Yahoo put a five-figure question to Canadians from different walks of life: If you had $10,000 to somehow make the world a better place, where would you deliver the cash?
The responses varied widely, from one not-for-attribution wag who suggested buying passports for U.S. politicians to go out and see the wider world (approximately two-thirds of Congress members don’t have a passport) to a Vancouver elementary school teacher who encouraged a general investment in “love.”
The question invites us to think about what we care about most during the holiday season. Our gifts could help get a lofty ideal airborne in the future or give immediate relief on the streets we walk down today.
My own interests lead me toward the arts, particularly work that presents a challenging view of the world: this is the essence of artistic freedom. However, I look at the life-or-death situation in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside and see the profound work that Insite does in easing the trials of the drug addicted: this is the essence of compassion.
So, I’d flip open the imaginary briefcase and hand $5,000 to the Portland Hotel Society to support Insite and count out the other $5,000 to the Vancouver Foundation, earmarked for the arts.
Michael Byers, the UBC professor, political columnist and author of Intent for a Nation (Douglas & McIntyre), noted that there are about 3,000 homeless in Metro Vancouver. He says he would give it all to the City of Vancouver’s Housing Advocate Judy Graves. “She could get five or 10 people off the streets and into housing, an essential first step in reconstructing their lives.”
Michael Green, artistic director of Calgary’s One Yellow Rabbit theatre company thinks along the similar lines: “I could make the biggest impact close to home with a gift to the Calgary Women’s Emergency Shelter, where many women and children find shelter and solace.”
Toronto writer Wayne Roberts, author of the recently published The No-Nonsense Guide to World Food, recognizes the spiritual significance of seasonal giving and so he’d wrap up a donation that has “continued life.”
“I’d identify school programs focused on local food,” says Roberts. “The money might support a trip to a market where students meet local farmers. I’d hope that this would become a lifelong interest, that they might help build the movement toward local sustainable food production.”
Toronto student, Alex Forgay, 9, a student at Forest Hill public school said he would put his do-good dollars toward new inventions that help slow global warming. Journalist David Swick would give warmth of another kind by co-founding the first Halifax hospice to give comfort to the sick and dying.
Vancouver elementary school teacher Karen Husak likes the idea of spreading the wealth to share the love: “Most of us seek love and it is the one thing that is rarely taught explicitly. We learn by watching those who are loving. For me it’s my dharma teacher, for another it might be an 81-year-old woman who teaches someone how to knit socks, or an organization that makes the lives of mothers easier so that they love their children easier, more joyfully, because they are not worried about how to pay bills or get into a daycare. Love. Give Love.”
