Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
i had a roommate who paid rent for a summer by busking instead of getting a minimum wage job
but i don't really consider busking and panhandling to be the same thing
Nor do I.
he was also dating a one-legged stripper at the time and she would hop out between songs and have people put money in her fake leg
I've worked in homeless shelters for years. I've also been homeless, as has my mother. There is no such thing as professional panhandlers, or professional homeless people, or people who "want to be homeless", or "rich hobos", or the homeless guy who makes hundreds of dollars an hour from begging, or any of that other fucking bullshit that people tell themselves or have been told to make themselves feel better about not giving a shit about the homeless.
A massive chunk of the homeless population are people you never encounter. They are not people on the street. They are people in shelters, hostels, halfway houses, and other charity institutions and social systems that support them. They are people crashing on their friends' couches for a little while until they get stuff together. These people are the "invisible" homeless and they represent mostly people who are just fuckin' poor or are in situations that are toxic or desperate and they ended up with no fixed address (leaving abusive situations, losing everything in a fire with no insurance, etc.). Most of these people have just gotten fucked over by life in some way and are trying to get their shit together.
But when you say "homeless" what most people think of is street homeless, people who live and sleep and beg on the street, and you encounter in your everyday life. The overwhelming majority of these people, like somewhere north of 90%, are mentally ill in some capacity. Co-morbid to this, many of them also have substance abuse problems, because you try living on the street like they do and not having a substance abuse problem.
Because most of these people are mentally ill, many of them have behaviors, mechanisms, issues, and problems that make it extremely difficult for them to function in "normal" society and for them to hold down jobs, acquire and retain a place to live, etc. Even if all these opportunities are presented to them by things like social outreach programs, without sufficient mental health support, their ability to actually utilize those opportunities in a lasting way is very minimal in most cases because the demons that put them on the street in the first place are still gonna be there.
There are people who, having been in this state for an extended period of time, have adapted very specific and sometimes quite elaborate survival strategies for doing what they can. When you see the guy who has a shopping cart full of cans to turn in for pittances, you might think "Why doesn't that guy just get a job, he clearly can do work and knows how to like, form a route and get paid and shit", you are missing the whole fuckin point of why that dude is at a point in his life of why he is comfortable digging through garbage to find soda cans to turn in.
Yeah I agree with all of this.
Yes, agree.
Was/am the poor dude staying with friends. Was the guy living in his illegal car.
I also watched a bunch of crustpunks from middle/upper-middle class homes ride trains and panhandle and busk over in Portland. It was trendy as hell in Eastern Oregon for a few years.
"I lived on the streets, maaaan, I know what it's like out there."
Not without mommy and daddy's plastic, they fuckin didn't.
Professional panhandlers exist. They're called Crusties.
That's a different thing.
That's "poor" like the fuckin' idiots in Rent are "poor".
That's poverty tourism. If that's a person's argument for the existence of professional panhandlers that's like saying Bigfoot exists because there's Bigfoot cosplayers.
Pony on
+2
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BeNarwhalThe Work Left UnfinishedRegistered Userregular
I keep hearing good things about Pyre
@Evil Multifarious explain yourself! I know nothing about it, and attempting to learn more illuminates ... little.
0
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amateurhourOne day I'll be professionalhourThe woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered Userregular
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
i had a roommate who paid rent for a summer by busking instead of getting a minimum wage job
but i don't really consider busking and panhandling to be the same thing
Nor do I.
he was also dating a one-legged stripper at the time and she would hop out between songs and have people put money in her fake leg
so like
it was a whole production kinda
Was her name Ilene?
are YOU on the beer list?
+3
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Donkey KongPutting Nintendo out of business with AI nipsRegistered Userregular
On a larger view, people who defraud various public services do exist (in disproportionately tiny numbers) but some people do latch onto these examples and imagine them as far more prevalent, I think largely to sell bumper stickers
I think this inordinate fear of people taking advantage of charitable leanings applies to homeless people quite naturally, if illogically (much like refugee talking points, "why would someone choose to live in such abject horror?" doesn't seem to cross people's minds)
See also: Welfare queens
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
i find it funny how many people who run thirty feet to their cars because it's drizzling out think it's easy being homeless
It's not that.
It's the idea that a beggar also has a $200k house because begging is so lucrative, somehow
If begging is so lucrative why do only poor people do it?
I think you hit on an important factor, here
The same people who think begging is lucrative think that there's value in a minimum wage job above and beyond the pay; poors should be grateful that they're saved from the indignity of panhandling, even though they'd make more money, and are able to enjoy Honest Work.
