I'm sure that we all have noticed the sheer number of nonprofit organizations or those who claim nonprofit status. We can see how nonprofits are being set up for every cause imaginable and it does not look like this trend is going to stop. We are asked for donations and are promised that if we give our financial contributions will do great things. We are offered volunteer opportunities and are told that our volunteering will make a tremendous difference for a cause and will change our lives through our becoming part of a dedicated, hard-working, valued team of people. Nonprofits "court" us through seeking to win our trust so that we will support them with our awareness efforts, our donations and our volunteer time, promising us that we will "belong" to their "community."
On social networks, people who run nonprofits as CEO's are who have official volunteer status, now fill the networks, including my own. It seems that the majority of people in my network have ties to nonprofits in some form or other; those who don't seem to be in the minority. I have mixed feeling about having so many people in my network. I appreciate and admire their advocacy and devotion on behalf of their singular passions, causes and missions. But the trade-off for that is the knowledge that while I do well with such folks IF they see that I'm supporting them and their agendas, that this is as far as it goes as far as online friendship goes. I know that any friendship I enjoy with such people is solely based on their causes and agendas and is not about friendship in the strict, social sense. These are people who use social networks for reasons other than social networking which to them is only a means to an end. To me, it is sad that we live in a world that we have to spend so much time and energy meeting needs that we feel that we lack time for friendhip for its own sake.
Whether CEO's of nonprofits or official volunteers (especially if called "senior" volunteers), I have noticed the love, admiration, cameraderie, trust and caring that such people enjoy, especially if their ties are with nonprofits that are highly regarded. And so much of that high regard of some nonprofits, even ones that are not well-established or proved, is based mainly on what these nonprofits promise or claim they do or will do. I have visited many sites and have seen "Donate" buttons and offers for volunteer opportunities, but which don't always provide even basic information that a public which they ask for donations from is owed, such as the nonprofit's fund distribution (and how much actually goes for their stated missions), where donations are used, how they are used, the nonprofit's by-laws, and its screening policies for employees and volunteers. And yet we are so quck to offer both our time and our money to nonprofits based on their claims and their promises without "reading the fine print" of the nonprofit. Nonprofits reserve the right to run background checks on us when we want to be admitted to their teams as volunteers and to demand sensitive information, so we have the right to expect accountability and transparency from them.
To illustrate my point, let me share something of my own experiences with nonprofits. First, there are my positive experiences. Many years ago, I applied to a local agency and am still "volunteering" with a couple of its clients, though the original program has dissolved through lack of funds. The other nonprofit I deal with is a large, well-established one where I sponsor a child in the country of Mexico. These experiences have been challenging and rewarding.
Unfortunately, my experiences with nonprofits have often been negative and have been the sources of personal pain and depression. Years ago, I applied to volunteer my time with a local crisis pregnancy center that served those facing unplanned or unwanted pregnancies. My application process seemed to be satisfactory and so, to "keep it real," I disclosed my Marfan's Syndrome (which affects heart, eyes and joints) and at a separate time, my epilepsy. A month after I began my volunteer work there, I was terminated and my termination was witnessed by another volunteer who tape-recorded me without my permission. And I was told that I was not a "good fit" for the nonprofit.
More recently, over two years on social networks and two separate times, I applied to nonprofits, both not well-established, relatively new and both which I learned about online only and which seemed to have only an online presence. Both nonprofits have "courted" me, seeking to win my trust through their friendliness and expressed appreciation of my support and hard work on their behalf. I wanted to "step up" my involvement as "just a supporter," and wanted to be admitted to volunteer status. So two separate times, I applied and because there were disability-related questions both times, to "keep it real," I disclosed my self-diagnosed autism spectrum condition, Marfan's Syndrome and epilepsy. Both times, I was asked to surrender my Social Security Number (SS#); while the CEO's and staunch supporters of these nonprofits had initially been friendly to me, after I was refused as an applicant, each time, I was "dropped like a hot potato," just as a boy who wants intercourse with a girl treats her when he is through with her. Both of these experiences have caused me much personal grief, depression and which forced me to re-live my past, questioning whether ANYONE could be trusted.
