Comments on: Starve on!

By: Those special "charity pens"? They were nicked from the office supply closet. | PassiveAggressiveNotes.com

Tue, 31 Aug 2010 23:21:57 +0000

[...] Starve on! [...]

By: That'sMe

That'sMe — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 22:53:05 +0000

“…but I am sure they will be greatly appreciated by those affected by homelessness, job losses, and the elderly.”

I think we’re all looking over an important part of our society – those that are affected by the elderly. Those people need our food donations.

By: Lin

Lin — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 20:23:07 +0000

To TOS (15.11): All I know is, I wasn’t going to eat it and I thought someone else might. The end.

By: Marie

Marie — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 17:49:13 +0000

Your food bank will buy food at retail? Okay, I take it back. Money would not go further in that case.

By: splint chesthair

splint chesthair — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 13:48:51 +0000

That’s fine but at some point you have to draw a line and say, “No, no more.” You’ve got office drives, school drives, Boy Scout, Girl Scout drive, sports drives, church drives, plus whatever volunteer work you’re doing on top of your daily chores. Sure, each place is only asking a bit but you can’t do it all or you burn out. And since you can never know what a person is doing, you should just keep judgements to yourself.

By: Beckmann

Beckmann — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 13:23:28 +0000

Listen, volunteering is, in a way, a form of secular religion–each person should get to choose how and when and where they volunteer, and for what cause they volunteer. An office running a food drive is absolutely fine . . . but you don’t have the right to shame the office in this manner. People will either participate or they won’t. Just leave it at that. Who knows what charities people are involved with outside of work? Emails like this are the reason shows like The Office and movies like Office Space have such cultural resonance–people bring their sad, weirdo grievances/obsessions to work and force them on you, expecting you to participate.

By: clumber

clumber — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 01:10:16 +0000

Amanda6 : My employer does not offer matching donations. I donate every month, not just the holiday food drives, to a local food bank. There is no standoff, of any ethnicity. I resent not the drives themselves, I resent the guilt trips because the “team” didn’t meet the arbitrary goal set to make the execs look good.

Hence, why the posted snark is an asshole email, and as PA as it gets, and the submitter has me very much in his/her corner.

By: secondsout

secondsout — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 23:38:53 +0000

Did I ever tell you guys about the rumor that when you flush the toilet, the invisible poo mist comes and seeks out your toothbrush? It turns out, that was debunked on Mythbusters.

By: Gandalf

Gandalf — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 23:24:38 +0000

SSSSHHHhhhhhh…. Don’t let it get around!

By: h3llc4t

h3llc4t — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:53:16 +0000

I work for a large corporation that does food drives at least once every 2 months. Sometimes (depending on how cranky I am with my job) it’s easy to be annoyed with constantly being asked to donate or not follow through with making a donation. I try to stop myself and think: would I be able to look a person who needed that food in the eye and say “Sorry, I was too caught up in my own crap to donate anything”? Whatever my issue is, I can surely manage to do *something*. It just occasionally requires a little attitude adjustment beforehand. In the end, it’s not about whether I felt vindicated or wasn’t inconvenienced; it’s about whether someone got something that I had which they needed.

By: duh!

duh! — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:40:21 +0000

@16.2:
DUH! They already said (repeatedly) that they donate everywhere else and anywhere else. As do I. Actually my employer is pretty good so I donate in many ways through them as well.

To the pollyannas who want to keep spouting PSAs and ignoring what was actually said, we got it already. Jeez. If you have to keep missing the point, at least stop beating the dead horse.

By: mamason

mamason — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:38:50 +0000

When you say work, do you mean there’s actual effort involved?

By: Gandalf

Gandalf — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 20:57:06 +0000

Cash, raw material, and time!
Low on food and cash yourself, give an hour or two of your time each week. But be careful, it can be addicting!
Seriously, 100% of that can of soup you gave will go directly to the poor. Cash has to be used to pay operating costs and overhead, first. Even non-profit organizations have paid staff.
Additionally, many large charities do buy staples in bulk, and still need canned goods. Second Harvest has the buying power to purchase rice, beans, tuna, and peanut butter. But they cannot purchase a large variety of vegetables, fruits and other foods, to do so would be costly, and defeat the purpose. Second Harvest also collects food from restaurants and markets. No, I don’t volunteer with them, I am just aware of their program.
If you don’t want to give food or cash, give of your time. There is a lot of work out there that needs to be done, and not enough of us to do it.

By: Gandalf

Gandalf — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 20:42:52 +0000

I have seen frozen dinners in the donation bins(long since defrosted). Some good hearted soul donated 10 pounds of weiners, in November, for a Christmas drive. Eggs, beer, cold medicine, batteries, a tupperware filled with something(not sure what it was, but when I touched the container, it growled!), and some items that good taste prevents me from describing. To those who mean well, Bless You, your kindness may be the spark of hope that starts the fire under a person to start a new life. And to those that are mean-spirited, or negative, or “feel pressured”, don’t bother, these people don’t need your help! And neither do I! I just hope that if you ever find yourself bad place, that you run across someone who is not like you!