Ethics of Gift Receiving

When most people bat about the ol' "it's the thought that counts" phraseology, its generally used as sort of an excuse for a bad gift. However, it shouldn't be understood as excusing a bad gift - rather, it's an imperative to the recipient of the gift.

A few years ago, my mother gave me a ton of iPod accessories for Hanukkah, along with a receipt from the apple store in case I didn't want them. My brother commented on the absurdity of the situation, but truth be told I didn't want them, and was glad for the opportunity to return them for something I might enjoy. Then, a few days later, it hit me how right my brother was.

When someone buys you a gift, they put thought into it - no matter whether they spend a whole day souring store after store, or if they just see something that they think you might like and grab it at the last minute. We buy each other gifts because we think that the particular recipient will appreciate it, because of their personality, their tastes, their hobbies... for whatever reason, we think it will bring joy into their lives. And with that thought comes a responsibility on the part of the gift recipient to enjoy the gift in the manner intended.

This includes the old wear-the-ugly-sweater-when-grandma-comes-to-town routine, but it goes beyond that. When someone buys you a gift, your obligation is to try to figure out why they thought you would enjoy it, and to then do your best to enjoy it in the manner the giver intended. We give gifts to bring joy into each other's lives. Accordingly, we should receive gifts in a manner to bring joy into our own lives. Indeed, we have an obligation to do so.

I threw away the receipt from the apple store without looking at it, and made as much use of the gadgets my parents had gotten me as I could. The JBL On Stage speaker/dock system is still sitting on my desk, stage-right of my laptop as I type, even though it won't interface with my iPhone - its still how I charge my nano, and its speakers may yet get a few more workouts in their lifetime. The monster cable 16th-inch-to-RCA-adapter, entirely superfluous given my exessive audio cable collection, has continued to be my go-to cable, even as the RCA plugs have started to fall apart. The remaining gadgets have stopped working in the last 5 years, but I made every effort to use them all as much as I could when I had them, even when I had already owned something which did the trick just as well.

Truth be told, I was perfectly happy playing my MP3s on my computer and charging my iPod in the wall socket. But that wasn't the point - my parents wanted to enhance the joy I got from my MP3s and my iPod, and I had (and still have) the obligation to use those gifts as they were intended.