Of course, I know that my bad experiences are largely because I applied to nonprofits that were not sympathetic to my life experiences and which were not well-established, well-funded or proved. I had believed their glowing claims about themselves and the claims of their supporters without seeing the results of their work. In the case of the two nonprofits I more recently applied to, there has been very little accountability or transparency on the part of either one. If anyone reading this wants to volunteer time with a nonprofit, know that in this era of background checks (thanks to the unethical, even criminal acts of volunteers or employees), you can expect to be required to surrender your SS# to "prove who you are" and you may be asked for other sensitive personal information; online searches may even be done to dig up "digital dirt" on you. And if, as I do, you have invisible disabilites that are widely misunderstood or stigmatized, you cannot count on the nonprofit to respond to your self-disclosure of your situation with empathy or support. This is not to discourage anyone from applying to volunteer your time, as long as you know that you "have the stuff" they are looking for and have done your homework about the nonprofit.
Yes, I know that every nonprofit has the right and the duty to carefully screen those who want to gain access to them through wanting to be received as official volunteers. This holds especially true in these days of our culture of lies and deception and high-profile exposure of too many unethical, even criminal acts of volunteers. In these days of increasing lack of trust and background checks, it is easy to be soured out on the very idea of volunteering and giving to nonprofits. Though nonprofits promise us a sense of belonging and community through volunteering or giving, we need to remember that nonprofits are NOT our friends and that we are only a means to the end of their protecting and serving their clients and furthering their interests as nonprofits and that they will value us only if they see that we can benefit them. And I have found this out the hard, painful way!
I realize that some organizations, like those that serve families with missing loved ones or which seek to identify deceased people, have to "keep close to the vest" and be close-mouthed about many matters to protect investigations. But ANY nonprofit that asks for donations from the public or that asks applicants sensitive personal information like SS#'s and the like, owe the public transparency and accountability! Based on my own, painful personal experience with certain nonprofits and based on others' experiences that I have read about, I discourage anyone from applying to ANY nonprofit that require you to sign vaguely-worded, sweeping waivers and confidentiality agreements that are set up solely to protect nonprofits and reduce THEIR liability while increasing YOURS. Such agreements are meant to "gag" you from exposing any unethical or unlawful practices or which "cover their rear-ends" if your experience with them should turn out to be a bad one. And I encourage anyone to be leery of ANY nonprofit that insists on your SS# and other personal information without providing transparency or accountability concerning themselves. After all, the Bible tells us to be "harmless as "doves" but also to be as "wise as serpents."
Yes, we are to give of our time, our talents, our skills and our resources. But there are many options to give and to share and many opportunities. Kindness, giving and sharing do not have to equal stupidity or being taken advantage of. Volunteering and giving can be wonderful, rewarding experiences for us as well as blessings to those we serve when we are discerning as well as generous. Below are links to sites that empower us to be discerning as we seek to give and to share. Please take the time to check them out.
http://www.charitynavigator.org/
This website provides comprehensive information about nonprofits in general and databases about many specific nonprofits. Not every nonprofit is evaluated there and we are not to read anything into that except that we are better-off to try to stick to nonprofits that are easy to evaluate and that are listed. My opinion.
http://www.bbb.org/Find-Business-Reviews
This is the Better Business Bureau website where we can find information about nonprofits that are listed with it and where we can file complaints about nonprofits (and for-profits) that we see engaging in unethical practices.
http://www.irs.gov/
This is the website for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). There is a "Charities and Nonprofits" tab there with much information about nonprofits and tax-exempt status in general. There is also a search tool, "Exempt Organizations Select Check" where you enter the basic data for a nonprofit and you can see if it is officially registered with the IRS.
http://privacyrights.org/
This website has much information about issues of privacy and as these pertain to other related issues.
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Motives for Killing and Bullying
A few days ago in the US and in Cleveland, Ohio, a student brought a gun and shot a number of other students. His act injured a couple of students enought to cause them to be hospitalized. And three other students lost their lives, one succumbing to his injuries and being declared "brain dead" when he reached the hospital. The suspect, a thin, sad-looking young man, did not seem to anyone who knew him, to be "the type of person who would do a thing like that." People who knew this young man described him as a "quiet guy," a "loner who kept to himself" and that he "always had a sad look in his eyes." He had been attending an "alternative school" for "at-risk" youth. He had been living with his grandparents. What is the suggested motive for this suspect's murder? It was suggested that he was a bullied outcast who had "snapped" and let his pent-up anger and hurt at his past boil over, spilling over onto innocent students who had nothing to do with his original pain.
