The Cookie Complex: Donating to Help a Cause

"Look at me! I donated [money/clothing/food/toiletries] to help the survivors of [horrible disaster]. See my generosity! Pat me on the back!"

You know you've seen it. A big disaster strikes, people are without food, every company and their offshoots offer ways to donate to help those affected. What does that inevitably lead to? Well, it's what I've started referring to as the cookie complex.

Hey, it's great if you are willing and able to donate to a cause that you believe in. More power to you. It's a beautiful thing. Why the need, though, to broadcast it to the world? What exactly is that supposed to accomplish? I can't help but feel like you're just showing off. Do you want a cookie or something? It's just as juvenile as Stuart's famous "look what I can do!"

Is it not enough for you to know that you did something to help? If your donations are made for the purpose of getting pats on the back, you're likely to be sorely disappointed, and I'd go so far as to say that you're not giving for the right reasons. True, the people on the receiving end of your supposed generosity care not two shakes of a lamb's tail why you ponied up the dough. They're getting needed support either way. But you... what are you getting out of this, besides an inflated sense of your own self worth?

Even worse is the judgment heaped onto those who either choose not to donate or are not able. They're pressured on all sides, made to feel small if they can't or won't shell out their funds. How dare they not donate?! How horrible they are! What a sorry excuse for a human being!

That attitude is downright disgusting, and often done with the added note that giving is the "Christian thing to do." Goodness knows I don't subscribe to the bible (shocker, eh?), but a particular verse addresses that statement quite nicely, and I will close with that:

Matthew 6: 2-4
"So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. ³ But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, ⁴ so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. "