Action Left

Some friends of mine did something really cool yesterday. They were deciding which organizations they wanted to give money to for the holidays, and one of the options was the Salvation Army. On the one hand, they provide vital humanitarian aid. After Hurricane Katrina, they served 5.6 million meals and in San Diego, they fund a comprehensive community center for underprivileged and homeless youth.

On the other hand, the Salvation Army is a self-proclaimed evangelical organization that traded lobbying favors with the Bush Administration to get out of anti-discrimination requirements that forbid them from discriminating against LBGT employees and job applicants.

And here’s the Salvation Army’s mission statement:

The Salvation Army, an international movement, is an evangelical part of the universal Christian Church. Its message is based on the Bible. Its ministry is motivated by the love of God. Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to meet human needs in His name without discrimination.

I mean, wow. Religious propoganda doesn’t get much more blatant than that. My friends decided not to support the Salvation Army, but generosity is such a terrible thing to waste. So, they decided to contribute to the San Diego LGBT Center’s Youth Housing Project instead.

The Center’s Youth Housing Project provides safe and supportive housing for San Diego’s homeless youth, including LBGT and HIV-positive youth…The facility is wheelchair accessible and contains two units that have been retrofitted to accommodate persons in wheelchairs. A major goal of YHP is to ensure that youth have easy access to needed services that will support them in maintaining stable housing.

Not only does the Project provide care and affordable housing to homeless youth, but it prioritizes some of the most at risk communities: Queer/Trans, HIV positive and disabled communities. So, by giving to an organization like the Youth Housing Project, you are helping to combat multiple problems at once that contribute to homelessness.

Obviously, the giving is the most important part of this situation, but the not-giving is crucial too.  About 40% of homeless youth in the US are LGBTQ. Homophobia and homelessness are clearly connected. So trying to combat homelessness and poverty by giving to an organization that promotes one of the causes of homelessness (in this case, homophobia and transphobia) is counter-productive in the long run, even though it’s well intentioned.

When you consider your holiday giving, maximize the impact of your gift by not giving it to organizations that cause harm to populations they should be serving. Instead, consider the San Diego LGBT Center, or one of the following organizations that supports LBGT youth:

• Ruth Ellis Center ~ Detroit
• The Ark House ~ San Francisco
• Sun Serve ~ Fort Lauderdale
• Iowa Homeless Youth Centers ~ Des Moines
• Visit Safe Schools for a more complete list of organizations

***blogger’s note: The Salvation Army is one of the largest service organizations in the world and we should not minimize the importance of humanitarian aid. In some areas, they are one of the only places that folks can turn, so I would never encourage actively trying to hurt their ability to serve people if there aren’t other viable options. But thats what’s great about organizations like The Center; they present another option. They realize that bigotry is no way to run an organization or raise funds and they still do so much to serve a phenomenal need.