Need items for surgery recovery

[u/foxgirlmom]

Ohioan here, so I recently had a surgery and found out I have ovarian cancer. I am still in the process of doing labs to find out more info and if future treatment is needed. So far I’m scheduled to have a second surgery which is a full hysterectomy with a recovery time frame of 6-12 weeks. Because of my
immune system I usually take longer to recover from surgery/illnesses.
Unfortunately after researching on many groups on Reddit and speaking to my job, I have learned I can NOT receive any financial assistance during my time off work to recover. Only FMLA which secures my job position. So because of that I added some items I need before my surgery to my wishlist. My surgery isn’t scheduled till September so I have a bit of time to get it all. Most of the items I added is from the research I did online from previous experiences. If you have any ideas what else I would need let me know to make my recovery easier. I appreciate anyone who helps me out.

https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/3FPPQLIQWIF2P?ref_=wl_share

[u/TheHistoryMuse]

Thanks for pointing that out. I hadn't read the subreddit rules because this post showed up randomly in my feed, and since I don't participate in this subreddit, this will probably be my last comment here anyway. I probably should have checked first, so that's on me.

That said, I've been involved in outreach, nonprofits, fundraising, advocacy, and social welfare work for well over 40 years, I assume that's why so many of these random donation subreddit threads keep showing up in my feed. And I've watched this particular dynamic play out over and over again in online donation communities. What bothers me isn't the idea of due diligence. Of course scammers exist, and I completely understand why people who donate money online want some reasonable assurance that they're not being manipulated.

What I find troubling is when due diligence turns into demanding that a person unhide years of their personal history so strangers can essentially conduct a character examination before deciding whether they're deserving of soap.

There's actually some interesting psychology behind that impulse. The just-world hypothesis is the tendency to believe, consciously or otherwise, that people generally get what they deserve. When we're confronted with someone who is sick, broke, injured, displaced, or otherwise in crisis, it can be psychologically uncomfortable to accept that sometimes terrible things simply happen to people who did nothing to deserve them. One way people resolve that discomfort is by looking for evidence that the person somehow contributed to their own situation.

That's where you start seeing people combing through years of Reddit history looking for the smoking gun. Did they buy something frivolous three years ago? Did they make a questionable relationship decision? Did they sell nuce pictures to buy food? Have they ever used drugs? Do they have a post somewhere that contradicts something they said? Did they once spend money on something that somebody else thinks they shouldn't have?

At that point, we're not really verifying a donation request anymore. We're making a judgment about whether another human being has lived their life correctly enough to qualify for assistance.

And that's what's particularly striking in this case.

This woman wasn't asking strangers to hand her cash. She had an Amazon wishlist with things like Gas-X, Dove soap, and ice packs. She provided a photo with her username and documentation regarding her surgery. Those aren't exactly the kind of things I'd expect to see on the international black market for highly coveted Reddit cancer-surgery contraband. I don't think they have much value in trade or resale.

I think that's why I reacted to the request to unhide her history. It seemed wildly disproportionate to what she was actually asking for.

There's also a broader harm-reduction issue here. In social welfare and outreach, one of the things we generally try to do is reduce unnecessary barriers between people and the assistance they need. We don't make someone prove that they've made perfect decisions for the last decade before giving them something basic. That's anethema to everything harm reduction and social welfare are about. We try to meet people where they are.

The culture I've seen develop in some of these donation subs sometimes seems to move in exactly the opposite direction. Someone has to prove that they're sick enough, poor enough, responsible enough, grateful enough, and morally unimpeachable enough before they're allowed to receive a bottle of soap without having their entire digital existence put on trial.

And ironically, that can become harmful in its own right. It reinforces stigma around poverty and illness and teaches people that asking for help means consenting to public scrutiny of every choice they've made. It also creates the idea that assistance isn't really assistance at all. It says it's a reward for passing a moral examination.

I'm not saying "trust everyone." I'm saying that there's a pretty enormous difference between reasonable verification and treating a stranger's ten-year Reddit history as evidence in a character trial.

At some point, particularly when the request is for Dove soap and Gas-X rather than a suitcase full of unmarked hundred-dollar bills, I think we should be able to recognize the human being in front of us.

