Wasting Green on Green: Green Charity Scams

World Wildlife Fund is gearing up to do it's annual CN Tower Stair Climb later this month. This event used to be in support of the United Way but that changed somewhere in the last couple of years. The WWF stair climb is to fight global warming while the United Way fights poverty and homelessness in the city. Neither are big concerns to me but I find the latter to be a far more noble cause than the former. This has got me thinking about the recent surge in the number of "green" charities. The WWF has led this bandwagon. Greenpeace is now said to rake in over a billion dollars in donations. What is this money being spent on? Well, they certainly aren't doing what you'd think a legitimate charity would do. It's not going to help people who need it. It goes to a lot of pipe dream pet projects that the group's members think will stop climate change. People in Africa need AIDS vaccines and access to clean water, not solar panels. I think it's shameful for someone to give to a green charity rather than spending it on legitimate humanitarian aid projects. If you want to donate money, I suggest giving it to people such as the Red Cross or medical charities. I'm personally a supporter of Heart & Stroke Canada and The Diabetes Association of Canada, and I gave to the Red Cross during the Katrina disaster. Rather than donating your money to the stair climb for global warming, please instead donate it to the disaster victims in the recent Italian Earthquake Disaster and Manitoba Floods. You'll be putting a smile on someone's face right when they need it the most.