Oh no, I'm sorry to hear that, @cadwr. Child's Play does do good work, and it's unfortunate that you no longer feel comfortable giving money to them.

Having said that, I do somewhat understand your concern. I don't agree with you, but I can understand it. I think it's bad just about any time someone's charity is used to defend them when they are found to have done something wrong. People with problems can still support good causes, and just because there is a good part to them doesn't mean they're immune from criticism. In this case, his support of Child's Play has nothing to do with his self-admitted problems with sensitivity and maturity.

I do feel that you should still be able to support the charity, as most charities do have some big names that support them, and some of those big names are not necessarily great people. Some people who I believe have done great damage to our nation still heavily support charities benefiting wounded soldiers, and while I mind that some people use their support of those charities to defend them, their support of a good charity isn't going to stop me from supporting something worthwhile. Bad people around the world support decent causes, but it doesn't mean we should stop supporting those causes. It just means that a wide variety of people see the value in good charities.

The best thing to do is just call out people for using any charities as a shield from criticism, not hold back from supporting charities just because of the character of the other people who support them.

Thanks for the reply @truthtellah!

If it was simply a case of him supporting a charity, I would have no problem with that charity. My problem is that Child's Play was spawned from Penny Arcade, and is either technically still a part of Penny Arcade, or is tied so closely to it that they are indistinguishable (I know that Krahulik, Holkins, and Khoo were involved in the selection process for the current program coordinator).

It is important to me not to hold back in giving to charities; as I said, I have no intention of reducing the amount I give to help ease the suffering of children, but I will be changing the charity I use to give that help. I can do just as much good without supporting something tied to Krahulik.

I think you said it all when you noted that he doesn't directly benefit from the money you give to Child's Play. That money goes to the kids it supports.

I understand deciding to change your main focus of charitable giving due to something like this, but I don't agree with boycotting it as a possible charity to support. If I'm just deciding for myself where my money will go, I might choose somewhere else, but if someone I know is raising money for Child's Play, I have little reason to reject their request for donations just because of this. I think you're making a reasonable decision regarding where you personally want to focus your giving, but if this extends to not giving donations to a marathon or something like that just because they decided to support Child's Play, then I think it's very unfortunate.

I think we can make that personal distinction when it comes to charitable giving. :)

While he doesn't financially benefit from the money I give to Child's Play, I do believe he benefits from it in other ways.

If someone I know is raising money for Child's Play, I'll make a donation in their name to a child-focused charity I feel comfortable with and let the person or event know. :) What matters most is that people are helped.

hm. I suppose that is a compromise. I still believe you are mistaken, but hey, as you said, it's possible you may feel differently later. Just thought I'd say my peace. I look forward to seeing you as part of many fun charity drives to come. :)

Of course :) #TeamMessy

So in other words, because a good charity is peripherally affiliated to some people who made a joke you did not like, and then did not properly apologize for that joke, you're not going to support the charity. Isn't that a bit like punishing the children your money would have helped, because you just hate Penny Arcade that much?

What an appallingly selfish person you are.

First, in the time since this post was made, Penny Arcade has done enough, both in trying to improve how they act (Mike has since said that he has realized he acted like a bully) and in distancing themselves from Child's Play, for me to reconsider my position on the charity. I am now comfortable supporting Child's Play again. I'll probably get rid of this post at some point in the future, or at least add an addendum, as it no longer reflects my current feelings about Child's Play.

As to the content of your post:

Actually, no, that isn't what I said at all. Let's go through it though.

At the time Penny Arcade was still early in the process of distancing themselves from Child's Play in a meaningful way. They were not just "peripherally affiliated." Child's Play was still a thing that people used to try and excuse Mike's behavior. They -have- distanced themselves in a more meaningful way since then- which is one of the things that prompted me to reconsider.

While I did talk about the dickwolves joke, I believe I made it clear that it was not just that, but a pattern of exclusionary behavior and discourse that I had a problem with. I didn't care for the dickwolves joke, but I continued giving to Child's Play after it happened. Their responses to the criticism, and Mike's cycle of exclusionary discourse and hollow apologies, are what made me feel more and more uncomfortable with Penny Arcade as a whole.

I believe I also made it clear that I would not reduce the amount of money that I would give to charities focused on children's health needs. If anything, thinking about the situation and charities in general has led me to want to give more, and become more active in events like Extra Life, but let's focus on your assumption.

