Laptop and charity

[triskellian]

On the subject of my latest toy, this, too, is being typed from the comfort of my bed. Oh! The joy of wireless networking! It's taking me a while to get used to the keyboard, which is a strange one even apart from the fact that I'm used to a natural keyboard, but, on the whole, I declare the laptop a thing of beauty and a joy forever, as someone who may have been Rhiannon, referred to it earlier.

On charity, I've recently decided that I should be giving some money to good causes. The difficult question now is which charity. There are so many causes I believe in, and think deserve my money, and only so much money. It's hard to narrow it down even to a reasonable shortlist. The National Asthma Campaign is the only one I'm reasonably sure about, for obvious reasons, but I'd like to choose one or two more. So my question to you is, do you give to charity, and if so, which ones, and how did you decide?

Comments

Careful choosing...

[leathellin.livejournal.com]

I tend to be rather picky about where charity money goes.
For a start there are several charities who causes I would happily support but I will not do it through them. FotE and Greenpeace being the two largest examples, possibly because I know most about what they are talking about. They don't get any money off me until they sort their act out and reduce the amount of bullshit on their sites and in their campaigns. I have a general objection to the misrepresentation of information to win a point and just because the "enemy" do it, doesn't mean the charities should.
I like charity actions which do permanent good and my favourite of these (obviously) are the forest protection schemes which basically work by buying them. Many are rainforest acres but there are also forest acres being bought up around the world and protected. It has to be done sensitively to local people and so as a result there are alternative "protect an acre" schemes for those worried that it is rather hard to check that the charity in question is buying sensibly. http://www.ran.org/give/paa/paa.html has the RAN scheme which protects (to a large extent by helping tribes win land grants from the government for their homeland) and also mentions (in passing) what makes a good buy scheme which is the extension of existing reserves. I must admit the claims about carbon balancing and preventing global warming on these sites make me wince slightly though. An example buy site: http://www.worldlandtrust.org/supporting/donation.htm

I also like to support ADHD/ADD charities which fund expensive teaching and counselling schemes to help children learn how to live with it rather than leaving their parents with only the much cheaper and more widely available drug option. Far too many parents don't have access to a choice or are even aware that drugs are not the only option.

Charities which feed, house etc those who are homeless I also like, mostly because I would rather give aid through the charities than give money randomly for almost anything to people on the street.