A question, regarding the floods in Pakistan.

[cassiesmom]

Yes, Sana, Pakistan has been in our prayers since the flood happened, we mention it every week at church.

My church too.

We can donate at church with our regular offering and they will forward the funds to faith-based organizations that are already established to help in Pakistan.

[sana]

Thanks everybody who's helping

[Miss Z]

Thanks for the responses. Perhaps after taking in some of the attitudes from other threads, I jumped the gun on this topic.

I can understand donor fatigue, and the 'charity begins at home' philosophy. Still rather sad at the donor to non-donor ratio of the poll, but it is right for people to follow their principles with regards to their finances.

I've always believed that the best charity is action rather than hand-outs, and if opportunity allowed I'd be straight out to Pakistan helping with the aid efforts. Charitable fatigue is never an issue when you become directly involved, I have found. But of course when direct involvement is not possible, the only help we can often give is through money, and I can affirm it is not nearly as gratifying.

There was a speaker for the DEC on television a couple of days back who described the disaster as 'on the scale of Haiti and the 2004 tsunami, but with the complexity of the Middle East.' I'm still pondering what entirely she meant by that.

Freedom and Laura's Babies, the publicity issue is very interesting. So many celebrities jumped on the Haiti bandwagon - who can forget that god-awful rehash of 'Everybody Hurts'? - and for Pakistan? So far I've seen David Suchet in a very typical, Oxfam-style advertisement appeal, and nothing else.

[Lady's Human]

There's a major difference between Haiti and Pakistan.

Pakistan chose to use enormous resources to develop nuclear weapons rather than pull the people in the rural areas out of the 7th century.

Haiti has not had a functional government for decades.

[Twisterdog]

The United States gives hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign aid each year, to countries of all religions. Money better spent on our own people and problems, IMO.

[Lady's Human]

US foreign aid is actually about 20-30 billion per year.

[lizbud]

US foreign aid is actually about 20-30 billion per year.

.....and some US schools are asking children to bring their own toilet paper
to school with them. How does that make any sense?

[Lady's Human]

Being that school budgets are (or should be ) a local item, all that tells me is that we have school districts who can't budget.

[JenBKR]

Our economy's pretty bad right now and it's not looking like it's going to get better any time soon. A lot of people are out of work, and many are struggling to get by. I know that my local food bank is really hurting, and that's where I have been donating lately. Maybe others are in the same boat, either they can't afford to donate to Paskistan or they are choosing to help others in their own community.

There are probably some people who aren't donating because of Islam, but I doubt that it's the reason for many. I haven't heard about Pakistan nearly as much as I did about Haiti, but like someone else said, I haven't been watching tv hardly at all so that could be why. Pakistan is in my prayers.

[lizbud]

Being that school budgets are (or should be ) a local item, all that tells me is that we have school districts who can't budget.

Perhaps I shouldn't have used your quote specifically to hang my comments on. But, it was what I was thinking, so...

Communities generally budget very well for the funds (taxes,fees) they
collect, but with the bad economy & people out of work, budgets are much
tighter then they have ever been.

[Catty1]

Every Sunday afternoon there is a national call-in radio show on CBC called "Cross-Country Checkup", and the donating to Pakistan was the topic.

One young woman, a Pakistani-Canadian, said that so many people in her home country don't trust the government at all. However, she and some friends contacted family and friends in Pakistan, and after verifying that these people there could actually get to the disaster areas, they are channeling their money to those individuals. Then these people in Pakistan buy the supplies and take them directly to where they are needed.

Also, there are NGOs like Doctors Without Borders and the Red Cross...hopefully not having to deal with the government!

For those who wish, the show can be heard via MP3, podcast, or right on the site:
http://www.cbc.ca/checkup/archives.html