Friends not sponsoring dh

[Primmyhill]

Ok, I know times are hard and there are loads of people asking for sponsorship etc but I’m just a bit hacked off. In the past I’ve sponsored friends kids for things like walking around the playground at lunch time, sponsored silence etc, you get my drift but there’s been loads over the last few years and I always give £10-20. My husband is doing a huge challenge in April and the sponsorship has been live for months and I’ve sent the link out twice and not one of them has sponsored him. None of them are badly off - they just can’t be bothered I reckon and I’m pretty annoyed. AIBU? Would you do? I’ll know better next time when darling Henry wants money for pushing his teddy around the local f’ing playing field.

Stop sponsoring others and don’t expect sponsorship- everyone hates it.

Wow. Lots of arseholery targetting you OP! Good luck to your DH and don't sponsor any of the twats who don't reciprocate.

I think you’ve probably got the idea from the opinions of the majority 😂 but the fact that you won’t say what the event is means that you know it’s wanky/ not impressive. Nice to do something for charity, and for an affected friend. But doesn’t mean that begging from all your friends is appropriate

Yes I agree. We've had to ask family for sponsership for various fundraising activities school have asked them to do. I've always been so grateful for their support (it has got to the stage that we now just donate what we think everyone would have ourselves - but thats another story)! When our son wanted to do his own challenge our family friends and neighbours were so generous and donated over £500 and I am still blown away by their generous support. I do make it a habit of supporting their endevours probably even more than I might have if their support hadn't meant so much to us. It is a shame OP and YNBU to be disappointed but what can you do?!. Incidentally I also think you've taken the results of your poll well so ignore those that suggest otherwise. I would add that the more tedious yearly school fundraisers I've only ever gone to family for but the one biggy we posted on various social media as we were pretty impressed by him ourselves.

Up to them whether they want to donate or not. Other people's challenges mean nothing to me. Sometimes I will donate if I really care about the charity, but other than that, nah.

That is a completely different matter, don't conflate asking for sponsorship to asking people to donate directly to a charity.

Ok, that's interesting. Why is this?

Is it because asking to give to a charity is for the charity, and asking for sponsorship is for the person? If not, what's the difference?

If someone asked for sponsorship for MND and you just said "I'll send them £1000 directly, but I won't mention your name", would you expect that person to be pleased or irritated?

There's also the aspect whether somebody actually agrees with the charity/donation request - this can apply to anything, for example

Medical research/testing on animals
Military/help for heroes
Captain Tom's daughter's swimming pool fund
Animal welfare
Oxfam and their appalling record of male staff behaviour
Church or faith based appeals
Gaza/Palestinian support
RSPCA head office vs local branches
Various LGBTQIAA++ organisations
Voluntourism that takes opportunities for locals to get paid work in favour of privileged Brits paying for the trip
Ecological damage caused by trips or activities

Etc, etc, etc.

Sometimes it's easier to ignore than to tell somebody that hell would freeze over before you'd give a particular charity money or that

You can't force people to donate just because you do. He should have thought about that before he spent money on whatever the event is - he could have just donated that money and done some fundraising on the side if the cause was really the main motivation.

This does not feel like it's about a charitable endeavour - the comments around "I supported them so they should support me" and if they don't support you then you shouldn't support them - not sure I understand this - it's meant to be supporting a charity not supporting egos, it's quite a distasteful business to behave in such a way.

I found friends more giving than family when we were raising funds for a charity. Our local shops also put collection tins in and another 2 local businesses donated upwards of £300 each. We are a small community and the mindset generally is we support those who support us. I support many small businesses with custom and sharing their pages etc. In return they were happy to sponsor us and share our just giving page etc ☺️

Might be worthwhile speaking to your local shops etc?

For what it’s worth, we never done anything fantastic. We done the Kilt Walk however, we had additional challenges such as carting medical equipment etc with us and some pre teens ☺️

I am fascinated by people who think it's okay to hit up their mates for contributions to theirs or their kids' causes numerous times, received the donation, but don't feel in any way obliged, not even the slightest degree of twinge, to do the same when the shoe is on the other foot.

@Primmyhill it could be the case that there have been so many circulated in your group of friends over the years there is fatigue? And maybe you are in the unfortunate position of being people's line in the sand, so to speak, that it's got to stop somewhere.

