an argument against giving beggars money

I won't give money to people asking for it because where I live if you offer to buy them food instead they cuss at you. So just no, I won't contribute to the booze or drugs, if you are truly in need (I've been there) an offer of food is mana from heaven.

I was shopping last week and an elderly woman was buying a little food and didn't have enough money so was taking things out of her 5 item pile. I handed the cashier the money for her to get all of it and she thanked me. If it was MY mom or grandma trying to get food to eat and couldn't pay 8 bucks for it, I'd hope someone would help them. I was going to offer to buy it all but she was embarrassed enough I gave her 2 dollars, so I just told her you're welcome and let it go. However if she'd had booze I wouldn't have done it heh.

Lil

eh. I think of it as putting good energy out there. I give whenever I have money in my pocket to spare. I don't care what they spend it on, its not about that. The fact of the matter is, if it does bad, well, that's bad they would have found a way to do anyhow.....but if its good, then I am glad that I was able to help. When it all comes down to it, the real fact of the matter is that yes, these simple contributions to my fellow man are one of the many factors that build an unshakable love for myself, and that's a love that I get to share with my family and those I love. I am a better person for it. Cheaply bought nobility? perhaps, but this is what the real karma is....not some universal force that goes about righting wrongs. Its that if you act generous today, and generous tomorrow, then you over time become a generous person. Its simple, and the opposite is true....acting selfish or afraid ingrains those traits as well until you internalize them and become a selfish or fearful person. So, my choice, reach out in aid whenever you can afford to, and the other persons motivation is on them. Why don't you try this.....give the dollar or two next time, and see how you feel. Then withhold the money a few times and see how you feel. Choose which one feels better to you. That's my input.

a reply to: introspectionist

What if someone was begging for mercy? Would you employ the
same reasoning?

Lets say you give someone mercy, because mercy was bestowed on
you in the past by someone who was merciful. The mercy
he gave you can not be given to anyone else. Period.

Can showing mercy actually contribute to maintaining condemnation?
I can count on my intellect to tell me if someone is begging because
their hungry, or for something nefarious. Call it gift for cripes sakes.

Thread fail.

If I have a few bucks extra I will generally give them to the homeless at the train station. I no longer give to charities however, it is not out of greed or contempt for others but due to the abuses I personally experienced during volunteering for a local organization. There was more money spent on "awareness dinners and galas" than actually spent on helping the homeless. Charity is just another business which doesn't pay tax, make no mistake about it. There are some good ones out there so do your research before you donate.

OK, so several of those who made some real contribution to the thread, instead of the sentimental self-righteous off-topic drivel, said something along the lines that it makes no difference because the dollar is injected into the market in either case. I have already argued against this but nobody dissected my counterargument, not sure if anyone read it. I understand that it might be hard to find it, you'd have to plow through a ton of the sentimental drivel to get there.

I would like to compare it to government welfare. I was on welfare for a long time and I hated it.

Every dollar given in government welfare is a dollar taken from somebody in the form of tax, and a dollar that could instead have payed for a service that the welfare recipient provided. The welfare recipient would not have been any richer. But society as a whole would actually have been, because the service that the welfare recipient provided would not have existed otherwise. And as I said before, the dollar could not potentially have gone to pay someone else for a service, either it went to welfare or it payed for the service that the welfare recipient provided. You could argue that the welfare recipient would have been a little bit poorer because he would have to work instead of not working. I argued that a beggar would rather work one hour under a roof than sit five hours out in the cold, the same applies here. By giving government welfare you are inhibiting the welfare recipients from working. It's not that they're lazy, it's that the dollar given to them in welfare simply is not anywhere else, it's not in the market. And you cannot simultaneously be the payer for a service and the provider of said service, so I believe that the argument that it makes no difference because the dollar enters the market anyway probably is flawed. The beggar is not going to work to provide the service he is the buyer of. You cannot be on both ends of the transaction simultaneously. Anything I said about government welfare applies to giving money to beggars and vice versa, the only difference is that in the latter case there is no middleman.

When giving money to beggars you are inhibiting them from getting work. It's kind of like you push someone to the ground and simultaneously say "poor you that can't stand up". The general fallacy of liberalism right there. I believe on a higher level it's used against you. And actually I believe there might be an even higher dimension to it that few people ever talk about, which is based on the enlightenment of suffering. Personally I believe it is might is right on a global scale; the smartest people are more or less Nazis, and they have brainwashed the rest of humanity into subservience because in the power struggle all means are allowed. To quote the book The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli:

If you act virtuously, you will be undone by those who are not, make use of this or not according to need.

