This town sickens me at times. The fact that we have dozens of pseudo-homeless beggars accosting us when we are attempting to walk to work, class or even to a friend’s house makes me physically ill. I have a dream. That dream is to stroll freely down High Street and not have to tell 14 or 15 people that I will not give them change.
Now, to prove that I am not just a heartless bastard with no compassion for his fellow man, I will explain what I mean by the term pseudo-homeless: A pseudo-homeless person acts as if they are homeless or an addict, or some other poor person truly in need of assistance. How can one tell the difference between these people and the true homeless, you ask? One sure way is notice their clothes. If the same person has asked you for change every day for a month, try to see if they wear the same clothes for a week or so. Chances are if they don’t, they have a reliable place to stay. If they ask for the same exact amount, chances are they’ve been at this a while.
This next bit is for you younger students. There are a few local pseudo-homeless people that you can recognize on sight. I have had the privilege of staying in our fair city for four full years, as I am beginning my fifth year at our illustrious university, so I have identified some of these characters for your convenience.
We have the “Help is on the way” guy, who is dressed in clean, relatively new looking clothes and usually sporting even more variety in his wardrobe than I do. I have seen this man driving a car, I have seen him wearing a new watch, new clothes and riding the bus downtown.
There is a particular woman who will address you directly, walk into your path and ask “Excuse me sir, do you have 75 cents?” in a stoned slur. This is an act. I have seen this woman outside of McDonald’s carrying on a completely normal conversation with another man. Totally normal, no slur, completely coherent.
There is also a fair amount of people in the same age bracket as you or I who will ask you personally, or via a cardboard sign, for money for drugs. And they even specify: “Need money for acid, coke, pot, ecstasy, beer. Please help.” If they want to buy drugs, they ought to get a job just like other kids who want to buy drugs. Some weeks I can’t even afford $2 for a sandwich, but I’m going to think it’s cool that you wasted all your money on coke and now want mine, too. Piss off.
To pacify you whiny hippie-types, I will say that there are some people who have legitimate reasons to ask for your spare change, but they are very few and very, very far between. And, those of us with jobs spend our hard-earned money in the form of federal, state and local taxes, which go toward outreach programs, rehab programs and shelters for those individuals who have truly run on hard times.
But these people who are more than capable of getting a real job and are just too lazy to do so, who would rather spend their time bothering me for my hard-earned pocket change, do not deserve my help. If, with all the help the city, state and even independent charity organizations offer them, these people are unable to get on their feet in four years, I have no compassion.
After this year, I will be somewhere in the neighborhood of $15,000 in debt to our country in the form of student loans, and that is considered to be getting off light. These parasites who beg for my hard currency and collect a monthly check from the state which you and I so happily supply are quite a bit better off than I am. They ought to be giving me money. If all of us stop giving them cash, they might be forced to become productive members of society. I can dream, can’t I?
Eric Harrelson is a senior in English. He can be reached for comment at [email protected].
