Re:The San Francisco Bay Area shelter-in-place order is bein...
by michaelt on Tuesday April 28, 2020 @07:06AM
(#23005785)
You might enjoy reading the utilitarian philosophy work of Peter Singer [1]
A lot of charity donation is based on feelings rather than calculations about saved lives. Otherwise there would only be one charity, and it'd be distributing malaria nets and deworming tablets in Africa.
In my experience, if someone donates $20 to animals in response to lowpro's post, that's not money subtracted from their fixed charity budget that would otherwise have gone to humans. That's money subtracted from their household budget, that otherwise would have been spent on hobbies and bills. People who have fixed charity budgets simply don't donate from them in response to social media posts.
A lot of charity donation is based on feelings rather than calculations about saved lives. Otherwise there would only be one charity, and it'd be distributing malaria nets and deworming tablets in Africa.
In my experience, if someone donates $20 to animals in response to lowpro's post, that's not money subtracted from their fixed charity budget that would otherwise have gone to humans. That's money subtracted from their household budget, that otherwise would have been spent on hobbies and bills. People who have fixed charity budgets simply don't donate from them in response to social media posts.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Life_You_Can_Save