I'm separating the people I'm talking about from people that actually just want to make donations because of the social good. This other group seems to have no interest in making contributions other than their own misunderstanding of what a tax deduction is.
Other than "feeling good" you can't derive personal benefit from a deductible donation.
That's not true. If the donation helps enable a societal outcome that you benefit from (i.e. a donation to a local environmental cleanup nonprofit organization results in a cleaner park for you to enjoy), then you can benefit. You can't derive an exclusive personal benefit from it, of course. If you did, it would be tax fraud.
Depending on how underwithheld you are, you can avoid tax underpayment penalties.