rod03801:

> I'm assuming you didn't TRULY intend to make such a broad generalization?

I sure did intend to make that generalization. What is "social conscience"? It is middle class guilt. If I give to the poor, then I am a good man. If I don't, then I am selfish, and I feel guilty about it. So I give to the poor, to prove to myself that I am good so I won't feel guilty about being bad.

Then we come to the definition of "good person". For a Christian, a good person is typically somebody who follows what they interpret the Bible to say. "Faith, hope and charity. Of all these charity being the greatest." "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." Hence somebody with money, knowing that the rich cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, must make ammends to prove they deserve to be good Christians and be accepted into heaven. So they launder their conscience by giving to the poor. "If I give to the poor, i am not the kind of rich guy who is compared to a camel, but the kind of rich guy who is welcome in Heaven."

Of course, many donations are tax deductible. So a rich man can buy himself a good reputation while at the same time getting himself a nice tax break. In fact, the more money I can afford to give, the more PR I can squeeze out of it, and the more of a nice guy I look. The artifice is so good, that I can literally get rid of my bourgeois sense of guilt, and even be a good Christian (or a good Moslem or whatever religion I might like).

Ultimately, everyone wants to convince themselves that they are good. Yet nobody wants to admit the truth. The poor of the world don't need charity. What they need is social justice. They don't need petty bourgeois guilt. What they need is the fair and equal distribution of wealth. But then, it is the evil godless communists who preached that. Charity is good, because as long as there is charity there is no need for real social change or revolution.

> Is that why you give to charity? WOW. It's not why I do.

Why do you give then? I give as much as I can out of guilt. I am honest. I know very well that the money I give to charity is for the most part wasted because it will never ellicit any real social change. It merely eases my guilt so I can sleep better at night. I am an atheist, so God does not play in my sense of guilt. Mine is mere middle class guilt. But then, if people don't give out of guilt, why do they give? Are they trying to prove something to themselves, or to the world? Even if they give anonymously, what is the psychological motivation behind giving?