+1
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ElldrenIs a woman dammitceterum censeoRegistered Userregular
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
Like
If panhandling were at all lucrative you'd think somebody on these boards would do it professionally. We have a pretty big slice of the anglosphere represented here
fuck gendered marketing
0
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SummaryJudgmentGrab the hottest iron you can find, stride in the Tower’s front doorRegistered Userregular
Wow, Ozark is some really good, weird shit
Some days Blue wonders why anyone ever bothered making numbers so small; other days she supposes even infinity needs to start somewhere.
+1
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
i had a roommate who paid rent for a summer by busking instead of getting a minimum wage job
but i don't really consider busking and panhandling to be the same thing
Nor do I.
he was also dating a one-legged stripper at the time and she would hop out between songs and have people put money in her fake leg
so like
it was a whole production kinda
Was her name Ilene?
let's just say it was because i don't remember
Allegedly a voice of reason.
0
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
yeah, deffo shouldn't blend the homeless and buskers.
Many buskers have permits and schedules and shit in NYC, it is a legit way to make money, if not very glamorous.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
+4
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TTODewbackPuts the drawl in ya'llI think I'm in HellRegistered Userregular
there's a guy here who, if you get out early enough" you'll see him sprinting carrying a wheelchair to the median of atlanta highway and when you come by later he'll be sitting in it pretending to be paralyzed asking for money to the people stopped at the intersection. if people arent buying he'll roll himself out into the turn lane and block traffic until the police show up
then he'll pick up his wheelchair again and book it.
he's been doing it for years. someone will drop him off at the shopping center nearby and go from there.
I've worked in homeless shelters for years. I've also been homeless, as has my mother. There is no such thing as professional panhandlers, or professional homeless people, or people who "want to be homeless", or "rich hobos", or the homeless guy who makes hundreds of dollars an hour from begging, or any of that other fucking bullshit that people tell themselves or have been told to make themselves feel better about not giving a shit about the homeless.
A massive chunk of the homeless population are people you never encounter. They are not people on the street. They are people in shelters, hostels, halfway houses, and other charity institutions and social systems that support them. They are people crashing on their friends' couches for a little while until they get stuff together. These people are the "invisible" homeless and they represent mostly people who are just fuckin' poor or are in situations that are toxic or desperate and they ended up with no fixed address (leaving abusive situations, losing everything in a fire with no insurance, etc.). Most of these people have just gotten fucked over by life in some way and are trying to get their shit together.
But when you say "homeless" what most people think of is street homeless, people who live and sleep and beg on the street, and you encounter in your everyday life. The overwhelming majority of these people, like somewhere north of 90%, are mentally ill in some capacity. Co-morbid to this, many of them also have substance abuse problems, because you try living on the street like they do and not having a substance abuse problem.
Because most of these people are mentally ill, many of them have behaviors, mechanisms, issues, and problems that make it extremely difficult for them to function in "normal" society and for them to hold down jobs, acquire and retain a place to live, etc. Even if all these opportunities are presented to them by things like social outreach programs, without sufficient mental health support, their ability to actually utilize those opportunities in a lasting way is very minimal in most cases because the demons that put them on the street in the first place are still gonna be there.
There are people who, having been in this state for an extended period of time, have adapted very specific and sometimes quite elaborate survival strategies for doing what they can. When you see the guy who has a shopping cart full of cans to turn in for pittances, you might think "Why doesn't that guy just get a job, he clearly can do work and knows how to like, form a route and get paid and shit", you are missing the whole fuckin point of why that dude is at a point in his life of why he is comfortable digging through garbage to find soda cans to turn in.
Yeah I agree with all of this.
Yes, agree.
Was/am the poor dude staying with friends. Was the guy living in his illegal car.
I also watched a bunch of crustpunks from middle/upper-middle class homes ride trains and panhandle and busk over in Portland. It was trendy as hell in Eastern Oregon for a few years.
"I lived on the streets, maaaan, I know what it's like out there."
Not without mommy and daddy's plastic, they fuckin didn't.
Professional panhandlers exist. They're called Crusties.
That's a different thing.
That's "poor" like the fuckin' idiots in Rent are "poor".
That's poverty tourism. If that's a person's argument for the existence of professional panhandlers that's like saying Bigfoot exists because there's Bigfoot cosplayers.