This sound like another, even more far-reaching mass murder that took place in April 1999, at Littleton, Colorado at Columbine High School. Two deeply troubled youth brought guns and pipe bombs into their school, to carry out a crime that they had planned a year in advance. They had intended to kill many students; however, one teacher and 12 students actually lost their lives. Then the two gunmen ended their own lives. What was the motive for this horrific murder-suicide? The two deeply troubled young men had been outcasts who had been bullied by classmates and theit pent-up hurts and anger spilled over and causes them to "snap" and "more than level the playing field" by becoming the bullies who also "checked out." Sadly, this is not the only such story. Months ago, I pulled up a link on Facebook and read a sad article about a boy who was on trial for the crime of raping his younger sister. What was the motive for this crime? Again, the defense was that this boy had been bullied at school and he finally "snapped" by taking out his anger and hurts on his younger sister, raping her. And weeks ago, I viewed a few episodes in a series that was designed to raise awareness about stalking. In the episode in question, the stalker was a young man and his victim was a girl who befriended him because she felt sorry for the way that other students bullied him. Their friendship started as a true friendship but something happenened one day that ended this all abruptly. He had tried to get this girl's attention that day or something; when he could not get that attention, he demanded, "So you think you are too good to speak to me now?" Then he began to stalk her and threaten her; fearing for her life, the girl avoided him. He grew worse until she reported him to authorities where he was arrested, tried and imprisoned. The motive for this young man's crime was clearly rage over an unresolved past of anger and hurt over years of being excluded and bullied by his peers. He was "getting even" by becoming the bully, the stalker. There have been quite a few other crimes that have been committed, especially in schools and in workplaces, that have had as their stated motive unresolved hurt and anger over pasts of being excluded and bullied.
I'm not condoning these young people's crimes or excusing them for what they did. Being bullied and excluded, even repeatedly and without adult involvement, no more justifies crime any more than any other adversity would. The point? Over and over, we should by now see, by the bullycides and bullying-motivated homicides, that bullying affects young people and affects their emotional development more than we have realized. And yet bullying shows no signs of going away, whether in schools or in the community, among children or among adults. We can be thankful for all the resources and awareness that are being poured into the prevention and ending of bullying. Because of all this advocacy, bullying is no longer seen as a "rite of passage" and victims are seen and treated with empathy rather than blame. And yet bullying is getting worse as well as how young people react to it so often, by bullycide or by bullying-motivated crimes. What explains this? It's the fact that respect for life, from conception to death, has declined dramatically, as the young are often not learning good morals, empathy or self-control. It's harder to pass traditional values of morality, empathy, self-control, compassion, conviction and respect for life to the next generation.
When I was growing up, I indeed endure much bullying and terrible teasing and the focus was on what I was doing to "bring on the bullying" and I did not see that my bullies experienced consequences or that I was taken seriously. Much of this bullying was done to me because of my differences that I'm certain would have gotten me an autism spectrum diagnosis via today's current DSM-5, had I grown up during these times. It was awful and scarring and the effects of growing up with unexplained differences and then being bullied by peers and widely misunderstood by adults, remains with me to this day. Yet because respect for life, moral values, empathy and self-control had been instilled in me and just a couple of years in a church-based school where God was central in the curriculum, had a big effect on me, ultimately. Faith-based values give hope in bad times; today, our culture does not help us instill such values in the young that would give them what they need to survive and so we keep hearing about more and more crimes being committed by young people, and more youth suicide. We can blame much of that on the fact that God has been driven out of so many of or schools and out of the public square. I have observed in so many of these bullying-motivated crimes and bullycides that the young people in question seemed to have little spiritual foundation. Or if they did, it was not passed on to them, as the values of love, compassion, empathy, self-control, hope and faith in God start first in the home.
These bullying-motivated crimes seem to be the saddest of all as they could have been prevented in the first place. Was the prior bullying that motivated these young people's crimes taken seriously? I doubt it. I know that educators, especially teachers, have hard jobs and that it is probably easier to ignore bullying or not take it seriously. We parents find it easier to ignore bullying, not only denying that our young are being bullied but that they can be the bullies. As for bad parents who neglect or abuse they young, they are not only hurting their children but they are also hurting society by inflicting on the rest of us young people who will likely bully our children and, if not helped, will "graduate to adult lives of crime. This is just one more reason to prevent and end child abuse.
