The French are generous... or not.

I usually ride my bike to work but one of the benefits of taking the metro instead is being able to read the free newspapers and catching up on French news as opposed to the New York Times.

This morning, there was an article about French and donations with the coming of Telethon 2007 – an annual event in France where stars man (woman?) the phones to collect money for rare, genetic diseases (Inspired perhaps by the beloved Jerry Lewis' MDA telethon?). So on the occasion of the annual telethon, there was a survey about the French and donations. To quote the article, “the French are generous…no, some French are generous.” According to the survey, only 1 in 4 French households make donations to not for profit associations with an average of 75€ a year. The article does say there’s a rise in donating, but that people mostly donate to research and after catastrophic events but that, “les gens restent insensibles aux causes profondes, comme les operations de developpement des pays pauvres.” (people remain insensitive to deep causes, like operations in developing countries). You can see the complete article here.

As you may remember from my very humbling attempt to collect donations for cancer research, I don’t find this surprising...perhaps appalling? I come from a family who regularly donates time and money to various causes. Hell, I even donated about a hundred litres of breast milk! As a kid, I tutored in ESL at the public library, helped my mother cook for the homeless and collected money for causes from medical research to environmental causes whenever the opportunity presented itself at school. And you know what? People donated!

I suppose this is just another marker of cultural difference. I don’t know how many Americans make donations on a regular basis, but donating sure seems to be more of American culture than French, as I have learned the hard way.

This year's Telethon, which seemed to begin earlier in the week with yellow clad people in the streets selling M and Ms for medical research will be on France2 aired from Chateau de Vincennes and will feature various stars asking the French public to call a "36" number (kind of like a 1 800 number but not free) to make donations. A big event for this year is the donations on-line and by mobile phone (sometimes this country is just so slow to get on the technology boat). Well I sure hope that Liane Foley has better luck than I did and, despite my negative view on donating in France, I am glad that the media can bring people's generosity out even if only once a year.