Tis’ The Season To Hate The Salvation Army
By: H. Elizabeth Falk
Tags: Salvation Army, Charity, Culture, Pop Culture, Politics

Tis’ The Season To Hate The Salvation Army

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

It’s Christmas eve so I just made a donation to the Salvation Army. I wouldn’t dare share that fact with my friends. It’s not worth the backlash. You see, I’m a firmly left of center liberal, so I can’t admit to supporting the Salvation Army.

About ten years ago a dear friend of mine, who I’ll call Bill, was about to drink himself to death. He needed help and didn’t have insurance. He entered a residential treatment program through the Salvation Army. He was fed and housed and given treatment for free for six months. When he relapsed, he went back for six more months and has stayed sober ever since. I have no doubt that he would be dead right now if not for the Salvation Army.

When I’ve mentioned this and the fact that the Salvation Army provides more inpatient addiction recovery programs than any other organization in the country, saving literally thousands of lives year after year there are two common responses. Either they insist my friend is not gay or transgender and if he were the Salvation Army would have let him die or they insist it wasn’t fair that he had to participate in their religious programs in order to get treatment. I have to admit that they are a tiny bit correct. Well, almost.

My friend is indeed a cis heterosexual man. Bill however did share stories about some of the other guys in the program being gay, he did not observe anyone trying to pray the gay out of them or treating them differently. It seems to me that all the testimonials by LGBTQ folks on the Salvation Army website can’t all be fakers or paid actors. Bill also told me that he found the preaching annoying. He shared some funny stories of some of the local musicians who visited their program and performed shows and tried to “rock out to Jesus” with them. If Bill had a secular option for treatment, I’m sure he would have chosen it.

Is anyone really shocked that a church based organization is a bit, well, churchie? Is it really that wrong that they offer a side of Jesus with the free loaves, fishes, shelter and treatment? No one is forcing them to accept their services. It is unfortunate that my friend didn’t have a secular option for free treatment but sitting through some religious programming doesn’t seem that bad to me when the alternative is no help at all.

Over the years I’ve gotten into so many online battles with friends and strangers alike about the Salvation Army. People insist that regular and consistent harassment of gay and trans people is the standard operating procedure at the Salvation Army. They share memes that claim that Salvation Army bell ringers regularly harass gay couples on the street. Really? Because I’ve seen people with kettles ringing that damn bell in front of countless stores every holiday season for the last 20 years in three major cities including San Francisco and I’ve not ever seen a bell ringer harassing a gay couple. Seems like I might have noticed it once or twice if it was a regular thing.

People love to tell the tragic story of Jennifer Gale, a homeless activist, who also happened to be transgender, she tragically froze to death in Austin in 2008. Immediately after her death a blog post accused the Salvation Army of refusing her shelter unless she was housed with men. Very soon after the blog was retracted. Yet just last week I attended a zoom holiday party for professional networking group and one woman announced that members should not donate to the Salvation Army because they let transgender people die rather than provide them services. This is just accepted as fact by most liberals I know.

Even though many of the “truths” about the evilness of the Salvation Army have been debunked or shown to be exaggerated and taken out of context, I have learned the hard way, that arguing with liberals about the Salvation Army is like trying to reason with someone who thinks the earth is flat or that vaccines cause autism or that climate change and Covid are a hoax. Engaging with them will only frustrate you.

My point in questioning the collective liberal stance against the Salvation Army is not to argue that it is an organization without problems or issues, particularly for the LGBTQ community. As is often pointed in out, the Salvation Army has a long history of varying levels of hostility to members of the LGBTQ community. Some reports from more than twenty five years ago are quite disturbing. The organization has been in existence for more than a century, no doubt many things in it’s past would not stand up to the scrutiny of today’s ethical standards.

Also, I am certain, absolutely certain that there are still some prejudiced, homophobic people working in the Salvation Army ranks even though they have changed their policies and attempted to shift the culture to ensure everyone is open and accepting of all people in need. It’s an almost statistical certainty that is true of any organization with over twenty five thousand employees across the globe running hundreds and hundreds of programs.

Liberals, we often ask conservatives not to think in black and white terms, we ask them to consider nuance and the bigger picture. We say don’t look at the misdeeds of a few individuals to derail an entire group of people. The Salvation Army is an organization made up of humans. Consider the possibility that it might be trying to do better and they are helping a lot of people along the way.

Why do we refuse to believe that this one organization simply cannot change? For decades now the Salvation Army has been reaching out to the LGBTQ community and trying to make amends for the sins of their past. So I’m asking you, liberal to liberal, please stop trashing them and perpetuating false stories. People like my friend Bill are depending on the Salvation Army to stay alive.