Santa Claus and the Aliens: Charities That Don't Work

A friend referred me to the website of the HEARTbeats Foundation, a 501(c) charity that intends to improve the lives of impoverished children around the world through music.

Based in Los Angeles, the HEARTbeats Foundation strives to help children in need harness the power of music to better cope with, and recover from, the extreme challenges of poverty and conflict, in hope of creating a more peaceful, sustainable world for generations to come.

In essence, this is a group of American musicians who travel around the world giving concerts to poor children, thereby improving their lives and "making a difference". Their first 6-day journey to Nepal was a great success. The photos show they brought great joy to many children.

Mind you, they are not doing anything concrete to improve the lives of impoverished children, they are just helping them "cope" with their poverty though the power of music. The 9-person team includes a 3-person film crew so they can record themselves bringing joy to others and making a difference.

So as I understand it, these musicians are improving the lives of desperate children by entertaining them. Sure, all children love entertainment, but this is very expensive entertainment, imported from America. These are concert violinists and cellists from prestigious American symphonies. Certainly impoverished children in Nepal will appreciate that!

This is an example of what I call a "Santa Claus" charity. They parachute in, give people some nice presents, and leave. Without a doubt, they bring joy to the people they give the presents to, but the joy doesn't last any longer than the gifts do. In spite of the short-term satisfaction of both the gifters and giftees, these charities can cause a great deal of long-term damage by disrupting local ecologies and giving people false hope.

To illustrate, here is a little parable I wrote for my friend...

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Alien Contact

After years of speculation, the truth is revealed: Alien life exists!

A flying saucer comes out of the clouds and finally lands on the White House lawn. The whole world is mesmerized. All other television programming is suspended as every channel covers this one stupendous event.

The saucer opens and six strange grey aliens get out. They set up their instruments and start playing a concert of curious alien music. They dance and sing in a strange language. Then they get back in their spaceship and fly away.

Without a doubt, it's a joyful, amazing event! It is perhaps the most impressive occurrence in the memories of millions of Earthlings, especially the young people.

But then what happens?

The aliens don't come back.

People are left wondering, "Where did they go? Why did they leave?"

Yes, we now know that alien life exists, but they're not communicating with us anymore. They just abandoned us. Did we do something to offend them?

Can you imagine the trauma this would cause on Earth? Aliens come down from the heavens, show us joy, then leave, taking the joy with them.

Some of the young people on Earth are curious about the weird instruments the aliens are playing. They would like to play those instruments, too, but they don't exist on Earth. We don't have that
advanced alien technology, and aliens didn't leave anything behind to help us obtain it.

People also wonder: We've got some serious problems on Earth -- global warming, war, overpopulation, poverty, hunger. These aliens are very powerful. Why can't they help us with these things?

People who were starving before the aliens came are still starving after they leave.

Oh, I forgot to mention something: The aliens brought a film crew with them. The purpose of the film crew was to record the six aliens bringing joy to Planet Earth. The joy is real and the film crew captures it! Without a doubt, the whole Earth is filled with wonder as the aliens perform on the White House lawn, and the film crew, pointing their camera out at the audience, accurately record that wonder.

But the film crew leaves with the aliens. It does not hang around to record whatever confusion or trauma takes place after the aliens are gone. As far as the aliens are concerned, the concert is over, but as far as the Earthlings are concerned, the questions and soul-searching have just begun.

You got to question the motives of the aliens when they bring a film crew with them. Are they really here to bring joy and hope to Planet Earth, or are they here to record themselves bringing joy and hope to Planet Earth?

Isn't that the REAL purpose of the mission? Now the aliens can go back to their home planet, show the film to all their friends and say, "We made a difference!"

But did they really make a difference? Did they really improve life on Planet Earth or just confuse the hell out of people? In the long run of five or ten years, did this concert help or hurt our planet? It's really hard to say. It is an alien event with a million different interpretations. In fact, most people can't process it at all. It's just this weird thing that happened.

The only clear thing is that any joy the aliens brought to our planet left as soon as they did.

The End.