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
i had a roommate who paid rent for a summer by busking instead of getting a minimum wage job
but i don't really consider busking and panhandling to be the same thing
Nor do I.
he was also dating a one-legged stripper at the time and she would hop out between songs and have people put money in her fake leg
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
Like
If panhandling were at all lucrative you'd think somebody on these boards would do it professionally. We have a pretty big slice of the anglosphere represented here
quite aside from the panhandling: say what
where are the 49/50/51ish of trumpotrons/brexiteers etc on this board
+4
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
there's a guy here who, if you get out early enough" you'll see him sprinting carrying a wheelchair to the median of atlanta highway and when you come by later he'll be sitting in it pretending to be paralyzed asking for money to the people stopped at the intersection. if people arent buying he'll roll himself out into the turn lane and block traffic until the police show up
then he'll pick up his wheelchair again and book it.
he's been doing it for years. someone will drop him off at the shopping center nearby and go from there.
maybe he's the next david blaine
Allegedly a voice of reason.
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BeNarwhalThe Work Left UnfinishedRegistered Userregular
I am a welfare queen
The $9000 / year that I strip away from the state is all ill-gotten gains
We'd better crack down on my $9000 / year, and not the bloated costs encouraged by the military - industrial complex that often balloon into the billions
0
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ElldrenIs a woman dammitceterum censeoRegistered Userregular
i find it funny how many people who run thirty feet to their cars because it's drizzling out think it's easy being homeless
It's not that.
It's the idea that a beggar also has a $200k house because begging is so lucrative, somehow
If begging is so lucrative why do only poor people do it?
I think you hit on an important factor, here
The same people who think begging is lucrative think that there's value in a minimum wage job above and beyond the pay; poors should be grateful that they're saved from the indignity of panhandling, even though they'd make more money, and are able to enjoy Honest Work.
If your beef is with the term "professional panhandler" I retract my use of it.
It is, because it's a harmful one and insisting they exist hurts people.
So, we're good then.
+1
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Donkey KongPutting Nintendo out of business with AI nipsRegistered Userregular
edited July 2017
Standard flush toilets operate off gravity, not pressurized water. Septic tanks are relatively low maintenance and not too bad for the environment if you plan and use them well. If there's one item that should be gorgeous and modern in your primitivist fantasy, make it the bathroom. Poop time is sacred.
Donkey Kong on
Thousands of hot, local singles are waiting to play at bubbulon.com.
People at work complain about Oregon Trail card users (food stamp program) to no extent. The prevailing opinion is they are all scammers.
Is is harmful. My point is is that because you can't tell a scammers from a legit user from standing behind them in the grocery checkout you shouldn't assume the worst.
0
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TTODewbackPuts the drawl in ya'llI think I'm in HellRegistered Userregular
there's a guy here who, if you get out early enough" you'll see him sprinting carrying a wheelchair to the median of atlanta highway and when you come by later he'll be sitting in it pretending to be paralyzed asking for money to the people stopped at the intersection. if people arent buying he'll roll himself out into the turn lane and block traffic until the police show up
then he'll pick up his wheelchair again and book it.
he's been doing it for years. someone will drop him off at the shopping center nearby and go from there.
maybe he's the next david blaine
The police are here?!
*waves magic wand*
I CAN WALK AGAIN
*sprints away*
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
Like
If panhandling were at all lucrative you'd think somebody on these boards would do it professionally. We have a pretty big slice of the anglosphere represented here
quite aside from the panhandling: say what
where are the 49/50/51ish of trumpotrons/brexiteers etc on this board
they keep getting themselves banned, lmao
+7
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
Standard flush toilets operate of gravity, not pressurized water. Septic tanks are relatively low maintenance and not too bad for the environment if you plan and use them well. If there's one item that should be gorgeous and modern in your primitivist fantasy, make it the bathroom. Poop time is sacred.
I saw a guy in Memphis park his corvette in a parking lot near an intersection, get out, take his stuff out, then setup in a chair with a "i'm homeless and need money" sign and a dirty jacket.
There's definitely people who do that to make money.
0
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amateurhourOne day I'll be professionalhourThe woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered Userregular
Every time I see a legit homless person two things happen:
1) I want to see the gear in their pack
2) I want to give them one of my many packs
are YOU on the beer list?
0
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ElldrenIs a woman dammitceterum censeoRegistered Userregular
Nobody said you were lying Pony. I agree with what you are saying if you acknowledge you can't speak in absolutes like that. There have been panhandlers by choice. Do I think they have unfairly helped tarnish the opinion of homeless people in general? Yes...?
How are you defining "by choice"?
Did they have a house, a good job, decent standard of living, and say "y'know, fuck the rat race, I'm gonna panhandle down at the corner!"
Can you give me a single example of what you are talking about and elaborate?
