Mississippi Humanists: A Call to Action for Tornado Victims!

NEMSHA Requests Help for Mississippi Residents

NEMSHA (Northeast Mississippi Secular Humanist Association) is calling on everyone to assist Mississippians who were victims of the recent tornado outbreak.

The easiest way to help is to donate money to the Red Cross, local animal shelters, or other local organizations that you trust. Even a small donation can get food, clean water, medicine, and other necessities to those affected.

Women and children have special needs during this time that are often forgotten. Items such as: liquid/powdered formula, bottles, nipples, diapers and wipes for children; soap and feminine hygiene products for women.

Our furry friends need assistance now too. The Louisville animal shelter is currently receiving funds through the Paypal account at Oktibbeha Humane Society and write in that it's for Louisville.

Cash or checks can be mailed to: 

Louisville Animal Control
110 Thompson Street
Louisville, MS 39339

The shelter needs large dog crates, dry puppy food, and cleaning supplies such as paper towels, latex gloves, liquid soap, garbage bags and bleach. Their wish list is on Amazon. They also need families to foster some animals until the influx can be dealt with as well as volunteers. They are desperately trying to avoid euthanizing any animals so please help them out! Call (662) 705-0398.

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We'll let you know if we receive more information. In the mean time, you can always team up with groups who have more organizational power than we do (churches, clubs, etc.) and lend them a hand.

If you'd like to add to the list, please comment below. Come on, Mississippi humanists, let's get to work!

2013 Beat the Heat Wrap-Up

It's the end of our 2013 fundraiser at least and I can only say one thing:

Holy Hypatia, guys! You really came through for us.

We began this year's fundraiser hoping to exceed last year's but we knew times were still tough for so many of you. Nevertheless, we pressed ahead with the idea of getting a portable A/C and heating unit for an out-of-state family who desperately needed the extra cooling power for their young son. I'm proud to say we raised those funds without a hitch.

Figuring out how to raise regular funds for Mississippians after this seemed like a monumental task. So we turned to our good friends Hemant Mehta and JT Eberhard for help. That's when the floodgates opened and a multitude of wonderful people came to our aid. We raised enough extra money to buy seventeen - yes, 17! - air conditioners for elderly and poor Mississippians.

Here's the letter from Community Action acknowledging we turned them over as well as some snaps.

 We had a little change left over so we did as we had done last year and bought school supplies for some needy children. In fact, we were able to sponsor one child's entire list. 

This was an incredible victory for NEMSHA, for the atheist community, and (most importantly) for Northeast Mississippians. None of it would have happened without your support, my friends. We are bringing substantial relief to other human beings regardless of our borders and differences. We are living out the very best of our values. We don't bring hope to these people - we bring help - and we do not apologize for it. When you have help, you do not need to hope. Imagine what we can do next year if we spread the word online and get more donors. It doesn't matter if you send $5 or $500 - you will be helping someone. 

But that's not all! The story has been picked up by the local paper and will run next week. NEMSHA is going full public with the story that nonbelievers are doing good. What will the churches make of this? Will they welcome our help or will they see us as competition? We cannot know but we have already pledged that any hostility or reproach will fuel us to work harder to do what's right.

This wonderful story will even feature a picture of Jon Rhodes, Vice-President of NEMSHA, so people can start seeing folks they know come out of the secular closet.

So we say again, THANK YOU to all our donors and supporters. Thank you to those who spread the word. Thank you for trusting us with your money and your information. We should have said it before but it's worth saying now: we value your trust and we will never knowingly share your name or address with anyone. Neither will we spam you or harass you. You have given willingly of yourself to those who need it most. We will always honor that trust.

2013 "Beat the Heat" Update

Good news and bad news, folks! We've successfully raised enough money to buy the special air conditioner/heater combo unit. It arrived on July 12th and the family is enjoying it. I'm hoping to get a picture soon to share with you all.

The bad news is that we are still about $600 short of our goal to buy 5 or 6 regular A/C window units for families here in Mississippi. July is almost over and August is looking to be incredibly hot. Many of our poor and disabled people cannot afford to replace broken air conditioners. Others are living with only box fans and open doors for circulation.

