Lucubratrix

On Giving

Those of my readers who celebrate Christmas (and probably those who don't) are no doubt familiar with the concept of mass-mailing Christmas cards. These cards are sent out at around this time every year, or earlier in the case of certain zealous relatives whom you have never met but who nonetheless reliably send you the Holiday Newsletter, in which they discuss the minutiae of their lives and the lives of their children. At any rate, these Christmas cards are often the sole contact with one's distant relatives, sent not because of any deep feelings of affection on either side, but because there is an obligation.

At any rate, the custom of sending Christmas cards requires the purchase of boxes of cards, often selling at exorbitant rates because, of course, you have no choice. Now, as Christmas is the season of giving and goodwill towards man, it seems only natural to buy cards that benefit some charity or other. There's only one problem: these cards are ugly.

Why is this? Is it so that people can demonstrate their utter devotion to charitable causes? I am so adamant about donating eighty cents to cancer research that I will check my dignity at the mailbox and affix my name to this abomination, rather than picking out a tasteful design and writing a check to the charity of my choice.

I would feel some guilt at mocking the appearance of these cards if, for instance, they were designed by cancer-stricken children. Maybe some of them are. If so, they are nowhere to be found, and the cards benefiting charitable causes are designed by adult... I hesitate to say "artists," as it's hardly art on the front, but probably these people would consider themselves artists, and probably consider themselves talented. The only justification for this is that these cards must have been designed at the lowest possible cost in order to contribute the maximum amount--although designing better cards would result in more people buying them.

The moral of the story is that I ended up with a tasteful box of cards, and will be writing a check directly to a charity instead.

posted by Just Me @ 14:37