Moral Riddle at your local Walmart
Sep. 7th, 2008 03:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captain_slinkyI had two dollars cash in my pscket. There were two tables set up outside of WalMart with people doing fundraising stuff, each one wanting exactly two dollars for their fundraiser item.
Table one was a Mom and her two little girls, trying to raise money so that the youngest daughter (maybe 6 years old?) could live her dream and go to an Ice Skating Camp this winter. She had been there before and showed INCREDIBLE promise, but the economy has hit the family hard and they can't afford to send her again this year. So they are selling candy bars for $2 each.
BIGGEST SELLING POINTS: Pictures of the little girl from last year on the ice in her skating outfit, little girl herself saying "I want to thkate in the Olympicths when I grow up, mithter! Pleathe?"
Table number 2 was a Dad and his two teenage sons, all wearing t-shirts and baseball caps, trying to raise money for the medical bills associated with his 4-year-old daughter's terminal Cancer. No story behind that - Dudes aren't the greatest communicators when it comes to emotional stuff like that. But the Dad and the teenage boys seemed desperate. For your two dollars, you would get a rubber wrist bracelet with some sort of anti-cancer slogan on it.
BIGGEST SELLING POINTS: Picture of little Cancer girl smiling in her hospital bed, Agressive-yet-not-pushy sales tactics of teenage boys. Everybody got a quick "Buy a bracelet to help my baby sister? No? Thank you..."
I gave my $2 to the little ice skating girl. There were lots of tiny superficial reasons such as "I don't need another piece of junk cluttering my dashboard" and "I like chocolate", but it all came down to Life Vs. Death.
$2 to help enrich a little girl's life and help her live her dreams seemed more important to me than easing the suffering of a family that, quite frankly, has A LOT more suffering to go. Giving the money to a girl who is going to live with it instead of a girl who's going to die with it.
Sure, i could have just given them both a buck and told them to keep their junk... or i could have just walked away and not given anything to anybody (like so many people do). But I couldn't do that...
Table one was a Mom and her two little girls, trying to raise money so that the youngest daughter (maybe 6 years old?) could live her dream and go to an Ice Skating Camp this winter. She had been there before and showed INCREDIBLE promise, but the economy has hit the family hard and they can't afford to send her again this year. So they are selling candy bars for $2 each.
BIGGEST SELLING POINTS: Pictures of the little girl from last year on the ice in her skating outfit, little girl herself saying "I want to thkate in the Olympicths when I grow up, mithter! Pleathe?"
Table number 2 was a Dad and his two teenage sons, all wearing t-shirts and baseball caps, trying to raise money for the medical bills associated with his 4-year-old daughter's terminal Cancer. No story behind that - Dudes aren't the greatest communicators when it comes to emotional stuff like that. But the Dad and the teenage boys seemed desperate. For your two dollars, you would get a rubber wrist bracelet with some sort of anti-cancer slogan on it.
BIGGEST SELLING POINTS: Picture of little Cancer girl smiling in her hospital bed, Agressive-yet-not-pushy sales tactics of teenage boys. Everybody got a quick "Buy a bracelet to help my baby sister? No? Thank you..."
I gave my $2 to the little ice skating girl. There were lots of tiny superficial reasons such as "I don't need another piece of junk cluttering my dashboard" and "I like chocolate", but it all came down to Life Vs. Death.
$2 to help enrich a little girl's life and help her live her dreams seemed more important to me than easing the suffering of a family that, quite frankly, has A LOT more suffering to go. Giving the money to a girl who is going to live with it instead of a girl who's going to die with it.
Sure, i could have just given them both a buck and told them to keep their junk... or i could have just walked away and not given anything to anybody (like so many people do). But I couldn't do that...
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