There was a time when GoFundMe was synonymous with kindness — a place where neighbors rallied around cancer patients, widows, and families who had lost everything in a fire or flood. It was a platform built on generosity, not judgment. You didn’t ask who someone voted for before you helped them. You saw a need, and you gave.
But today? That era feels like a distant memory.
Now, GoFundMe pages are less about compassion and more about confirmation. They’ve become another arena in the culture war — a place where political tribes race to donate not out of sympathy, but as a statement. Sometimes, even as revenge.
The platform has become a stage where America’s obsession with heroes and villains plays out in real time — and with real dollars. And instead of waiting for the facts, people now open their wallets based on whatever narrative trends first.
It’s not charity. It’s tribalism.
Let’s be honest: most of the viral GoFundMe campaigns today are less about need and more about narrative. A person gets into a public altercation — suddenly there’s a fundraiser. Sometimes, they were clearly in the wrong — but if their side of the story fits your political worldview, you’re likely to donate anyway.
And if the person happens to represent your perceived political enemy? Then it's open season. The platform has become less of a lifeline and more of a scoreboard.
This shift mirrors a larger societal trend. The quicker the public decides who’s who, the faster the money starts pouring in. And let’s be clear: the giving isn't always about the person — it's about the cause they now represent. On both the left and the right, people donate to prove a point. The campaigns become digital billboards for political allegiance. A way to say: “We stand with our people — and against yours.”
This isn't how it used to be. GoFundMe once helped families cure children. Pay for chemotherapy. Rebuild homes after wildfires. Support elderly neighbors on fixed incomes. There was dignity in that. Unity. A sense of shared humanity, no matter what side of the aisle you stood on. But that’s been replaced by a new, reactionary economy — one where virality matters more than veracity, and the loudest story wins. The shift says more about us than it does about the platform. We’ve allowed our giving — something once sacred — to become another form of online warfare.
And it should bother us.
As conservatives, we’ve always believed in community over government. In voluntarily helping our neighbors. In faith-based generosity. That’s part of what made GoFundMe powerful in the first place — it decentralized aid and put it directly in the hands of people. But for that to work, we need discernment. We can’t keep mistaking tribal support for true charity. We can’t let digital mobs dictate who deserves help and who doesn’t. We need to return to the idea that need, not narrative, is what should drive giving. Let’s help the single moms. The cancer warriors. The mom who is pregnant and wants to keep her baby and needs help with the cost. The veterans. The families trying to make ends meet after disaster. Let’s stop funding fame and start funding actual faith in each other. Because if our only goal is to win the next viral fight, we’ve already lost the bigger one — the fight to remain a compassionate, discerning, and decent society.