If I have $500 that I want to give to charity, and I am deciding between a Leukemia organization and an Alzheimer's organization, am I punishing the people with Leukemia who would have been helped if I decide to donate that money to the Alzheimer's organization? Likewise, if I have $500 that I want to donate to a children's health charity, and when weighing my decision between Child's Play and my local Children's Miracle Network hospital, I end up choosing the hospital, am I punishing the children who would have been helped by Child's Play? If I choose Child's Play am I punishing the children at my local children's hospital? If not, does it become punishment if one of the criteria I used to make my decision was how I felt about the behavior of the people who created, and were (at the time) explicitly tied to, the charity? If so, why is that criterion significantly different from charity efficiency/overhead, personal connection to the disease/cause, or any other criterion I would use to decide where my money will go?

People have a finite amount of money they can give to charities, and they use a variety of criteria when deciding where to donate that money. If I don't feel comfortable with the people who are the face of a charity, why would I choose that charity over another one, all other things being equal, that doesn't have that problem and that will do the same amount of good and for the same cause?

I never said I hate Penny Arcade. I don't hate Penny Arcade. I don't hate Mike Krahulik now, and I didn't hate him then. I'm not really into hating people. I hate plenty of actions- and if those actions are extreme, or become inseparably entrenched in, and dominate, a person's identity, I may then hate the person. That isn't the case here though. I have big problems with Mike's public discourse in the past. I think it was pretty shitty and toxic. I have a big problem when people's actions contribute to the marginalization of an entire group of people. But I don't hate Mike. Mike is now learning, both about other people and himself, and growing as a person, and I think that is great! We can all do more of that; I sure as hell can, and hope I continue to do so. Nothing in my post came out of hate. It came out of feeling uncomfortable doing anything that would support Penny Arcade and the discourse of its creators.

It's fine if you think that. I'm not particularly invested in your opinion of me, or hurt that it is a negative one. It seems clear, based on the content of your post, that you read very little of, or did not pay much attention to, my post. That is, of course, also fine. But hey, thanks for creating an account to write a reply. I don't even know how you found this post. I wrote it over a year ago and had largely forgotten it even exists until I saw the notification. I can't even be entirely sure that you will read this, but I think it was worth writing anyway.

I hope you have a good day, and as you seem to be interested in charities / charity events (although maybe you aren't and only care about replying to criticism of Penny Arcade- I won't make that assumption though), I wish you success in any future fundraising or awareness-raising activities you engage in. The more good that is done for people in need, the better.

Well, damn. That was a considerably different reply than what I expected.

For starters, if I did miss that you'd said you'd simply donate to a different charity, then I apologize.

For seconds, I think I found this post by chance while looking for information on Child's Play, so it's not personal.

For thirds, I may disagree with your position towards this issues, but you've given me a line of reasoning I can respect. I apologize again for reading your post as more inflammatory than it was, as I hate when someone else does that to me, and I'm ashamed to have been guilty of that myself.

Personally, having looked through the whole controversy, I didn't see anything particularly worth getting upset about regarding Mike's behavior. As a writer, I see his defensiveness coming primarily from frustration at the tone of the criticism, not a hate for actual marginalized groups. I can understand him feeling that people were not just criticizing his work, but making *demands* of it. No writer I know likes that feeling. And I'm also someone who believes that *all* subjects *must* be joked about, because the very purpose of humor is to make tragedy bearable. I believe that, to get angry at a joke that was not intended to cause offense, is to make someone else responsible for your own emotional state. I dealt with emotional and verbal abuse my whole childhood, and I've gotten better from that largely due to accepting that I cannot change what people say, I can only change my reaction to hearing it. But deeper than that, I think that the opinions of one lone webcomicer are nothing in comparison to the wider problem. I have defended the reality of transgenderism to idiots who utterly refuse to believe in it, and I think *that* is the attitude that should be getting the most condemnation. Having looked at what Mike said, it looks insensitive, but not malicious. To me, I think the malice should be prioritized. In any situation where awareness is slowly being raised about a truth most people would prefer to ignore, there will always be a huge number of people just repeating common belief. There are too many of them to educate, so if given the choice, I will prioritize someone who's actively hostile. Someone who's *not* joking, in other words. I can disagree with what Mike said, while also fully empathize with why he felt attacked and reacted with defensiveness. He felt the shame being directed towards him was disproportionate to what he'd done, and I agree with him. In a culture where a lot of guys loathe the very idea of transsexualism because they think they're going to be tricked into sleeping with a "girl with a penis" (it's mind-boggling how often I've seen this fear expressed), the anger I saw at Mike seemed like using heavy weaponry against a minor target that ought to be reserved for the real enemy.

If you disagree with that, that's okay. I was just hoping to give you a clearer position of my opinion, as you did for me. And thank you for that; you could have much more easily said, "Go to hell, you rude asshole," which I would have deserved. Again, I apologize for basing my opinion of you on an anger-filled first impression, rather than what you'd actually written.