And I actually believe that there is a spiritual dimension to it. The masses simply do not listen or comprehend because they are unable to. They have to be enlightened through suffering from failure. This is the purpose of Christianity and the Jews are the Nazis I talked about. It's been camouflaged. Israel are those that have suffered because of the emotionally intelligent, i.e. the groupthinkers, and therefore become enlightened. And in order to enlighten the rest of humanity, those that are not there yet, they have to make them go through the same suffering they did. This is the reason the elite are simultaneously promoting feminism and Islam in the West, something that otherwise would appear to make no sense whatsoever. It's like your child whines about how good it is to touch the stove and they won't listen to you. So you encourage them, push them, to touch the stove, in order to make them learn. All of Marxism serves this purpose. Those are my thoughts on Marxism, Zionism, Christians, Jews, Nazis and Israel, and it can all be seen in this thread. The way I see it the emotionally intelligent people, the "useful idiots", do serve a purpose though. It's just like in The Matrix, the agents build the machine world, and without the agents and the machine world Neo would not have awoken.

Feel free to dissect or argue against anything I have said in this post or in these two:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Yesterday when I was eating out a guy came up to me with a paper on which it was written that he had impaired hearing and wanted to sell pens. How weird isn't that? If that has ever happened to me before it's very rare. Felt like a synchronicity.

Don't know if the lack of response in the thread is because most people on this forum are Americans and they haven't woken up yet or if it's some other reason. I'll just wait and see if anyone replies or not.

a reply to: introspectionist


I agree money will never rule me.I think of what it takes to actually get out in public to beg for money not sure I could do it.

I gave to a homeless man yesterday if fact it was the first homeless person I've seen around here and I got more from it than he did. I had a trunk full of groceries at the time in my car it made me feel very blessed so a few buck? well worth the deed.
One day I maybe in his shoes....

None of what you are saying is necesssary you either give or don't! people are homeless or down and out for various reasons you can't lump them all into one category.

I'm speechless

originally posted by: introspectionist
I'm speechless

I seriously doubt that...

originally posted by: introspectionist
Yesterday when I was eating out a guy came up to me with a paper on which it was written that he had impaired hearing and wanted to sell pens. How weird isn't that? If that has ever happened to me before it's very rare. Felt like a synchronicity.

Don't know if the lack of response in the thread is because most people on this forum are Americans and they haven't woken up yet or if it's some other reason. I'll just wait and see if anyone replies or not.

Most probably was synchronicity - did you give the hearing impaired beggar a dollar?

An 'argument' of this nature and spaghetti-bowl complexity could only come from a position of relative wealth.
No beggars are posting on ATS with the computers driven by the electricity payed for with begged dollars.
OP didn't like being on welfare...really a euphemism for 'begging off the taxpayer' - what changed?
Employment positions are traded like swapcards by big business - those positions delivering service disappear C/O big business that receives inordinate amounts of tax breaks, and buildings full of taxation specialists, slicing invisible money from their books to avoid the game of paddle-wheeling the economy - so they can sit in comfort and mount arguments as to why giving a measly dollar will deprive them of the Gaggia machine in the corner of the kitchen, or whether they have the affront to determine how the invisible or paper and coinage goes 'round.

It's not emotional whatever-ism, it's the practicality of survival...

Å99

originally posted by: akushla99

originally posted by: introspectionist
Yesterday when I was eating out a guy came up to me with a paper on which it was written that he had impaired hearing and wanted to sell pens. How weird isn't that? If that has ever happened to me before it's very rare. Felt like a synchronicity.

Don't know if the lack of response in the thread is because most people on this forum are Americans and they haven't woken up yet or if it's some other reason. I'll just wait and see if anyone replies or not.

did you give the hearing impaired beggar a dollar?

Don't know if you call that a beggar. Although it is kind of begging when you come up to the table of someone who is eating in a restaurant and want to sell stuff. I did not buy a pen. I was a bit befuddled by the event. If it happens again I might.