There is still time to help! Even the smallest donation helps us bring relief to a family in need. Please consider helping us by donating or spreading the word. And to those who have already donated, thank you so much!

When the event is over, I will write a final post that will provide pictures and a full accounting of the funds.

2013 Beat the Heat Campaign

It's time for our second annual "Beat the Heat" campaign in which we pool our resources to buy air conditioners for needy families in the Northeast Mississippi area.

This year we will add a very special out-of-state family to our wish list. This family needs a portable unit to meet the needs of their young son. Portable units are more expensive than the small window units we provided last year but the unit we'd like to donate will serve as additional cooling and heating for them throughout the year. In addition, the portable unit will be able to go where their young son is instead of confining the family to a single room.

This event can only happen with your help. The wonderful community at the "Friendly Atheist" blog really came through for us last year. This year, we hope more of you can help. As before, we will have a Paypal widget on the sidebar for you to donate. And as before, we will give a full accounting of the money we raise and how we used it (receipts, photographs, etc.). Any money left over after the air conditioner purchases will be used to buy school supplies for needy children in the area.

Please support our campaign financially if you are able. If you can't, then please spread the word and encourage those who are able. Mississippi has a lot of problems and a lot of poverty. We can't fix it all but we can provide some measure of comfort and safety for those who have none.

Thank you for your support!

Beat the Heat and Beyond

After 6 long weeks, we can finally say that DFFT, through the donations of many generous nonbelievers, have "Beat the Heat." What began as "an idea in the car in the driveway" morphed into a full kindness campaign that we hope will continue for many years.

At first, we thought this would be simple: we'd ask for donations, buy a couple of air conditioners, find out who needed them, and then provide them. Things turned out to be much more complicated.

First, we had zero luck getting any local help. Everybody claimed it was a great thing to do but nobody had any real desire to do the work. It seems people around here - even churches - are very skeptical about helping others who aren't of their own flock. Everybody talked a good game but when it came down to actually giving their money, they weren't willing. 

Second, we had a really hard time tracing the Community Action group that had the list of folks in need. The phone number in the original article was wrong and, when we got the right one, it was for a different group. We spent a lot of time calling all over northeast Mississippi trying desperately to find out which organization could help us. When we finally found Community Action, we took the time to vet them. They are part of a government program to help elderly, disabled, and low income families. They screen people to prevent fraud and, because they are federally funded, they do not discriminate against any person for race, religion, etc. They told us that they have lots of requests because the local Good Samaritan and Salvation Army don't provide enough help. By this time, we were thoroughly unsurprised.

There was a light at the end of this long tunnel, however. We ended up with a ton more money than we had thought we would thanks to the Friendly Atheist and his wonderful community. These people came out of the woodwork to donate to the cause and, because of their efforts, we were able to buy seven air conditions instead of just one or two. To Hemant and his readers, we thank you so much for trusting us to make the lives of the poor and elderly just a little bit better.

Here are the seven brand new air conditioners we purchased with the donated funds:

We had some money left over so we decided to go shopping and see what else we could put together for donation. This is what we found:

It may not look like much, but this is enough file folders, notebooks, pencils, and hand sanitizer for 40 kids. There are also about 20 rulers in this pack. No child should have to start school without the basic stuff! 

We still had money left over after we grabbed every notebook and folder off those shelves so we went to another store and found some discount medical supplies. We decided to make some little first aid kits.

Just some basics here: alcohol, band-aids, aspirin, antibiotic ointment, and some OTC allergy relief. Not perfect but just what a Mississippian needs going into school and flu season!

So here's the financial breakdown of this campaign:

We're so pleased with how this campaign went that we want to do more of this. And that brings me to some really great news: this campaign has given birth to the Northeast Mississippi Secular Humanist Association (NEMSHA). We are in our infancy stage with only 4 members right now but we want to continue this charitable work in our area and to promote education and secular values. If you live in the Northeast Mississippi area and are interested in participating, please send an email to ournemsha@gmail.com.