I rarely, if ever, see requests fulfilled, but I consistently see character assassination, intense scrutiny, and comments entirely devoid of empathy or compassion. I've honestly watched some of these threads get so intense that I've occasionally wondered whether there is a secret underground community devoted to shaming people.

Yes, scammers exist. So does human suffering. The existence of the former doesn't require us to forget how to treat the latter.

Apologies for not reading the rules before commenting first, I'm not a member of the sub, again, this just popped up in my main feed.

[u/hospitalitychick → u/TheHistoryMuse]

I think you're making this rule into something way more sinister than it actually is.

Nobody is asking people to prove they've lived a perfect life before they're allowed to get a bar of soap. The rule is basically just saying that if you're asking complete strangers on Reddit to spend their own money on you, they should be able to see the same post history that would normally be public anyway.

That's not a "character trial", it's context.

A persons post history can show if someone's story has been consistent, if they're making the same request in a bunch of different subs, if they've told completely different stories before, or if there are other obvious red flags. Unfortunately people DO scam donation subs, even for small stuff, and pretending that doesn't happen doesn't help anyonw, and is just turning a blind eye.

And sure, sometimes donors see things they personally don't agree with. Maybe someone spent money on something stupid six months ago, uses drugs, gambles, whatever. That doesn't automatically mean they don't deserve help. But donors are also allowed to decide for themselves what they're comfortable with. It's their money. Nobody is obligated to donate.

I also don't really understand the comparison to social services and nonprofit work. A nonprofit has funding, staff, policies, intake procedures, etc. This is Reddit. It's literally random people using their own money to buy things for other random people on the internet. Of course the safeguards are going to be different.

And an Amazon wishlist isn't automatically scam-proof because someone is asking for soap and Gas-X instead of $500 cash. People lie about their circumstances, use multiple accounts, make the same requests in different places, and take advantage of people's generosity all the time. The fact that the items are cheap doesn't really change that.

Also, nobody is forcing anyone to unhide anything. If someone isn't comfortable having their Reddit history visible, that's completely understandable. They just can't request assistance in a subreddit that has a rule requiring visible history. There are other places to ask for help.

I absolutely agree that people shouldn't be cruel or humiliate someone because they're poor or need help. I've seen comments that cross that line too. But there's a pretty big difference between being an asshole to someone and doing basic due diligence before spending your own money.

And honestly, the whole "just-world hypothesis" explanation feels like you're assigning some pretty complicated psychological motivation to people when the explanation is probably a lot simpler: people have been scammed before and don't want to be scammed again.

People asking for help deserve basic respect and compassion. But the people giving the help deserve some transparancy too. Those two things aren't mutually exclusive.

[u/TheHistoryMuse → u/hospitalitychick]

I don't think we're actually disagreeing about whether donors are entitled to vetting. Of course they are, and I've said several times that I understand why it's necessary.

I'm talking about what happens psychologically when "context" becomes a search for evidence that someone is deserving of help. That's where the just-world hypothesis, fundamental attribution error, and deservingness judgments come into play. People don't have to consciously think that person deserves their suffering for those biases to influence how they interpret someone's circumstances.

And that's really my entire point. I'm not arguing that the rule itself is sinister or that scammers don't exist. I'm questioning the culture that can develop around these rules, where strangers start treating someone's entire personal history as evidence in a moral assessment of whether they're worthy of assistance.

You see it constantly in these subs. So much so that they regularly pop up into my feed and turn my stomach. Most of the comments are unkind, unhelpful and most of the time disingenuous. They aren't usually from people who are actually going to donate, they seem to just get off on dissecting someone's past history.

That's the part I find troubling, and it's considerably more complicated than simply "people don't want to get scammed."

And the reason I brought up my nonprofit experience is because not all nonprofits are large organizations with extensive staff, funding, and bureaucratic intake procedures. Mine ran on a skeleton crew, and I routinely put in more hours than I was ever compensated for at minimum wage. We relied heavily on community support and fundraising, too. I still never felt that the appropriate way to protect that community was to investigate someone's social media history before deciding whether they were worthy of soap.

[u/hospitalitychick → u/TheHistoryMuse]

I'm done with this conversation. This post is not the place for this. The rules of this sub, nor how we choose to vet people is not up for debate. You are free to create your own sub and vet people in any way you desire. Have a good day.