101–110 of 182 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
SA is tied to Catholics, and this is a big deal breaker for a lot of people.
That’s not true, the Salvation Army is, as I understand, its own Christian denomination.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good question. There is Salvation Army, which accordingly to the comparison to Red Cross, has done extremely better job, delivering its mission well. But why didn't orgs like FB or Google (I forgot which) advertized SA? SA is well-known too. I think there is a social effect, but more likely because the people working at Red Cross has better reach to the big organizations and media outlet, despite the backlashes. The…
SA is tied to Catholics, and this is a big deal breaker for a lot of people.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They've come under some criticism for apparent lack of transparency around how donations are spent, and for allegedly having very high overheads. They are also borderline abusive with how often they will call you and harass you if you miss an opportunity to donate blood. They apparently have unlimited funds to pay phone operators.
Not borderline abusive, they are straight up abusive with their phone calls. If you ever decide to give blood do NOT give them your phone number. I tried to give blood ONCE and found out that I was ineligible. For the next five years or so they harassed me non stop about giving blood. I told them I was ineligible they just said "ok" but I still got phonecalls. I asked them to stop calling me but they didn't stop. Aft…
I recently decided to stop giving them blood, however, because I was actually reading the fine print for once, and apparently they send your blood off for use in research at universities and you cannot opt out.
Is there any non religious charity that does well?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good question. There is Salvation Army, which accordingly to the comparison to Red Cross, has done extremely better job, delivering its mission well. But why didn't orgs like FB or Google (I forgot which) advertized SA? SA is well-known too. I think there is a social effect, but more likely because the people working at Red Cross has better reach to the big organizations and media outlet, despite the backlashes. The…
> But why didn't orgs like FB or Google (I forgot which) advertized SA? SA is well-known too. I don't know the actual reason. But it could be because of the religious connection. While I've seen that the Salvation Army has done a lot of good, they also connect it with their belief system. This makes me uneasy. Fundamentally I'd be happy to donate to a charity that I knew would: - Responsibly manage the funds - Ensure…
You get a lot of "secular" charities that rake in a lot of money and yet don't produce much in the way of results (White Ribbon, for example), and you also see a lot of religious charities that have big budgets and also produce good results (Salvos are a good example of this).
Not to say this is the rule by any stretch, but it does seem to be a readily observable trend.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, but the extent of it seems to be American exclusive. Are there not a bunch of cancer charities that simply do nothing but enrich the owners?
Perhaps Americans are more diligent in tracking down bad actors?
Hence, there's more charities, more attention given to them, etc.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the biggest challenge your organization faces? My kneejerk reaction is: local labor!? local materials!? So inefficient! But I'm wrong. You're doing exactly what's needed; bootstrapping skills and contributing towards the local economy. I'm curious how much housing is still needed in Haiti, how much more money into the pipeline would fix the problem, etc. Would you be able to scale beyond Haiti? Sorry to ramble…
It's been years since I was an American Red Cross (local) disaster services volunteer, but at the time I believe the philosophy was also providing funds rather than materials because it helped local economies recover.