I understand the cynicism when it comes to giving to charities. There are a lot of bullshit ones out there, like United Way. And there are outright scammers, like the Red Cross, who took money from people for 9/11 relief and used it to pay obscene salaries to their CEO. But I wish people would bother doing the research, which doesn't take a lot of time, before writing this off.
First, as to whether this cause is worth your time, ALS is a nasty, nasty disease. It's one of the worst out there. Between the two, I'd probably rather have Ebola, 'cause at least with Ebola it's over quickly. With ALS, your muscles gradually stop working. You become paralyzed. You can't walk. Then you can't move your arms. You're confined to a wheelchair. Then you lose the ability to speak. If you want to communicate, you have to blink to tell people what you want. You can't even smile when you're happy or frown when you're upset, your face is stuck in an expressionless mask. Eventually, you lose the ability to breathe on your own, and they rip open your lungs and stick a device in there to help you breathe. Not that by that point, there's any point in living. To the person who said that this money should be going to Wounded Warriors, I agree that vets in this country have it pretty bad. I've donated to veteran's causes myself. ALS patients have it worse.
Secondly, as to whether the money is going to actually help people with the disease, or whether it's just going to line some rich guy's pocketbook, there are easy ways of finding this out. You can see from the link in the first post that the guys behind this are
ALSA, the American ALS association. I've never heard of them, but if you want to know where your money is going, the place to look is Charity Nagivator. They do independent audits on charities to see if donations are being wasted or put to good use.
Here's their breakdown from Charity Navigator. They're 4 stars, the highest rating available. They spend only 10% of their income on administrative overhead.
So it's a worthy cause, and the money will be spent where it should be. Whether people dumping ice water over themselves is silly or not is certainly up for debate, and there are certainly things to be said about self-centeredness in American culture. But this is a good use of your cash, if you've got any spare money lying around. I think I might make a donation myself.