Thank you. I’m not bothered by the poll results tbh and expected it really. What I am aghast at though is the character assassination and finger wagging, calling me all sorts of names because I have stood my ground! I have had some really good advice though from sensible people and it has given me some food for thought re the general view on this kind of thing that I week keep in mind for the future.

If you care about a charity linked to a friend's disease why can't you just ask for donations to that charity. Why the ridiculous sponsoring just so the person sponsored can get the honour of other people's donations all while doing an activity he enjoys. It's so hypocritical. But in OP's case the friends don't seem to object to sponsoring in general because they have asked OP to contribute, which she has, why I think those friends have short memory and are pretty tight.

A marathon or sky dive (or any other high cost thing) is fine as long as the person fronts the costs for doing it, themselves. All of it. Any money raised then by sponsoring goes to the charity as all the costs are paid for.

That's what I mean by it. Charities should be able to confirm whether costs have been paid or not - and no, I don't trust people to tell the truth because so many don't (that bit is to another poster).

If people don't pay for the upfront costs of whatever they are doing then what's in it for the charity? Sponsorship money is sucked up into that cost and I don't agree with that at all.

But like you said ‘amazing’ experience.

This is a sad post, OP. Good on your husband.
I must admit I don't give much to charities and I never do any events myself for charity but for sure if one of my DC did a sponsored hop-o-thing, I'd 100% do a reciprocal donation to anyone who had donated to Henry's hop-a-thon.
In your case, I'd note who did and didn't sponsor my DH and never give to a penny to those (assholes) that didn't.

Silly me for thinking that’s how things work. This is how I see it too but apparently not in the eyes of MN.

Think about it though. Have you ever looked at the financial reports of some of these charities? The percentage that goes toward the actual core cause vs. The amount spent on salaries, fundraising, expenses etc?

say a charity has 10 places for the London marathon. The donations have to cover a team manager, kit, entry fees, support team- presumably it will involve overnight stays, food etc for that team for the event. Often there are physios, food and drink for the runners as well. Then you probably have a small full time team working year round to advertise, recruit runners, book entries, deal with finances etc to organise the following year.

so after all the bills are paid how much is left for the “charity”?

the cynical side of me (tainted by have worked with gb athletes where it’s a similar mentality, the paid staff are extremely well looked after- better than the athletes they “support” in some cases) would wonder if the majority of the funding keeps the fundraisers in jobs and privileges.

Yes, so? It was incredibly hard work. The sense of achievement is something I'd never experienced before. I followed up with the charity now I can't do physical fundraisers like that and continue to support them. Had never heard of them before the challenge.

I would recommend making the fundraising interesting: a raffle for a very posh Easter egg, the kind nobody would ever buy for themselves... A quiz night ... Perhaps a film night if there's a suitable film which ties in with the charity.

Good luck to him, he'll get there. Mumsnet is thank heavens not representative of most of the world.

Do bc we actually know what he's doing?

Or is it one of those ones where people have 'a great experience climbing xxx and raised £2' when actually the sponsorship is £200 it's just £198 went on the costs incurred

When I do sponsor someone online, I prefer to do it anonymously - I prefer to give without advertising it. Perhaps that means my friends are disgruntled because I haven't given, although one friend happened to mention how pleased she was that she'd had someone donate anonymously.

Gosh MN is such an odd place. Or maybe I'm just clueless as to how people feel / think about everyday experiences. Wedding threads are always an eye opener too. I'm my day to day life evening invites are fine, as are paid bars and asking for a donation to the honeymoon instead of a pressie.

Personally, I've done three half marathons over the last 10yrs. I was sponsored for all and realised much more than I expected. I'm an occasional runner so training for a half is bloody hard work. The race is indeed a great experience because of the crowd and camaraderie. By the logic of some on here the fact that it was a "great experience" means that I didn't deserve to be sponsored. Which makes no sense to me at all. And how dare I have been proud of myself and put "I did it!" posts on social media. How selfish am I?!
I suspect the OPs DH is doing the marathon. For the vast majority of people running a marathon is incredibly hard. It may have been a personal life goal, but that doesn't mean that it's any less hard work. I'm in awe of friends of mind who've managed to complete the marathon and I am more than happy to sponsor them because I think they deserve it. Clearly lots of people think differently but there you go.

Good luck to your DH, OP.

I just don't understand the point of sponsorship....if I give £10 to a charity, it makes no difference to me whether you climbed a mountain, ran a marathon, did 100 star jumps...