to boycott BBC children in need

[economistextra]

And give my donations to nspcc and other children's charities.In fact, I will happily double my usual donations to other children's charities to show the BBC and any abusers that it is not acceptable. The BBC should be ashamed of itself, perhaps if they had more women in senior positions the Saville and other BBC 'stars' abuse would never have happened.

Anyway, I think it entirely inappropriate that BBC should collect any money for children until they can be sure there have been no further cover ups.

Surely this year more than ever they should be raising money for cin

YABU. To not give to CIN because of JS is just daft.

CIN raises badly needed funds for children in the UK. Funding for UK based support networks for ill and disabled children has been decimated by the government and it is often only charitable donations like those made by CIN that keep support groups going or pay for motorised wheelchairs or pay for support workers to give parent or child carers a break. I think you are being very shortsighted.

We benefitted from CIN. They gave a grant to a charity that takes children with cancer on an adventure holiday in the Lake District for a week. DS absolutely loved it and still remembers it now 17 years on. Children in wheelchairs were able to abseil and go canoeing and build rafts and cook bacon and eggs on a campfire and have an amazing week away from the worries and smells of hospital. They just had fun, excitement and adventures and that is priceless.

Fuck JS and what he and his cronies did, they were disgusting individuals, but that should not be an excuse to deny children in the UK who are in need of help. CIN does good things, boycotting it will just make it harder for them.

Not only are British children in general undeserving of charity, children with parents who have a higher income also shouldn't expect compassion.

Have I got that right Vivien?

I hope the charities who you do give to make sure they only show Poor People in the literature they send to you.

I'd hate for people to stop giving to CIN because of the Jimmy Saville thing etc

Vulnerable/needy children aren't going to know or care how it was raised or who by.

Because Zigzag, it used to be a charity that seemed to cross borders.
Children In Need. It's in the words.
All children everywhere that are suffering.
Now it does seem to push itself as a 'British' charity.
If I donate to a children's charity, I don't expect to say where I want it to go.
But it's pointed out ad nauseum on CIN that the money isn't all going to them starving furriners, we help our British poor as well.
Like that will encourage people to give money.
Or maybe it does.

Oh yes, because all British children are so much better off than all the other children in the world LBE.

What a very narrow, blinkered view, I suppose you do have to be very careful of where those few quid go. It wouldn't be right for it to go to an Undeserving because they happen to have been born in a country you think of as having no children in need.

I don't give a fuck what country they're in, the relativeness of the situation is lost on them if they need something to improve their life in some small way.

LBE I've noticed that in recent years but sadly I think it was necessary for them to start informing people that it doesn't all go to other countries.

The reason being, that it was one of the most common reasons non givers used for not wanting to donate.

I think they just had to address the problem in order to get them to give IYSWIM

Everywhere was a sexist old boys club in the '70s though. BBC wasn't any different from anywhere else sadly.

So if you boycott the BBC charities, there are loads of others that were dodgy back then.

I mean, there were a lot of third world charities tied to religions, where they only helped those who became Christian. If you were to boycott all of those now because of how they used to be in the past, it wouldn't help the people they help now, if that makes sense.

i never give to CIN as I have one at home.
her school raise funds though, which I think is great, so I suppose I contribute that way.
the idea of boycotting a charity for this reason is sick imo. the people who will lose out are the vulnerable children who are already the hardest hit.

Did you read my post Agent?

No LBE, I answered your post without reading it.

I agree MaryZed it was different in many ways way back then.

I also boycott the NSPCC. Waste of money.

Women's Aid and refuges for me.

OK Agent.
So you've taken from it that I think all British kids are undeserving.
Fine, I've clearly explained myself badly.
Anyway, we got totally off the point.
And no, I don't think CIN should be boycotted because of JS.

Er agree with soul, many many needy children in the UK today.

On sexism I watched or started to watch a morcombe and wise film on sat( 1963) I had to turn it over as the casual sexism and denigration of women as stupid sex objects/ older women as harridans and derided actually made me want to vomit!!

