Just A Gentle Reminder....

I did take a closer look, and I learned the opposite of what you learned.

 

I'm going by personal experience. You can't believe everything you read (especially when it comes to the homeless...)

 

... which is why you have to do your own investigating and find out who does the best job in your area.

There's one charity around here where the director makes $400,000 a year. They will never see a dime from me. Another one seems very disorganized, and hates to answer questions. I'm done with them too.

Are you okay with the most aggressive and assertive homeless people getting the most money? I'm not. I'm more concerned about the quiet mother of three, who is shy because her boyfriend used to beat the shit out of her every day. I'm more concerned about the elderly homeless guy with arthritis who can't stand out on the street corner all day because it's too painful. I'm more concerned about the homeless girl who is so uneducated and so mentally deficient that she can't sell newspapers because she can't count change. All those kinds of people can be found on the street. That's why a system is needed that is intended to be at least halfway fair. We can't count on the government to do it. Private contributions are needed.

 

Most homeless people just need a big hug, and told that everything is gonna be okay. Charities don't do this. It's all so simple, just buy the newspaper for a dollar, smile and say a few kind words, and you've helped to change a life. It only takes a few minutes, and you literally might save someone. How much cooler is that? We all need to be touched/ loved. More important than money

 

Most? I don't know about that. I'm hesitant to say any one thing is true of "most" homeless.

Definitely. This need is not confined to any one group. The nastiness of urban life really, really, really needs to change. Three or four straight days in the city is about all I can take.

 

As you know, there are plenty of reasons but, if you want to go back in time a little ways.....the invention of psychotropic drugs is partially responsible for wide-spread de-institutionalization of psychiatric patients beginning in the late 60's/early 70's. The idea was that the drugs would improve their lives enough that they could live with the general public assuming they also had local mental health services to help out and keep tabs if need be. But in many cases, there was no local help available, those services were overwhelmed or they just lost track of people and had no way to find out if the drugs were actually working. Couple that with the influx of troop returning from Viet Nam (and their associated problems) and you now have a homelessness epidemic that has never been brought under control.

All of that being aside from past and current economic issues.

 

What's the alternative though? Its not like anyone is going to think, "oh, this $5 wont do any good. Instead I think I'll pay for them to go to rehab or maybe ill take them home and let them live with me until they find a job."

Giving them the $5 may not help but not giving them money doesn't help either. At worst they'll end up sober and suffering from the DTs all night. I would rather just give them the money and let them choose how to enjoy it.

 

If I have extra with me, I will give it...and not worry about what the person does with it.
I do my part, and it is not my responsibility what they do with it.....just like a gift....if you don;t like a gift I give you, fine....give it away. i am never hurt about things like that.

Some people just need an act of kindness to change their mind chemicals...and that is all that matters....really. the kindness.

 

That's a huge part of the problem, but I was thinking more in terms of looking at each individual's personal situation and figuring out what needs to change to put them on a path to a better quality of life.

The VA is a topic for another thread, but they really do need to take more responsibility for their veterans. Tragic situation. Morally wrong.

A new problem that has surfaced in the last year or so; people who can't apply for total subsidies for ObamaCare because they're illiterate, or can read and write only a language other than English or Spanish. Caring volunteers at charities can fill out the paperwork, and the patient can sign it. Taking care of accumulated health problems can allow them to re-enter the job market.

 

It takes a lot of people giving $5 to do something big, but fortunately, there are a lot of people who give a little.

 

my schizophrenic, alcoholic uncle was homeless for a while - he couldn't be helped. He was beyond it. He was dependant on my grandmother until she died, then he somehow blew through his $100,000 inheritance in a year. He lived with my family for a while but my mom had kids to raise, she couldn't really help. So then he spent some time living in a tent until my mom eventually got him into some kind of home (not really a nursing home, more like a rest home) where my siblings would gladly pick him up and take him to the liquor store. He died of liver disease.

I loved my uncle. He was kind, funny, handsome, and generous (which is why he blew through his inheritance.) He had a somewhat wealthy mother and family who lived him and all the resources anyone would need but he couldn't be helped - and he's the reason why I think its important to give freely without judgement that the recipient wont spend the money in a socially acceptable way.

it makes me happy to think that when my uncle was homeless someone looked at him and thought, "that man deserves a beer" and gave him money freely and kindly, instead of looking at him as something less than human.

 

Honestly and intelligently stated. Something tells me you are a writer? I wanted to like this post, but it seems I am all out of "likes" for the day? So I will be back tomorrow

 

Stories like that make me want to pull my hair out! To my way of thinking, they basically murdered him. This is what happens when the key decisions are being made by people with good intentions but no understanding. Classic "enabler" behavior.

If he had been in a place that wouldn't let them take him to the liquor store, he might still be alive today.

 

Give me a break, they hardly murdered him. He was a grown, albeit mentally ill man and they were teenagers. They visited him a couple of times a month, he drank every day and had been drinking every day since he was in his 20s. He made his own bed. He never would have agreed to go anywhere he wasn't allowed to drink and its not safe to cut someone off cold turkey anyways.

Cuts to mental health services in the 80s are more complicit in his death than anything else. He spent a lot of time in mental institutions in the 80s but by the 90s when my grandmother died there was nowhere for him to go.

 

Thanks for the kind words

 

I hope you do not take offence (as I feel we're clashing a bit in convo's lately with our opinions, which would be just that ) but it is arguable which peeps have the bigger understanding in this particular case. How great, fun and useful would it even be for that man to be still alive today? Not saying it couldn't be a good thing, and there are examples of that, but sometimes you also don't have to bother 'helping' people against their will. But when she said he was beyond help I don't think she would say that if there was a real chance to 'save him'. He just needed the help that he got (as I read it, I'm just as informed as you on this particular situation of course) and that (help without judgement) is pretty awesome imo.

 

^^ Some people don't want to change, and they can't be forced. The decision has to come from the person, not be forced on them by society, relatives or whatever.

I have known a couple of people like that, who ended up dead. But nobody could do anything to change them, and one of them actually got a lot of help with his alcoholism at a local hospital. If that person ever asked me for anything, it was inevitably the price of a drink. In the circumstances, it wouldn't have done any good at all for me to start telling him he should quit, or get help (he'd already tried that). I don't feel that any money I gave him was the reason he died, or played any significant part in it.

 

From my perspective, there is something about being addicted to drugs or alcohol that is fundamentally incompatible with the purpose of human existence. One should therefor free one's self from addiction or die trying.

Maybe the debate here comes down to what we believe the purpose of life is.

In any case, it's good to hear people talk about having been homeless, or having relatives who are or have been homeless. A lot of the negativity about homeless people seems to come from not having any, or only very little contact with them.

 

Honestly....having been through some shit in my life....I don't think there is an inherent negative or positive experience. I don't believe there is inherent good or evil. It just is what it is and it's all about how you interpret it and what you gain from it. Some things that I thought were the worst things to ever happen in my life turned out to be some of the best things that ever happened to me. It's just a matter of perspective. So I think the "purpose of life" can be many things based on perspective and all of those things can be right but all of those assumptions can change with time too.

 

I can't believe you said that.

I don't think any of us here are experts on the treatment of true addiction, but I do know that it's a complicated and difficult thing. How do any of us know what would have taken place if that man had spent some time with well trained people, where he was not free to make a liquor store run anytime he felt like it? I don't have a crystal ball.