It’s no secret we live in a consumerist society run on marketing plans that convince us to load our shopping carts with as much “stuff” as humanly possible. Whether we need those items—or can even afford them—feels irrelevant when we’re targeted with all these holiday season promotions, both in stores and online.
Not that it’s wrong to update your electronics to the latest model or snag the pair of Doc Marten boots you’ve been wanting for months. But now that Black Friday is over, we hope you will join us in turning our focus to another seasonal initiative: Giving Tuesday. Since its launch in 2012, this movement has aimed to maximize social impact in communities across the globe with the collective action of “radical generosity.”
Rather than searching for the cheapest deals on a new Smart TV when your current TV still functions perfectly (based on a conversation I had with my significant other last week), Giving Tuesday is a chance to spend that money where it can make a real difference. So we want to help you out in this area with a roundup of organizations that will put your dollars to work on the frontlines of meaningful causes this holiday season.
Below are 10 nonprofits, which our team at The SunDaze Journey plans on donating to this year. Some you might be familiar with, while others could be new on your radar screen—but all of them share a core value to help the world become a more equitable place for everyone. And you, oh conscious consumer, can be part of their mission today!
Higher Foundation
Higher Foundation strives to make a college education more accessible to students across the state of Georgia. Your contribution will enable this organization to provide financial scholarships, mentorship programs, and other resources to help students thrive in their academics and future careers. (We love Higher Foundation so much that we recently talked to its founder Mallorye Crowell on The SunDaze Journey Podcast!)
Grassroots Law Project
Grassroots Law Project has a successful track-record of mobilizing advocates from all walks of life to push for sustainable justice reform and structural change in the American court system and law enforcement policies. Your contributions will enable this organization to finance its high volume caseload of clients, such as Marvin Guy, an innocent man who has been held in county jail for seven years without access to a trial.
Preemptive Love
Preemptive Love is a coalition that delivers relief on the ground to victims of conflict or human rights atrocities in the most war torn regions on earth. Your contribution will enable this organization to respond in a crisis with food, clothes, shelter, health care, and other essentials for refugee families. From the Middle East and North Africa to Latin America and the U.S.–Mexico border, join in this work to help end war.
Hate Is a Virus
Hate Is a Virus exists to amplify, empower and protect marginalized voices of Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) descent in a time when this community faces so much racist violence and rhetoric. Your contribution will enable this organization to combat Anti-Asian hate crimes, which have escalated by more than 73 percent since 2020, and equip AAPI activists to come alongside other harmed communities as well.
Families Belong Together
Families Belong Together was formed by the National Domestic Workers Alliance to fight the inhumane separation of children and their parents who seek asylum in the United States. Your contribution will enable this organization to reunite immigrant families who were forced apart at the border, as well as to hold government officials accountable for immigration reform measures and to ultimately stop cruel detention practices.
Native American Rights Fund
Native American Rights Fund works to defend core issues which affect Indigenous life in the U.S. Your contribution will enable this organization to uphold tribal nation sovereignty, natural resource conservation, land treaty rights, cultural preservation, infrastructure development, voter registration or assistance, and self-governance of tribal education (like what Sitting Bull College has created on the Standing Rock Reservation).
Parks for All
Parks For All is an offshoot of the HydroFlask brand, which helps to build more accessible, inclusive, and eco-conscious parks systems all over the world. Your contribution will enable this organization to make outdoor green spaces both easier and safer for marginalized or differently abled visitors to use, while ensuring that parks, beaches, trails, and other natural settings are clean and protected from human pollution.
Nalgona Positivity Pride
Nalgona Positivity Pride centers the BIPOC experience in conversations of body acceptance and eating disorder recovery. Your contribution enables this organization to offer therapeutic interventions and healing resources in communities that, all too often, are overlooked by mainstream mental health programs. Founder Gloria Lucas refers to this work as a mission to decolonize positive body image for women of color.
SOIL Haiti
SOIL (which stands for Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods) increases free, public sanitation measures in impoverished Haitian urban centers. Your contribution will enable this organization to transform waste into compostable sanitary services or applications around the country. This will also lower the risk of waterborne illness in vulnerable regions and help to combat Haiti’s worsening environmental crisis.
The Okra Project
The Okra Project seeks to alleviate food insecurity across the United States—in particular, for those who are Black and Transgender. Your contribution will enable this organization to deliver free, nutritious, culturally specific meals to Black Trans recipients, using CDC-safe protocols. The Okra Project’s “Dinner on Us” collaboration with DoorDash will also distribute over $18,000 in DoorDash gift cards this holiday season.
Which causes will you donate to this Giving Tuesday? Are any of the nonprofits we mentioned on your list, or is there another organization close to your heart? Please share in the comment section below—and let’s promote some radical generosity!
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