It happened again last night. I spoke to a gentleman who is—or was—a high-dollar donor to the prestigious medical school from which he graduated. He felt gratitude toward it and gave generously for many years and ever more as he had the means. But during the past three years, this medical school did nothing to stand up to the onslaught.
The faculty stayed quiet while grossly unscientific policies were foisted on the country. The administration gladly enforced every ridiculous mandate. They went COVID bonkers while neglecting every other area. They fired the doctors and nurses who refused the shots. My friend knows many physicians and faculty there, and few agreed with what was happening but they wouldn’t stand up. They went along like everyone else.
As a result, they became part of the problem. The donor feels robbed. Betrayed. And now he’s furious. He certainly will not write a check this year. Or any other future year. He’s now looking for other outlets for his donor dollars. But this time, he’s smart. He’s making sure that the nonprofits he supports in the future performed with integrity during COVID times, speaking out against policies or otherwise doing their best to maintain normal operations insofar as that was possible.
This conversation is one of dozens I’ve had with people who have completely rethought their donor dollars and commitments. The stakes here are huge. Some $500 billion is donated to mostly nonprofit institutions each year. It won’t take much of a shift here to create a crisis among many of the institutions. They need it and deserve to face the grim reality of how they behaved. They revealed underlying corruption. They need to shrink and be replaced by better institutions.
Certainly, universities that abused their students with mask and vaccine mandates, or forced them into a Zoom existence despite high tuition, or locked them in dormitories in the guise of quarantine, or fired unvaccinated faculty and staff, don’t qualify. There are plenty of colleges and universities that didn’t go along. They deserve support!
It’s true for churches, too. Some did nothing but go along. It was sad and tragic, canceling services because the government said so. Some did this for a year, while others pretended like holding Zoom prayers was a decent substitute for in-person worship. If the churches and other houses of worship couldn’t fight against this despotism, how seriously do they really take their faith? Why give them support?
And arts institutions deserve their own scrutiny. Did they close to the unvaccinated? Or close for a year or two even? What about theaters and museums? Many absolutely betrayed their customers and their donors, not to mention the ideals of art and film, just as universities betrayed their alumni and students, and churches threw their own parishioners under the bus.
They all say it was out of an abundance of caution, but it was actually an abundance of obsequious deference to the hegemonic ruling-class elites. Or just plain cowardice plus stupidity.
They went along, and now they hope no one noticed. They don’t deserve support now. At the very least, they should have to answer for their actions. This is especially true if they participated in the creation of vaccine apartheid. This country and these times have morally condemned segregation. Why did it suddenly become OK just because Dr. Anthony Fauci ordered it? Why did so many go along?
And let’s talk about the nonprofit educational and advocacy sector, especially in Washington. Many organizations have long claimed to back individual freedom and decentralization. Where were they for the better part of two years? Mostly, they were silent. Some actually put out communications bragging about how they went virtual, as if that was some kind of humanitarian act, while forcing the working class to face the virus bravely while delivering food to them as they luxuriated in their donor-funded homes and apartments.
Some waited way too long to protest the outrages, and some said nothing at all and just pretended like nothing happened. Others even weighed in on behalf of lockdowns, masking, and vaccine mandates. Thanks to the internet and Archive.org, we have all the receipts. Donors have every reason to examine the record before the end of the year to find out who said what and when and why. If institutions couldn’t stand up to an outrageous experiment in totalitarian control over the whole social order, precisely what good are they?
There’s a very famous organization called the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) that seemingly did absolutely nothing to speak out against lockdowns, mandates, or censorship. On the streets of Washington, a guy from that organization came to me looking for a donation to support “voting rights.” I asked where the ACLU was when we needed them during the biggest attacks on liberties in my lifetime. The guy figured out what I was about and turned his back to me to find someone else to harangue and trick.
It’s time for donors to be more scrupulous about the institutions and causes they support. Now is the season. Let the betrayers be drained of support while the brave and bold rise up!
Or, what about the many Washington nonprofits that serve as lily pads for ex-government officials who also serve on boards of pharmaceutical companies? These nonprofits are giving intellectual cover to graft and conspiracy. They need to be held accountable by their donor base right now.
There’s another strange feature of the nonprofit world. Many large foundations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation played a huge role in preparing the way for lockdowns and vaccine mandates, even going so far as to heavily fund institutions such as the World Health Organization, which served as little more than a propaganda vehicle for the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing and its lockdown experience that inspired politicians in the West.
The Gates Foundation is only one of many. They aren’t engaged in philanthropy. They are partaking in malanthropy—“mal” from the Latin for evil. They aren’t doing good but preparing the way for the destruction of freedom as we knew it only a few years ago.
They need to be countered at every step by vigorous efforts by other foundations and institutions willing to stand up for civilized principles before it’s too late. For this reason, charitable giving is absolutely crucial. In fact, it’s more necessary than ever. But it isn’t enough anymore just to believe the claims of an institution. Now, we have a test as to whether their walk matches their talk. If it does, great. If it doesn’t, donors are right to rethink everything.
The conversation I mentioned is one of so many I’ve had with people over the past two years. I wouldn’t be shocked to see a huge shift taking place. It’s bad enough that we’re taxed to support policies with which we disagree and that violate every principle we hold dear. Donors certainly shouldn’t give their hard-earned dollars to institutions that lack the ability to speak out and stand up when it matters most of all.