Because this sounds very "welfare queen" to me bro
Like
If panhandling were at all lucrative you'd think somebody on these boards would do it professionally. We have a pretty big slice of the anglosphere represented here
quite aside from the panhandling: say what
where are the 49/50/51ish of trumpotrons/brexiteers etc on this board
Aside from the fact that there aren't that many of those people in existence,
The $9000 / year that I strip away from the state is all ill-gotten gains
We'd better crack down on my $9000 / year, and not the bloated costs encouraged by the military - industrial complex that often balloon into the billions
Well yeah but can I sail your lack of hunger around the ocean flipping off other countries?
0
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amateurhourOne day I'll be professionalhourThe woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered Userregular
I saw a guy in Memphis park his corvette in a parking lot near an intersection, get out, take his stuff out, then setup in a chair with a "i'm homeless and need money" sign and a dirty jacket.
There's definitely people who do that to make money.
yeah, but they're con artists, plain and simple. There's no reason to give them a name that also lumps them in with legitimate homeless people.
They're just working a con
are YOU on the beer list?
0
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
People at work complain about Oregon Trail card users (food stamp program) to no extent. The prevailing opinion is they are all scammers.
Is is harmful. My point is is that because you can't tell a scammers from a legit user from standing behind them in the grocery checkout you shouldn't assume the worst.
i live in a lower income part of town and see a lot of EBT shoppers and i have been trying very hard to strike that balance of displaying that i don't judge and i am cool with it and also i'm just totally not even noticing so you aren't uncomfortable
I saw a guy in Memphis park his corvette in a parking lot near an intersection, get out, take his stuff out, then setup in a chair with a "i'm homeless and need money" sign and a dirty jacket.
There's definitely people who do that to make money.
yeah, but they're con artists, plain and simple. There's no reason to give them a name that also lumps them in with legitimate homeless people.
They're just working a con
I thought that's what "professional panhandler" was a synonym for basically.
+2
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ElldrenIs a woman dammitceterum censeoRegistered Userregular
Standard flush toilets operate off gravity, not pressurized water. Septic tanks are relatively low maintenance and not too bad for the environment if you plan and use them well. If there's one item that should be gorgeous and modern in your primitivist fantasy, make it the bathroom. Poop time is sacred.
Yeah the only thing a flush toilet really requires over a hole in the ground is a water source.
And if you need to get super conservationy about it graywater is fine for use in a toilet
I don't even think I'd be okay with the idea of a septic tank; I need a complex infrastructural system that will be obliterated at first sign of societal collapse
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
+3
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BeNarwhalThe Work Left UnfinishedRegistered Userregular
The $9000 / year that I strip away from the state is all ill-gotten gains
We'd better crack down on my $9000 / year, and not the bloated costs encouraged by the military - industrial complex that often balloon into the billions
Well yeah but can I sail your lack of hunger around the ocean flipping off other countries?
People at work complain about Oregon Trail card users (food stamp program) to no extent. The prevailing opinion is they are all scammers.
Is is harmful. My point is is that because you can't tell a scammers from a legit user from standing behind them in the grocery checkout you shouldn't assume the worst.
Sure, but I think there's an even stronger point to make, which is that the "scammers" don't actually cost that much.
Here's a little fun fact I like to bust out from time to time:
Back like 15 years ago, when Mike Harris and his Progressive Conservative party ran the Ontario government, Harris made "stopping fraudsters" of the social welfare systems a significant issue.
They introduced a bunch of reforms to the disability support system (ODSP) and the welfare system (Ontario Works) that made them both harder to get, harder to keep, and tried actively to get fraudsters out of the system.
Ostensibly, this was to lower costs to the government, bring down taxes, blah blah blah shithead Conservative talking points.
This dramatically increased workload for those government agencies and programs due to the increased scrutiny needed for current and prospective users of those systems.
Which raised the operating costs of those systems dramatically even while overall usage of those systems stayed the same or even went down because for ODSP especially, many genuine situations where people needed the system were declined.
12 years later, a study and review was done of the amount of money the government saved under the Harris reforms.
Not only did it have no measurable impact on the number of reported fraud cases, it ended up costing more money than had they done absolutely nothing at all.
The idea that the poor actively need to be fought is this insane capitalist idea that poisons nations.
+3
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
A formerly-homeless friend gave me the idea of keeping canned soup in the car for panhandlers
I mean, I give money sometimes as well, but soup has benefits. You can leave a can of soup at a panhandling spot for someone to find when they return, even.