Now there is one young person who, because he "snapped" because of a painful past, which also included a bad home life, will probably spend the rest of his life in prison and will be hated and feared by society. The lives of those three families who have to bury beloved children, the students who are injured and their loved ones, will never be the same. And the lives of the suspect's family will never be the same. They are no doubt devastated and shocked and had no idea that their loved one would do such a thing. The boy who raped his younger sister will also probably spend the rest of his life in prison and likewise be hated by society; his family are no doubt in incredible emotional pain. I don't need to go into all the lives that were destroyed as a result of the mass murder-suicide at Columbine High School or other school or workplace shootings. Shouldn't all these cimes, so often motivated by pasts of bullying and exclusion, not to mention all the bullycides of young people, convince us that bullying can kill or scar one for life?
And where do these young people gain access to guns or other weapons of destruction? This is almost never talked about but it should be, as these weapons are used in the act of murder. Don't adults in the home have a responsibility to deny youth all access to guns or other weapons that can kill? Does anyone but me see the obvious, that these school shootings and other crimes by teens and children, would have been prevented if they had had no access to the weapons that they managed to access? This inceasing availability of guns and other killing weapons may be just an aggravating factor in these crime, but it is an important one.
We can conduct all the bullying awareness projects and campaigns we want, but unless hearts are changed and values are instilled in the young that will result in empathy, respect for all life, compassion, faith in God, self-control, and conviction, these efforts will have limited impact. I would like to see less focus in schools on the "higher math" and other subjects that students will probably never use; I would like to see these repaced by classes in anger management and classes teaching kindness, social skills and assertiveness. We parents need to both model and teach the next generation the values of respect for all life, integrity, empathy, compassion and faith in God.
http://www.stopbullying.gov/
This is a government-sponsored website to educate the public about how to prevent and end bullying.
http://www.stompoutbullying.org/
This website is for a nonprofit organization that provides comprehensive services to prevent and end bullying, including a hotline for bully victims. Whenever I visit this site, I think: How I could have used such services growing up!
http://peerabuse.net/
This is one website that is devoted to those among us whose bullying was bad enough to leave lifelong scars.
http://bullyinglte.wordpress.com/
This website is a forum for those who want to share their bullying stories to prevent and end bullying and to heal themselves and "let go."
This sound like another, even more far-reaching mass murder that took place in April 1999, at Littleton, Colorado at Columbine High School. Two deeply troubled youth brought guns and pipe bombs into their school, to carry out a crime that they had planned a year in advance. They had intended to kill many students; however, one teacher and 12 students actually lost their lives. Then the two gunmen ended their own lives. What was the motive for this horrific murder-suicide? The two deeply troubled young men had been outcasts who had been bullied by classmates and theit pent-up hurts and anger spilled over and causes them to "snap" and "more than level the playing field" by becoming the bullies who also "checked out." Sadly, this is not the only such story. Months ago, I pulled up a link on Facebook and read a sad article about a boy who was on trial for the crime of raping his younger sister. What was the motive for this crime? Again, the defense was that this boy had been bullied at school and he finally "snapped" by taking out his anger and hurts on his younger sister, raping her. And weeks ago, I viewed a few episodes in a series that was designed to raise awareness about stalking. In the episode in question, the stalker was a young man and his victim was a girl who befriended him because she felt sorry for the way that other students bullied him. Their friendship started as a true friendship but something happenened one day that ended this all abruptly. He had tried to get this girl's attention that day or something; when he could not get that attention, he demanded, "So you think you are too good to speak to me now?" Then he began to stalk her and threaten her; fearing for her life, the girl avoided him. He grew worse until she reported him to authorities where he was arrested, tried and imprisoned. The motive for this young man's crime was clearly rage over an unresolved past of anger and hurt over years of being excluded and bullied by his peers. He was "getting even" by becoming the bully, the stalker. There have been quite a few other crimes that have been committed, especially in schools and in workplaces, that have had as their stated motive unresolved hurt and anger over pasts of being excluded and bullied.
I'm not condoning these young people's crimes or excusing them for what they did. Being bullied and excluded, even repeatedly and without adult involvement, no more justifies crime any more than any other adversity would. The point? Over and over, we should by now see, by the bullycides and bullying-motivated homicides, that bullying affects young people and affects their emotional development more than we have realized. And yet bullying shows no signs of going away, whether in schools or in the community, among children or among adults. We can be thankful for all the resources and awareness that are being poured into the prevention and ending of bullying. Because of all this advocacy, bullying is no longer seen as a "rite of passage" and victims are seen and treated with empathy rather than blame. And yet bullying is getting worse as well as how young people react to it so often, by bullycide or by bullying-motivated crimes. What explains this? It's the fact that respect for life, from conception to death, has declined dramatically, as the young are often not learning good morals, empathy or self-control. It's harder to pass traditional values of morality, empathy, self-control, compassion, conviction and respect for life to the next generation.
