Not that any is needed, but the proof that most of us approve of donating to charitable causes is that we laugh at John Cleese’s Monty Python skit where he plays a banker to whom his solicitor has asked him to donate a pound to an orphanage. First he thinks he’s being asked because it’s an investment opportunity, then maybe a tax scam. His solicitor says it’s neither:
Cleese: No? Well, I’m awfully sorry I don’t understand. Can you just explain exactly what you want.
Solicitor: Well, I want you to give me a pound, and then I go away and give it to the orphans.
Cleese: Yes?
Solicitor: Well, that’s it.
Cleese: No, no, no, I don’t follow this at all, I mean, I don’t want to seem stupid but it looks to me as though I’m a pound down on the whole deal.
Solicitor: Well, yes you are.
Cleese: I am! Well, what is my incentive to give you the pound?
Solicitor: Well, the incentive is -– to make the orphans happy.
Cleese: (genuinely puzzled) Happy? . . . You’re quite sure you’ve got this right? . . .
(Quoted from “Motivation, Cognition, and Charitable Giving,” by Robert Frank. Page 130 in: Giving: Western Ideas of Philanthropy, J. B. Schneewind, Indiana University Press, 1996.)
We invite you to look at the opposite view -- “Lewis Carroll on giving of oneself," posted on The Saunterer, July 16, 2014 -- by clicking here.
For a brief biography of John Cleese, click here. For images of or relating to John Cleese, click here.
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