by Attack Ships on Fire » Sun Aug 13, 2006 7:06 pm
Arcadia, I just wanted to comment on your response. I know you didn't mean any offense and none was taken when I read what you said, but I also wanted to add this follow-up.<br><br>When I wrote my original post I almost added saying that your wife is part of a large group of anonymous people that I see through the course of my daily life, but I decided that it sounded too feel good. Still, after I read your post I feel that you need to know that: it's not all bad, uncaring people out there, at least in the city that I live in. While walking down the street of my city I've seen people dressed in housemom clothing or business attaire engaging in conversation with homeless people. I know of dozens of local organizations that attract interest and donations that help homeless people, as well as battered wives, kids in trouble or people that are in crisis. I've also seen homeless people abuse the good will of strangers, but almost all of my experience with these sorts of individuals are with street kids that are doing the homeless thing to be cool or avant guard rather than out of necessity. During her last job, my wife saw an older Asian man beg every day for change on a street corner. One day she saw this same man being picked up by a newer model minivan, which probably means this guy isn't homeless and begging for change is his job.<br><br>My experiences have led me to believe in supporting the organizations that exist to address and support the homeless and not the individuals begging for spare change. Your wife did the right thing by suggesting to this woman that she can get some help from your local organizations, but ultimately it is up to the individual to seek the help. My common sense tells me that if you're pregnant and not getting help, you're an idiot, but as the old saying goes, you still can't force a horse to drink water if it doesn't want to.<br><br>I think that there is a tremendous amount of change happening with average citizens because of the freedom of information. 25-30 years ago people would automatically give spare change to someone without question; then sometime in the 80s people began to become jaded, but organizations started to increase awareness of how people can help. Today there are dozens of ways to help homeless people in my city, whether by donating clothes, money, supporting awareness or by taking part in conversations like this one. Every little bit helps, and I also believe that the same thing is happening with the movements towards raising the awareness of people towards world affairs, conspiracies and cover-ups.<br><br>Also, you don't hear about good news that much on the news because it doesn't grab the attention the same way that death, disease and fear does, but good news still happens when you're not watching or learning about it. If you're feeling helpless, try to spend some time finding out what good your local organizations are doing for the homeless because they have a daily, frontline view of the situation; all we see is a seemingly endless parade of people on street corners as we walk to work, so it can look hopeless. When you think about it, would you know about the world's current level of fear and uncertainty over terrorism if you didn't tune into the news? Of course not, but you don't see the daily effect of this escalation in fear if you live in North America and haven't walked into an airport in the last week. We're aware of all these things going on around us like terrorism, Bush being an idiot, financial meltdowns and so on because we're paying attention to the news placed in front of us; by the same token, if we investigated what's happening with charities around us locally, we might find something to feel good about. All those millions of dollars and untold hours of volunteering are coming from somewhere, aren't they?<br><br>Cheer up. It's not all bad. Yes, the problems of global warming, nukes, terrorists and corrupt politicians are still out there, but you need to stay mentally healthy too. It is not all bad, and the first step in combating the problems is recognizing they exist, then combating them. There are so many horrors that can happen to anyone that it's easy for a person paying attention to the world around them to want to withdraw from it all so it will go away, but it's not worth surrendering the fight for.<br><br>Your wife did a good, compassionate act and there's nothing wrong in saying "Thank you". Feel good about having a woman like that. Tell her some stranger on the internet thinks she rocks and deserves a pat on the back. And enjoy the day.<br> <p></p><i></i>