OP didn't like being on welfare...really a euphemism for 'begging off the taxpayer' - what changed?

nothing changed

Employment positions are traded like swapcards by big business - those positions delivering service disappear C/O big business that receives inordinate amounts of tax breaks, and buildings full of taxation specialists, slicing invisible money from their books to avoid the game of paddle-wheeling the economy - so they can sit in comfort and mount arguments as to why giving a measly dollar will deprive them of the Gaggia machine in the corner of the kitchen, or whether they have the affront to determine how the invisible or paper and coinage goes 'round.

All kinds of surrounding context and circumstances are interesting to look at and discuss. However, in this case I clearly defined what I wanted to discuss. Not one of your posts has addressed the main topic I presented for discussion.

It's not emotional whatever-ism, it's the practicality of survival...

It is emotional intelligence that makes it impossible for people to look beyond their conditioning and have an emotionally detached intellectual discussion.

a reply to: introspectionist

originally posted by: introspectionist

originally posted by: akushla99

originally posted by: introspectionist
Yesterday when I was eating out a guy came up to me with a paper on which it was written that he had impaired hearing and wanted to sell pens. How weird isn't that? If that has ever happened to me before it's very rare. Felt like a synchronicity.

Don't know if the lack of response in the thread is because most people on this forum are Americans and they haven't woken up yet or if it's some other reason. I'll just wait and see if anyone replies or not.

did you give the hearing impaired beggar a dollar?

Don't know if you call that a beggar. Although it is kind of begging when you come up to the table of someone who is eating in a restaurant and want to sell stuff. I did not buy a pen. I was a bit befuddled by the event. If it happens again I might.

OP didn't like being on welfare...really a euphemism for 'begging off the taxpayer' - what changed?

nothing changed

Employment positions are traded like swapcards by big business - those positions delivering service disappear C/O big business that receives inordinate amounts of tax breaks, and buildings full of taxation specialists, slicing invisible money from their books to avoid the game of paddle-wheeling the economy - so they can sit in comfort and mount arguments as to why giving a measly dollar will deprive them of the Gaggia machine in the corner of the kitchen, or whether they have the affront to determine how the invisible or paper and coinage goes 'round.

All kinds of surrounding context and circumstances are interesting to look at and discuss. However, in this case I clearly defined what I wanted to discuss. Not one of your posts has addressed the main topic I presented for discussion.

It's not emotional whatever-ism, it's the practicality of survival...

It is emotional intelligence that makes it impossible for people to look beyond their conditioning and have an emotionally detached intellectual discussion.

What is quite clear, is that you are 'discussing' nothing with anyone who disagrees with your premised example - instead, labelling these respondents with the 'emotionally charged' moniker...way to 'discuss'...
The only 'actual' question (with a question mark) has been answered in a number of ways - perhaps not to your satisfaction, but that rider should have been included in the OP.

'Nothing changed'
So you are still dependant for your next meal on the 'service' provided by a model that services your welfare, C/O the taxpayer? - how are you, or did you, justifying this 'one-way' transaction?

Å99

originally posted by: akushla99
a reply to: introspectionist

originally posted by: introspectionist

originally posted by: akushla99

originally posted by: introspectionist
Yesterday when I was eating out a guy came up to me with a paper on which it was written that he had impaired hearing and wanted to sell pens. How weird isn't that? If that has ever happened to me before it's very rare. Felt like a synchronicity.

Don't know if the lack of response in the thread is because most people on this forum are Americans and they haven't woken up yet or if it's some other reason. I'll just wait and see if anyone replies or not.

did you give the hearing impaired beggar a dollar?

Don't know if you call that a beggar. Although it is kind of begging when you come up to the table of someone who is eating in a restaurant and want to sell stuff. I did not buy a pen. I was a bit befuddled by the event. If it happens again I might.

OP didn't like being on welfare...really a euphemism for 'begging off the taxpayer' - what changed?

nothing changed

Employment positions are traded like swapcards by big business - those positions delivering service disappear C/O big business that receives inordinate amounts of tax breaks, and buildings full of taxation specialists, slicing invisible money from their books to avoid the game of paddle-wheeling the economy - so they can sit in comfort and mount arguments as to why giving a measly dollar will deprive them of the Gaggia machine in the corner of the kitchen, or whether they have the affront to determine how the invisible or paper and coinage goes 'round.

All kinds of surrounding context and circumstances are interesting to look at and discuss. However, in this case I clearly defined what I wanted to discuss. Not one of your posts has addressed the main topic I presented for discussion.

It's not emotional whatever-ism, it's the practicality of survival...