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knitdanIn ur baseKillin ur guysRegistered Userregular
What are you all too good for outhouses now
Compost toilet is some hippie bullshit but I like the idea of a yurt
“I was quick when I came in here, I’m twice as quick now”
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
Posts
he was also dating a one-legged stripper at the time and she would hop out between songs and have people put money in her fake leg
so like
it was a whole production kinda
That's a different thing.
That's "poor" like the fuckin' idiots in Rent are "poor".
That's poverty tourism. If that's a person's argument for the existence of professional panhandlers that's like saying Bigfoot exists because there's Bigfoot cosplayers.
@Evil Multifarious explain yourself! I know nothing about it, and attempting to learn more illuminates ... little.
Was her name Ilene?
it's a miracle she hasn't killed you yet. where did you find the foolhardy courage to even suggest this?
See also: Welfare queens
I think you hit on an important factor, here
The same people who think begging is lucrative think that there's value in a minimum wage job above and beyond the pay; poors should be grateful that they're saved from the indignity of panhandling, even though they'd make more money, and are able to enjoy Honest Work.
Like
If panhandling were at all lucrative you'd think somebody on these boards would do it professionally. We have a pretty big slice of the anglosphere represented here
let's just say it was because i don't remember
Many buskers have permits and schedules and shit in NYC, it is a legit way to make money, if not very glamorous.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
then he'll pick up his wheelchair again and book it.
he's been doing it for years. someone will drop him off at the shopping center nearby and go from there.
Its not poverty if you can end it at any time.
that is aggressively college
1) I love the new avatar
2) I like to chum the water and then swim with sharks
quite aside from the panhandling: say what
where are the 49/50/51ish of trumpotrons/brexiteers etc on this board
maybe he's the next david blaine
The $9000 / year that I strip away from the state is all ill-gotten gains
We'd better crack down on my $9000 / year, and not the bloated costs encouraged by the military - industrial complex that often balloon into the billions
Health insurance?
It is, because it's a harmful one and insisting they exist hurts people.
So, we're good then.
Is is harmful. My point is is that because you can't tell a scammers from a legit user from standing behind them in the grocery checkout you shouldn't assume the worst.
The police are here?!
*waves magic wand*
I CAN WALK AGAIN
*sprints away*
they keep getting themselves banned, lmao
you can get compost anywhere
lots of other things poop and fall over and die
you don't have to use your own
There's definitely people who do that to make money.
1) I want to see the gear in their pack
2) I want to give them one of my many packs
Aside from the fact that there aren't that many of those people in existence,
There are occasional thems what show up
They don't post in [chat]
Well yeah but can I sail your lack of hunger around the ocean flipping off other countries?
yeah, but they're con artists, plain and simple. There's no reason to give them a name that also lumps them in with legitimate homeless people.
They're just working a con
3) depending on how their clothes look, I sometimes want to ask if they are a hulk or a traveling kung fu warrior.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
i live in a lower income part of town and see a lot of EBT shoppers and i have been trying very hard to strike that balance of displaying that i don't judge and i am cool with it and also i'm just totally not even noticing so you aren't uncomfortable
i deserve an award
I thought that's what "professional panhandler" was a synonym for basically.
Yeah the only thing a flush toilet really requires over a hole in the ground is a water source.
And if you need to get super conservationy about it graywater is fine for use in a toilet
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
Yo
I should do that!
Sure, but I think there's an even stronger point to make, which is that the "scammers" don't actually cost that much.
Here's a little fun fact I like to bust out from time to time:
Back like 15 years ago, when Mike Harris and his Progressive Conservative party ran the Ontario government, Harris made "stopping fraudsters" of the social welfare systems a significant issue.
They introduced a bunch of reforms to the disability support system (ODSP) and the welfare system (Ontario Works) that made them both harder to get, harder to keep, and tried actively to get fraudsters out of the system.
Ostensibly, this was to lower costs to the government, bring down taxes, blah blah blah shithead Conservative talking points.
This dramatically increased workload for those government agencies and programs due to the increased scrutiny needed for current and prospective users of those systems.
Which raised the operating costs of those systems dramatically even while overall usage of those systems stayed the same or even went down because for ODSP especially, many genuine situations where people needed the system were declined.
12 years later, a study and review was done of the amount of money the government saved under the Harris reforms.
Not only did it have no measurable impact on the number of reported fraud cases, it ended up costing more money than had they done absolutely nothing at all.
The idea that the poor actively need to be fought is this insane capitalist idea that poisons nations.
I mean, I give money sometimes as well, but soup has benefits. You can leave a can of soup at a panhandling spot for someone to find when they return, even.
Compost toilet is some hippie bullshit but I like the idea of a yurt
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades