Preliminary reports say this year’s Project ISFC exceeded all expectations. Project I’m So Freaking Compassionate, begun several years ago in Southern California, has now expanded to most of the United States. This year, Thanksgiving meals were served cafeteria fashion to an estimated 340,000 people.
Delighted volunteers say it’s difficult to name just one highlight from 2010 activities, but the improved demeanor of the indigent was definitely a factor. “Yeah, they smell better now and they’re more grateful” said Tuscadegalooga, AL socialite Gladys Kravitz.
“I’ve been doing this for years; we used to get nothing but drunks and schizophrenics. It’s just a better quality of folk now, if you know what I mean? Louise Tate and her kids even dropped by; she’s so nice. She used to live down the street from my sister.”
News footage of the well behaved throngs and their smiling apron-clad benefactors has led to serious accusations from outside the ISFC community. Some have questioned the authenticity of the indigent. While organizers vehemently dispute the charge, experts say the divide reflects a new paradigm in sporadic philanthropy.
Said Harvard Sociology Professor Hyman Liloleman, “This is due to a decreasing distance between plate bearers and apron wearers. When soup kitchens were only patronized by the homeless, or urban campers as we call them, it was a much different interaction. One disputes the credentials of the newly indigent for self-assurance it could never happen to him. This new crop of hungry folks, they sure do smell better though, you got that right.”
Project ISFC organizers say the media controversy will have little lasting impact, and they will follow up this year’s success with an even better 2011. Next year, after dinner mints will be served too.
The event was marred by only a few random outbursts. Across the nation there were some reports of Salvation Army personnel angrily confronting ISFC volunteers. In each case the altercations were resolved without violence. Police dragged away the SA workers as they continued shouting crazily, “Where are all you people in January?”