It is emotional intelligence that makes it impossible for people to look beyond their conditioning and have an emotionally detached intellectual discussion.

What is quite clear, is that you are 'discussing' nothing with anyone who disagrees with your premised example - instead, labelling these respondents with the 'emotionally charged' moniker...way to 'discuss'...
The only 'actual' question (with a question mark) has been answered in a number of ways - perhaps not to your satisfaction, but that rider should have been included in the OP.

'Nothing changed'
So you are still dependant for your next meal on the 'service' provided by a model that services your welfare, C/O the taxpayer? - how are you, or did you, justifying this 'one-way' transaction?

Å99

I have tried to give counterarguments to those that contributed to the debate. I don't think you have read the entire thread. I wish I hadn't asked the extra add-on questions at the end, because those were not meant to be the main focus of debate, but they were the only part that a vast majority of posters addressed. Those I call emotionally intelligent, because they probably are, are not those that made a real contribution to the discussion but those who only posted sentimental drivel and refused to look at the core issue discussed.

Nothing changed because I didn't necessarily like welfare policies just because I was a recipient of welfare which you seem to imply one must. If you bothered to read the thread you might understand why.

What is 'the core issue'?

Charity? Beggars? Long-bow economics? Spiritual herf-up? Big business? Welfare policy?

The OP was a confused analog that drew a tenuous link between the dollar, the beggar, employment - to somehow build a case against giving beggars money...if you'd 'bothered' to clarify what it was you wanted to 'discuss' from the outset (which you kind of admitted you didn't) you could never have gotten to the point of dismissing replies as 'sentimental drivel'...

Clarify.

Å99

originally posted by: akushla99
What is 'the core issue'?

Charity? Beggars? Long-bow economics? Spiritual herf-up? Big business? Welfare policy?

The OP was a confused analog that drew a tenuous link between the dollar, the beggar, employment - to somehow build a case against giving beggars money...if you'd 'bothered' to clarify what it was you wanted to 'discuss' from the outset (which you kind of admitted you didn't) you could never have gotten to the point of dismissing replies as 'sentimental drivel'...

Clarify.

Å99

The core issue was the argument against giving beggars money. After stating the argument I said I wanted people to dissect and/or argue against it. That was what I wanted the thread to be about. The extra part about whether or not people give money to beggars and why was meant to be only a complement, connected to the argument, not the main discussion. If it was meant to be the main discussion I hadn't posted it only as a short add-on at the end after writing mostly about other things.

I don't really mean to take any position, I am interested in the discussion of the arguments.

I said I didn't necessarily like welfare policies when I was a welfare recipient. I wrote in another post about how I think policies like this have many dimensions of meaning. Being a truth seeker I don't really attach emotionally so much to any side, as much as I'm looking for truth. I have discussed in other threads spiritual dimensions of crony capitalism and other things. It's multidimensional phenomena like that that make me not sure at all where I stand. (And I don't care so much about taking a stand as the search for answers in itself.) On the one hand I think my life might have been easier without many of the leftist policies. But on the other hand if I had grown up in a free market economy I had probably been a totally different person, and not necessarily for the better. I think the friction that systems of crony capitalism, leftist policies etc. cause is part of a complex issue. I think there are spiritual dimensions to it. But none of these abstractions and other dimensions were the issue I addressed in this thread, here it was clearly defined as a particular issue to discuss.

a reply to: introspectionist

Thank you

The example you gave of money changing hands and being somehow responsible for the loss of employment at some other juncture, doesn't seem to take into account the beggar him/herself. Did this beggar pay taxes for most if their life?...and why is welfare denied them, when the taxes they paid were paid as a mandatory proxy insurance for when they might need it?...you know, for welfare...
That dollar you give might deny someone else the dollar - but the beggar might be able to buy a haircut and a cheap suit to go for a job interview, so they wouldn't be a beggar being discussed. In that case, depending on his/her qualifications they might either get the job, or not - to someone else.
In a sense, beggars are self-start entrepreneurs, utilising caveat emptor to suspicious customers, every day.
They are not a burden on the economy (as they rely on donation) are poorly serviced to the point of abject poverty, and should surely only pay a tax, by percentage, of what they earn - which is bugger all.
The dollar you give them might (under certain circumstances) get them to bring important ideas to a position of employment - but you'd have to let that cat out of the bag...
I'd rather give $5.00 to a beggar than buy a brand name t-shirt with logo, that I am not getting paid to advertise - hey, there's an idea! Beggars sitting in front of banners of (your favorite cola drink) paid to promote, as they beg...who the hell loses?

