts at a time in most cases, but then I can turn the repayments around and loan to others. It FEELS like donation because I keep my original amount recirculating instead of having it come back to me. I NEVER donate to organizations that bug me by phone.
We do Amazon Smiles, too. I started with the free medical clinic here , because they helped me when my heart failure was really bad, and I had no money to see a doctor, and not quite old enough for Medicare yet. Then we changed to a rescue organization for animals, and now we have it set to benefit a place here that helps feed homeless people. I also do the Survey Monkey (surveys) which donates to Doctors Without Borders each time you complete a survey.
My Smiles donations used to go to an animal shelter; I did that for a few years. It's such an easy way to make a small contribution.
Now, another question: Would you rather give some kind of donation, that could be money, to The Salvation Army (at Christmas) or an organization like them, than to give to a homeless person asking for money on a street corner or the entrance to Walmart? We have never gave a homeless person money. Just don't trust how they will spend it. Believe it or not, there are those that would rather throw good clothing, or other things, into a trash bin, rather than to give to The Salvation Army or Goodwill. We we started "downsizing" some years ago, we took a lot of stuff to both of those. From what I remember, we trashed nothing.
Giving money do a homeless person (or someone pretending to be homeless) seems like a really bad idea, and we have never given anyone more than a dollar or two for gas when they were parked at a gas station and the story seemed legitimate. When someone asks for food money, we usually buy them food, or offer to do that. For a while , it was hard to go anywhere and not have someone standing outside of the store or restaurant, asking for money. They have on Nike shoes, and smoking regular cigarettes, and claiming that they need money and are homeless. Often , Bobby or I have offered to take these people to the rescue mission, but they always have some excuse why they do not want to go there, which makes it even more doubtful that they are telling a true story.
And, there are those homeless folks that will ask for money instead of food or gas. They will say, "I/we ran out of gas, do you have an extra change?" and when told "I'll get you some gas", they can get upset. Now, I don't want to turn this thread into a "homeless problem" thread, I was just curious about how people handle it, when asked for money. As far as not want to go to the Rescue Mission, many don't, because of the rules that are in place, like "no smoking or cussing".
I grew up with parents who believed people had to "deserve" their charity. Not only "deserve" but also hold the same conservative and religious "beliefs". The parents had to "approve" of the person and the reason someone asked for help. It was their money and they had a right to like the recipient and how it was spent, they thought. Their possessive idea of ownership of "their money" extended beyond gifting to someone else. Their implicit message was one of thinking they had a right to control others' choices. When I got older, I realized this was a sickening form of bribery, and a not so subtle form of classism. And yet that baggage is still in my own head, and I'm ashamed to say that I rarely give handouts to panhandlers, claiming not to have any cash with me, which since covid, is usually true.
If a homeless person asks me for money, I give them a few bucks. I don't ever give ANYONE a gift with "strings." They can wipe their butt with it; it's not "mine" after I hand it over. There but for the grace of God, etc. A couple of years ago a woman approached me as I was loading groceries into my trunk in a Kroger parking lot. She said she was from a town about 70 miles away and was running out of gas and her kids were hungry. She pointed to an old car with two little expectant faces peering out. I gave her $20 which was all the cash I had at the time. Another woman walking by told me I was being scammed. I shrugged. You're only "scammed" if you believe that you are. If there was one chance in 1,000 that I fed those little kids (a McDonalds was right across the parking lot), then it was no skin off my nose.
That is almost word for word what my mother used to say, @Beth Gallagher . My dad always scolded her and said that she was being lied to, and should not be helping the person out (or in many cases, living rent-free in one of her rentals); but Mom always said that she would rather be taken for a fool and lied to about someone needing help, than to not help someone who actually was in need of the help they were asking for. That being said, she usually didn’t hand over money to anyone. She took them to get the food, haircut, or whatever it was that the person said they needed, and then paid for it herself. Years back, my daughter gave some money to one of those “homeless people” with the “will work for food” signs, and then she thought that she would also invite him home for dinner . (I was horrified when she told me this part of the story !) Anyway, during the course of the dinner, the guy admitted that he made around $500 a day standing out on the street corner, so he made many times the amount my daughter made working at a department store as a clerk.
I mostly support local organizations I can reach out and touch, and whose members I know. I was on the board (and was a field worker) for the local affiliate of a nationwide organization. It was a real eye-opener to how Charity Navigator rates these groups. I'll never take those ratings at face value again. Long story short: every dollar that is spent on administrators at HQ is counted as going "directly to the stated mission" if those administrators support the field organizations. The implication is that your dollar goes to someone in need, while it really goes to pay the salary of someone who touches the individual groups who are the ones who actually deliver goods & services to those in need. It's deceitful, and you can only tell if you're familiar with the inner workings as your read the C.N. analysis and the supporting financials. I generally don't give money to panhandlers. Every few years I violate that rule, and it seems I end up regretting it. I believe @Gloria Mitchell started an entire thread on these experiences. I recently saw this sign when I went into the big city to get a gyro:
Sorry, but the "Why lie; I need a beer" guy gets a couple of bucks from me every time. I know what it's like to want a beer.
Honestly, I'd rather just hand over a couple of bucks than to cart a homeless person around to feed them or whatever. I just wanted to get my groceries home before the ice cream melted, and when I looked at those kids I suddenly didn't care if mom was a scammer. My husband has handed a bag with burgers and fries to a panhandler; the guy was thrilled. Of course, then we had to go back to the burger place and re-buy our dinner.