Kilroy Café #23: "The Paradox of Protection"

Here is a fresh revision of Kilroy Café philosophy essay from January. You can click on the image above for a larger version or print it out on a single page via the pdf file. The full text is also below. Also see my other Kilroy Café newsletters.

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THE PARADOX OF PROTECTION

You want to help others don't you? The problem is how to do it without inviting dependence.

By GLENN CAMPBELL

Once you give someone protection or security of any kind, they tend to adjust to it and become less inclined to help themselves. Give someone a crutch, even a gentle and well-meaning one, and they may come to lean on it instead of on their own resources—especially when the going gets tough.

I call this the Paradox of Protection. It is an inherent risk in everything you try to do for others, from raising children to solving world hunger to curing disease to falling in love.

All forms of charity run the same risk: dependency. If you give someone a gift with no strings attached, they may come to expect this privilege in the future—from you or someone else—and this expectation can sometimes be more dangerous than the original threat.

For example, if you feed the pigeons in the park, they will quickly come to rely on your largess. Their numbers will grow, and they will fail to develop other food sources. If you then stop feeding them, they may face worse starvation than if you had never intervened.

The same applies to any kind of good work, especially where the need is open-ended. Eventually, your contribution is expected and you become imprisoned in it. The person or system you are trying to help may lose its motivation to change, and the total net improvement to the world may be zero.

So the question arises: Why give anything to anybody?

Because that's just what you do. Life is made for giving, for doing something to improve the world you live in. There isn't a lot of meaning to life otherwise. You just have to be crafty about how you go about it.

Obviously, there are cases where protection is necessary. You can't expect someone with a serious disability to climb a flight of stairs, and you can't tell a young child, "Fend for yourself," but there is always going to be a fine line between "protecting" and "enabling."

Look at how children work the system. Their helplessness increases when they know they can get something for it. They'll say, "I can't do that!" when they know you have provided for them in the past and will probably protect them now. Without pushback from you, they will always remain in a state of childish dependence.

Everyone claims to want independence, but each step in that direction is also frightening—for both the "child" and the "parent". Always, there is danger, both real and perceived, and protection usually feels more comfortable than responsibility.

No matter what the circumstances are or how powerful you may be, you cannot provide protection forever. All charity must end, and you are as responsible for the ending as you are for the beginning. You can't enter into any good work without an exit strategy. You must understand where it will ultimately lead and how you are going to get away.

If you feed a stray cat, where will its next meal come from? If you join the Peace Corp or some other noble sounding mission, what will happen to your clients when your mission ends?

Perhaps education is the solution: "If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, but if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime." Ah, but what about the depletion of local fisheries when you teach too many people to fish? There is no system that is immune to the potentially disastrous effects of good intentions.

The only lasting solution lies in local control. You can provide temporary protection for a specific purpose, but ultimately each person, family and nation must be responsible for its own economy. Only he can design the survival mechanism that is best for him.

It may not be a survival mechanism we approve of. If someone chooses prostitution, drug dealing or a religion we don't agree with, it is not our place to criticize it unless we are prepared to provide an entire replacement system. The most we can usually do is provide tools and boundaries.

A "tool" is an alternate survival mechanism that someone can use if they choose to. A public library is a tool. A job training program is a tool, and so is simple information provided at the right time. You can't force someone to use a tool, but sometimes its availability at the right time can make a huge difference.

A "boundary" is a limitation on another person's behavior enforced by what you yourself do. You may withdraw a privilege or exercise a right based on what the other person does, depending on what you think is wise for both your future and theirs.

Always, there must be strings attached. Even young children must not be given anything unless they pay for it. The form of payment can be tailored to their ability, but every act of charity must be paid for or it will lose its value and be taken for granted.

Charity is part of a system, like everything else in the world, and there are no isolated acts. You make it work only by understanding the system as a whole—not just what happens now, but what will happen years in the future.

—G .C.

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©Glenn Campbell, PO Box 30303, Las Vegas, NV 89173. See my other philosophy newsletters at www.KilroyCafe.com.
Revised April 28, 2009 near Denver, Colorado.
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