Å99

originally posted by: akushla99
a reply to: introspectionist

Thank you

I get the feeling you're coming into this thread posting without having read much of the thread.

Did this beggar pay taxes for most if their life?...and why is welfare denied them, when the taxes they paid were paid as a mandatory proxy insurance for when they might need it?...you know, for welfare...

I used government welfare as a comparison. The debate is about giving money to beggars.

That dollar you give might deny someone else the dollar - but the beggar might be able to buy a haircut and a cheap suit to go for a job interview, so they wouldn't be a beggar being discussed. In that case, depending on his/her qualifications they might either get the job, or not - to someone else. In a sense, beggars are self-start entrepreneurs, utilising caveat emptor to suspicious customers, every day. They are not a burden on the economy (as they rely on donation) are poorly serviced to the point of abject poverty, and should surely only pay a tax, by percentage, of what they earn - which is bugger all. The dollar you give them might (under certain circumstances) get them to bring important ideas to a position of employment - but you'd have to let that cat out of the bag... I'd rather give $5.00 to a beggar than buy a brand name t-shirt with logo, that I am not getting paid to advertise - hey, there's an idea! Beggars sitting in front of banners of (your favorite cola drink) paid to promote, as they beg...who the hell loses?

I have addressed your arguments. Please read the following three posts and see if you can dissect and refute the arguments in them:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

a reply to: introspectionist

Just a really quick addition to that post before I head off to work.

I think that the purpose of Marxism, Zionism, feminism etc. might be to elevate people above the corporeal, to end the wheel of birth.

I talked about it in this post:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

The state that Noam Chomsky talks about here:



It is exactly the same thing as low emotional intelligence. Compare to how for example Buddhism talks about just observing the world, including yourself and your thoughts, without emotional attachment. This state of being a free-floating atom in space, having low emotional intelligence, is comparable to autism, and it's not all that different from solitary confinement. I believe Jews have a form of autism.

Sam Harris talks about solitary confinement among other interesting things.

solitary confinement—which is essentially what we are talking about—is considered a punishment even inside a prison. Even when cooped up with homicidal maniacs and rapists, most people still prefer the company of others to spending any significant amount of time alone in a box. And yet, for thousands of years, contemplatives have claimed to find extraordinary depths of psychological well-being while spending vast stretches of time in total isolation.

www.samharris.org...

www.youtube.com...

www.youtube.com...

a reply to: introspectionist

Your argument is convoluted...schemes like these are already in operation under different guises - but if I see a beggar I will give them money to content their stomach so they have the strength and right mind through nutrition to undertake a job in the first instance - all the other spiritual palaver through isms is like doctors in a triage room debating the hypocratic oath while the patient bleeds to death...

I'll leave you to your self stimulation

Å99

Here's the conclusion I came to about 3 years ago when I noticed this panhandling thing becoming a major issue in my local area (South Florida):

Every single interstate exit here (I-95) has people on every side of the intersection at most hours of the day or night these days. I even witnessed one day, a fairly new SUV stop and two of the panhandlers (beggars) got out and walked to opposite sides of the intersection, one male, one female and looking a bit pregnant (with a sign that said so).

As I sat there waiting at the lights, I put myself in their shoes. (5years ago I myself was homeless, and only had a storage unit and a car).

I thought to myself "what would I do if I was down, broke and needed to get back on my feet?"

I went through a list of things in my head, ask my parents, ask my friends, ask my siblings, ask my former step-mom, ask my recent neighbors, ask my childhood neighbors, ask former co-workers, and I continued down this list.

I realized then, than any logical person would do the same. So either:

A) They have let down every single one of those people, and everyone knows that they are not trustworthy to lend money to, and not capable of keeping their crap together long enough to actually get somewhere. if this is the case, this person is clearly a bad investment and by giving them money, we are being enablers.

or

B) They have people in their lives who would help financially, or even bed and food for a week to get cleaned up, go to some job interviews etc BUT they chose not to use that option because it's so much easier to beg/panhandle and make $250-400/day. In which case, this person is a piece of crap and making more money than I do running my own business!

A good friend worked with a guy who now panhandles and the guy said he usually makes over $300/day. Roughly makes $2 on every redlight change he said. And he's only out there in the afternoon/evening.