This holiday season, I’m starting what I hope will become a yearly tradition to encourage more poker players to donate a portion of their winnings to non-profit organizations. And since it must have a cheesy poker related name, I’m calling it Cheque-Raising for Charity.
Over the next three weeks, I will be highlighting a number of deserving non-profits recommended by and for poker players and encouraging the poker community to show their support for these worthwhile causes.
Here’s how you can help make this initiative a success:
- First and most importantly, give generously yourself. There are people in need all around the world, and if you are lucky enough to be able to make money from playing a card game, surely you can share some of your good fortune.
- Please submit information about non-profit organizations that are important to you that you would like to see included.
In the US and many other countries, December 31 is the deadlines for contributions to count as tax write-offs for the current year, so now is a great time to give!
To submit a non-profit to be highlighted: Send me an e-mail at andrew@thinkingpoker.net with the name of your favorite non-profit, a one-paragraph description of the organization and why they are important to you, and a link to the organization’s website. If possible, please also include a link to the organization’s listing on Charity Navigator or another independent evaluator.
Stay tuned in the weeks to come to see all the great organizations suggested by your fellow poker players!
At this time of year, and in this economy, food banks, soup kitchens, and programs like Toys for Tots could use a lot of help.
Many grocery stores have some kind of food drop-off for charity. So even if you don’t have any money to spare, this is a good time to clean out the canned and packaged goods you’re never going to use.
Poker players should probably also know that the omnipresent Salvation Army is virulently anti-gambling. From their website, to which I refuse to link:
It goes on like that from there.
Not surprising I guess, but I wasn’t aware of that. Where do they stand on games of skill? 🙂