That's was morcombe and wise ffs

It was rife then although no excuse.

well, I guess it's a good thing that different people want to support different charities isn't it. If we all agreed and gave to the same ones, most would fold.

I think charities for British children are very worthy of support but, for me personally, they come lower on my priority list than charties supporting children in the third world because all UK children get somewhere indoors to sleep and at least a meal or two a day. Not much but more than in many countries. The only chairites I wouldn't bother supporting are animal charities. Not because I hate animals, I just don't rate them as highly as people.

CiN though - I don't know if YABU or not. I think probably you are. But I hate the programme, it's dull as ditchwater.

And agree worra, it's to make people give more as its for 'our own' and not just 'African kids'. Have heard that as a view so think that's why it's emphasised.

yrbu op kids in need are kids in need. Wherever they live and it's nice to help.

well said soulsource

Actually, given the cutbacks and everything else I think there will be more families in need in this country that we've seen in a long long while

I'm 43 and don't have a memory of ever seeing food banks in the UK until now.

Soup kitchens for the homeless - yes....but never food banks for families.

I stopped giving to the NSPCC when my Godmother was forced out of her job that she'd had for years and had done very well by the local manager parachuting his girlfriend in as office manager, who didn't have the first idea how to run a charity and made the staff's lives a misery. All the local fundraising coffee mornings, jumble sales and sponsored walks/runs/whatever stopped after she left. I have no idea how they are raising funds now or if that branch is even still going.

But a couple of years back when I had more money than I have now I considered sponsoring a child. I went onto the Plan International website and it offered me the chance to sponsor a child in the USA. A child in Virginia, USA. I was totally disgusted that a country like the USA would be asking for people to sponsor its children. Poverty is everywhere obviously but I'd much rather support a child here than in the USA.

Actually regardless of anything else I would give to CiN because it goes to British children. Charity begins at home and all that. Lots of other charities give loads to Africa etc its nice to see 'our' children benefit too

I think (but of course I'm not speaking for everyone), that there is a lot of truth in people wanting to give close to home.

I sort of feel: I don't have a huge amount of money to give. If I send it off to Africa, it will make very little difference because the need is so vast it's almost incomprehensible, my money just disappears into a vast hopeless hole.

But by giving closer to home, I can see the little bit of good it does, and so I can feel better about myself and might consider giving a little more.

It's a very selfish way of giving, to make oneself feel better, but I'm aware it is what I tend to do. And when my children were younger it was easier to make them see the importance of what we gave (interestingly all my children have fundraised and worked a lot for local charities, so my opinions obviously sank in a bit).

So most of my charity giving goes to our local children's hospital and hospice, because where I am (in Ireland) there is massive need for money and facilities for very sick children and their families that isn't met by the public purse, and I can (selfishly) see that I am doing some good, however small it is.

I suspect CiN is stressing British charities to tap into people like me.

I can't see any problem with them saying they help children here as well as in other countries

Why shouldn't they portray the children who need help here?

They should have a voice too.

Unless you start nitpicking that a child not having food in another country is different somehow to a child not having food here.

Or is it that because the child here isn't getting food because their mum has mental health problems and struggles to get herself together to feed them and doesn't adequate help from the state, but it's alright because we're a wealthy country.

A hungry child is a hungry child.

There are not many things on TV that reduce me to tears but last year's CIN did when it showed a little girl hiding from her drunk parent, on the phone to a helpline. She was petrified and they were trying to help her...but the helpline was running out of funds and was in danger of having to close.

CIN doesnt give to uk as well as foreign charities.

It only gives in the uk.

We can all choose where our donations to charity go. Having volunteered abroad, and also worked and volunteered very close to home, my time and effort goes in close to home, but my money goes abroad.

Yes, some poverty is caused by inept governments. But the so-called developed world is utterly complicit in keeping it that way. I'd like to help with that. I don't want children to starve to death. I don't want a child to die every 3 seconds because of poverty. That's my priority in giving.