Quote:
Originally Posted by pj3000
I don’t give money to twitchy or barely-conscious addicts, nor to young able-bodied dudes who hang out all day in traffic at intersections or on bridges around here. Nor to basic street hustlers who always got some line of bullshit story for you.
I always give money to someone who I think might need it. Maybe they’ll use it to buy a sandwich or maybe they’ll use it to go buy a beer or a bottle of cheap ass wine. I don’t care either way. If they need a drink to help get them through whatever nasty twist of fate has brought them to where they are, then they need a drink. I don’t feel that it’s my place to judge them. I’m lucky to have my brain, my limbs, family and friends, and the means to give a few bucks to someone who’s somehow been reduced to begging his/her fellow humans for money on the street.
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That's basically how I see it as well. If I've got a few bucks and I like the guy, I'll just give 'em some change. Not my business how they use it. Hell, there've been times where I had a case of beer and just offered someone a beer instead - lord knows they could use it. Some of you are acting like these are zoo animals or something.
As an aside, is it just my impression or does homelessness in cities across the US seem to have gotten a lot worse in recent years? On my last trips to New York, Boston, and DC in the early 2010s there didn't seem to be much of a homeless problem at the time; but from what I've heard from friends DC is pretty bad right now, while I've seen a number of articles about the growing problem in Manhattan. And based on a recent trip to Chicago it seemed to have a
huge homeless population throughout the city. To say nothing of the West Coast...