Here are some charities that I approve of. I’d appreciate it very much if you made donations to them, and I’d be honored if you did so in my name. I believe that most, if not all of them have ways to donate online. There are a variety of different organizations grouped by type here, so hopefully you’ll find at least one that you’re comfortable with.

Some of my top favorites

• The Institute for the Study of Energy and Our Future - ISEOF is committed to helping society both steer away from fantasy and avoid catastrophe.
• Doctors Without Borders (also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF) - An international humanitarian aid organization that provides emergency medical assistance to populations in danger in more than 70 countries. The group was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1999.
• International Campaign to Ban Landmines - These brutal devices do not deserve a place anywhere in a civilized world.
• Wikimedia Foundation - The organization responsible for Wikipedia, Wikibooks, Wiktionary, and tons of other valuable resources for the entire human race.
• The Internet Archive - Home of the Wayback Machine and unique and obscure media of all types. A precious Internet resource.
• The Union of Concerned Scientists - A national nonprofit organization founded by scientists to use rigorous, independent science to solve our planet’s most pressing problems.
• Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank
• Animal Friends
• Cultural Survival - I highly recommend reading Daniel Quinn’s novel, Ishmael. In an author’s note to that book, he recommends that readers donate to this charity, and so do I.
• Climate Science Legal Defense Fund - Ensuring that scientists can conduct, publish, and discuss their research and advocate for science without the threat of political harassment, censorship, or legal intimidation.

Medical/Humanitarian/Human rights related

• American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) - Preserving civil liberties
• Human Rights Watch
• Amnesty International
• The Smile Train - Providing free cleft lip and palate surgery for needy children worldwide.
• UNICEF
• CARE
• Dementia Society of America
• The Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration
• Eluna Network - Running Camp Mariposa, a free mentoring and addiction prevention camp and program for children affected by a family member’s substance abuse. See this NPR story that is simultaneously heartbreaking and encouraging.

Environmental

• PennEnvironment - Protecting Pennsylvania’s natural resources.
  • also Environment America, which is also part of the Public Interest Network
• Arbor Day Foundation
• Tree Pittsburgh - Tree Pittsburgh is an environmental non-profit organization dedicated to strengthening and building community vitality by restoring and protecting the urban forest through tree planting and care, education, advocacy, and land conservation
• World Wildlife Fund - Their mission is to conserve nature and reduce the most pressing threats to the diversity of life on Earth
• Greenpeace
• Sierra Club
• Natural Resources Defense Council
• Center for Land Use Interpretation - Dedicated to the increase and diffusion of information about how the world’s lands are apportioned, utilized, and perceived.
• Clean Water Action

Social/Legal/Political/Lobby

• Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) - The EFF is a nonprofit group of passionate people - lawyers, technologists, volunteers, and visionaries - working to protect your digital rights.
• Public Citizen - A national non-profit public interest organization focused on protecting health, safety, and democracy.
• PennPIRG - Consumer advocacy, also part of the Public Interest Network
• Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)
• Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) - Working for Democratic Values in a Digital Age
• MoveOn.org

News/Media/Information/Education

• WQED and WESA - Public TV and radio for Pittsburgh
• Northland Public Library - My local public library. You can also donate to the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh to support the broader library services in the Pittsburgh area.
• Freedom of the Press Foundation - Defending press freedom for the next generation
• Propublica - an outstanding nonprofit, independent newsroom with one job: to hold the powerful to account
• Cryptome - Cryptome welcomes documents for publication that are prohibited by governments worldwide, in particular material on freedom of expression, privacy, cryptology, dual-use technologies, national security, intelligence, and secret governance – open, secret and classified documents – but not limited to those.
• Bellingcat - an incredible independent international collective of researchers, investigators and citizen journalists using open source and social media investigation to probe a variety of subjects.
• MIT’s OpenCourseWare - The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has put courseware for hundreds of their courses online and FREE for everyone.
• WFMU - The best independent, listener-sponsored, freeform radio station in the world.
• Prometheus Radio Project - Promoting Low Power FM and microradio
• Pacifica Radio
• Democracy Now!
• Inter Press Service News Agency - Independent news from around the globe
• Common Dreams Newscenter
• t r u t h o u t - News and Politics
• Project Gutenberg
• Alternet.org
• A-infos Radio Project
• The Saturday Light Brigade - Great family radio.
• The National Security Archive at the George Washington University. One of the highest quality resources on the Internet.
• Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR)