Shriners...what's the deal with them?

[chenGOD]

Ok so they ride around on tiny cars and wear the funny hats, they also featured prominently ona DK record cover.

What's the point of the organization though? Are they like Knights of Columbus (blechhh) or what?


Anyone? Bueller? bueller? Anyone?

[BlondieK143]

1. From what I've heard...

They help out kids that have pretty serious burns. They pay for all the expenses and so forth. Their hats may be a little odd, but from what I've heard, they help out a lot of communities.

[mopaul]

7. I practically grew up in Shriner's Hospital for Crippled Children

since i was two till about 13, with periodic visits home. my dad became a mason because of it. it was all free, and my folks were poor working class. this was during the awful polio epidemic of the 40's and 50's. they still operate a lot of these hospitals, and they also have many burn units for burned kids whose parents can't afford hospitalization.

for this reason alone, i support the shriners.

as far as the masonic order, i know it gets called a cult a lot, and it has a weird history, but i know many of them. i never became one, but i'm not a joiner of groups for the most part.

like the elks, who donate to the blind, the shriners donate to the crippled and burn children. i see this as a practical use of christian charity, helping the poor and afflicted.

i was even one of those clowns for a while, not a shriner's krazy klown, but a de molay clown. demolay is the boys version of the masons. i was one for years, but sort of grew out of that phaze.

so i find it hard to critcize or chastise the shriners as a group.

[kodi]

2. its a volunteer organization, that does a lot of good for people.

ask any one who has ever had a friend or relative with severe burns and let them tell you about shriner hospitals and burn centers that provide orthopedic and burn care to children under 18.

volunteerism, as de Tocqueville mentioned nearly 200 years ago is a distinctly american attribute

[r_u_stuck2]

3. google is your friend

http://www.shrinershq.org/

[greatauntoftriplets]

4. Try googling them.

http://www.shrinershq.org/

[burned]

5. shriners

http://www.shrinershq.org/

http://www.shrinershq.org/hospitals/geninfo.html

they've been helping my daughter free of charge for thirteen years. i'd estimate our expenses would have been well over $500,000 so far.

[burned]

6. :)

got enough links??

[chenGOD]

8. Thanks guys...

do you think I could some links or something? ;)


that's cool that they do a lot of good.

Anyone have any experience with the masonic side? Care to talk about it?

Are they more powerful than the stonecutters?

Why would they be on a DK reord cover?

Can you tell this is just a desperate attempt to get out of the 700 club?

[lpbk2713]

9. The Shriners support a burn hospital for kids in Tampa

that does a lot of good. So if they want to dress up funny and act silly once in a while, that's OK with me.

[ldf]

10. shriners are masons

and they do a lot of good.

i think it may be an excuse to get together to party and act stupid, but that is ok.

i bet those little cars are a lot of fun.

[Bunny]

11. Indeed those little cars are a hoot.

Way back when, my landlord's son-in-law was a Shriner and drove one of those tiny little Corvettes. This was a comical image because this man was about 6 foot, 200 lbs., so squeezing into the vette would have been a sight to see.

Anyhoo, they stored the vette in the garage of the house I was renting. Many a night was spent debating the wisdom of trying to hot-wire the Shriver vette and take it for a spin. These discussions were of course fueled by alcohol and other substances!

Fortunately we had sense enough to never actually try it - I understand those cars can run as much as ten grand to purchase!

[Rabrrrrrr]

12. Apart from the billions of dollars of free medical care they provide,

what I mostly appreciate about the shriners is that they don't run their hospitals like a typical free clinic - they don't expect their doctors to work for peanuts, and so pay them just as much or more than they'd get at a regular, for-profit hospital, in order to make sure that they (the Shriners) are always able to attract and pick from the top talent.

So it's totally free medical care, including a lot of money to fly families around and give them housing, in which the doctors and nurses and other staff are getting paid at highly competitive wages, have huge budgets to maintain the hospitals with cutting edge technology and medical care, and a lot of dedication to treating the underclasses.

I was able to get to know the Shriner's hospital in Honolulu (not as a patient, but as an interested observer) and every time I was there and had a little tour, or talked to the chief of staff about his work, I was forever blown away at the sheer amount of money being spent to fix burns on kids from Indonesia and Fiji and other small South Pacific islands, as well the entire Pacific Rim. Those were all "disposable" kids, and yet the Shriners spend billions to fix their burns, fix their bones, fix their birth defects, etc.

My uncle is a Shriner, as is my insurance salesman. Their hats might be a bit funny, but being a Shriner isn't just joining a group: it's a serious obligation. They're expected to donate money, and a fair amount of it, to the hospitals and other shriner/mason helping organizations.

[ikojo]

13. One of my nephews was born with bilateral clubbed feet

and had at least one surgery at the Shriner's Hospital here in St Louis. It is true that everything was done at no cost to my sister and her husband.

He is now 25 and does not require any braces. The only problem he has is occasional pain in his ankles.


The Shriner's may look goofy in their hats and cars but they do good work.

[Khephra]

14. Depending on where you live

A Shriner is a Mason who has completed his Blue Lodge work and is a member of either York Rite or Scottish Rite to a certain degree.

Indiana, because of a loss of Masons of the higher up levels, has made the qualifications for being a Shriner to being simply a Mason, the level doesn't matter anymore. The reason? Loss of memberships. They need the people to be able to support their charity work.

And yes, they do party like fools sometimes. Sometimes it's nice that there are a lot of cops in the Masons.

[mopaul]

15. I used to hang with some wild krazy klown shriners in the 60's

i was a teen demolay member and i started my own clown troupe in st. louis. we visited the hospitals too, and parades as well with the krazy klowns. these guys used to drink beer and go out into parades, but never the hospitals.

it's a sort of religious clown ritual, the comradery, the fun that they give the kids. some of them would break down and cry after visits to shriner's hospital, in full clown getup. what a sight.