When I was growing up, I indeed endure much bullying and terrible teasing and the focus was on what I was doing to "bring on the bullying" and I did not see that my bullies experienced consequences or that I was taken seriously. Much of this bullying was done to me because of my differences that I'm certain would have gotten me an autism spectrum diagnosis via today's current DSM-5, had I grown up during these times. It was awful and scarring and the effects of growing up with unexplained differences and then being bullied by peers and widely misunderstood by adults, remains with me to this day. Yet because respect for life, moral values, empathy and self-control had been instilled in me and just a couple of years in a church-based school where God was central in the curriculum, had a big effect on me, ultimately. Faith-based values give hope in bad times; today, our culture does not help us instill such values in the young that would give them what they need to survive and so we keep hearing about more and more crimes being committed by young people, and more youth suicide. We can blame much of that on the fact that God has been driven out of so many of or schools and out of the public square. I have observed in so many of these bullying-motivated crimes and bullycides that the young people in question seemed to have little spiritual foundation. Or if they did, it was not passed on to them, as the values of love, compassion, empathy, self-control, hope and faith in God start first in the home.
These bullying-motivated crimes seem to be the saddest of all as they could have been prevented in the first place. Was the prior bullying that motivated these young people's crimes taken seriously? I doubt it. I know that educators, especially teachers, have hard jobs and that it is probably easier to ignore bullying or not take it seriously. We parents find it easier to ignore bullying, not only denying that our young are being bullied but that they can be the bullies. As for bad parents who neglect or abuse they young, they are not only hurting their children but they are also hurting society by inflicting on the rest of us young people who will likely bully our children and, if not helped, will "graduate to adult lives of crime. This is just one more reason to prevent and end child abuse.
Now there is one young person who, because he "snapped" because of a painful past, which also included a bad home life, will probably spend the rest of his life in prison and will be hated and feared by society. The lives of those three families who have to bury beloved children, the students who are injured and their loved ones, will never be the same. And the lives of the suspect's family will never be the same. They are no doubt devastated and shocked and had no idea that their loved one would do such a thing. The boy who raped his younger sister will also probably spend the rest of his life in prison and likewise be hated by society; his family are no doubt in incredible emotional pain. I don't need to go into all the lives that were destroyed as a result of the mass murder-suicide at Columbine High School or other school or workplace shootings. Shouldn't all these cimes, so often motivated by pasts of bullying and exclusion, not to mention all the bullycides of young people, convince us that bullying can kill or scar one for life?
And where do these young people gain access to guns or other weapons of destruction? This is almost never talked about but it should be, as these weapons are used in the act of murder. Don't adults in the home have a responsibility to deny youth all access to guns or other weapons that can kill? Does anyone but me see the obvious, that these school shootings and other crimes by teens and children, would have been prevented if they had had no access to the weapons that they managed to access? This inceasing availability of guns and other killing weapons may be just an aggravating factor in these crime, but it is an important one.
We can conduct all the bullying awareness projects and campaigns we want, but unless hearts are changed and values are instilled in the young that will result in empathy, respect for all life, compassion, faith in God, self-control, and conviction, these efforts will have limited impact. I would like to see less focus in schools on the "higher math" and other subjects that students will probably never use; I would like to see these repaced by classes in anger management and classes teaching kindness, social skills and assertiveness. We parents need to both model and teach the next generation the values of respect for all life, integrity, empathy, compassion and faith in God.
http://www.stopbullying.gov/
This is a government-sponsored website to educate the public about how to prevent and end bullying.
http://www.stompoutbullying.org/
This website is for a nonprofit organization that provides comprehensive services to prevent and end bullying, including a hotline for bully victims. Whenever I visit this site, I think: How I could have used such services growing up!
http://peerabuse.net/
This is one website that is devoted to those among us whose bullying was bad enough to leave lifelong scars.
http://bullyinglte.wordpress.com/
This website is a forum for those who want to share their bullying stories to prevent and end bullying and to heal themselves and "let go."
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