'Benchwarmers' sought to block Homeless

'Benchwarmers' sought to block Homeless

www.rawstory.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Ahh man, I don't really know what to say to this...I know it's an upscale community, so I know why they're trying to dissuade the homeless people from taking up residence. But on the other hand, with the way things are going here in the states, there's going to be a lot more of us joining these people over the coming months and years, so I feel for them as well. It's a really sad situation...

www.rawstory.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by DimensionalDetective

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The merchants are ignorant. They are very close to the level of the men of Sodom and Gomorrah. If Angels walk the earth ,they pose as bums in order to test humanity for compassion. No one does enough to help the poor ,but making life hard for those who are less fortunate is begging for bad karma.

I guess the homeless don't have it bad enough. Not only are they basically forgotten by society, but now we don't want them to sit on benches.

I don't want any alarms to sound, but I'm pretty sure they use the sidewalks too. Maybe we should have people start taking shifts sleeping in discarded cardboard boxes also?

I think that the police have powers to move people from doorways and pavements but not benches because they are for public usage.

I might be wrong though .

I wish i had the means to make portable lightweight folding benches and give them to homeless people so that they could put them where they wanted.
All because people dont want to be reminded of what they can be reduced to.Tough i say because they are not exempt from hardship and homelessness can happen to anyone.

Damn, that's cold.

So what's the logic? We would rather pay people to take up our bench space, than let poor people do it for free? You're spending money for the exact same effect?

The way this nation behaves towards its homeless is ridiculous.

It isn't bad enough that there are people with no home. Now there are creeps who'd begrudge them a decent rest as well. Instead of getting people to occupy benches, why don't the citizens try and figure out where they can set up a shelter for these people to sleep on cots with a roof over their heads and a meal in their bellies?

reply to post by Sublime620

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You're so funnyyyy!!!!

I think it's heartless. (Not your sense of humor)

It's like people think the homeless CHOOSE to be homeless. "Meh, why have a home? It's such a BOTHER, you just have to clean it over and over and OVER!"

I'm glad no one has offered to be a benchwarmer. And I hope no one invites this woman for cocktails for months.

I sometimes wonder if I became a homeless bum what would I do. I know when I was trucking, there were plenty of truck stop bums bummin all the time no matter where the truck stop was. Than I tripped to florida and realy seen the bum problem. Bums there sleep under the over passes and off ramps by motels, hotels, resturaunts and any place they can bum a dime. At the off ramps they mob ya for a quarter or buck if ya stop.

So if I was a bum, I'd want it warm with at least 10-15 bucks a day to eat and drink from. Than I'd want one of those recliner folding hiker chairs of cloth to carry on my back from walmart with my plastic travel bag filled with my stuff.

Now that I think of it, bums need help and the city should outfit them to live in the wild like they normaly do. If they gave the bum a folding recliner chair to sit on, the park bench would be open for the birds to sit and go blurp on. Than they would complain about the birds doo dooing the benchs.

reply to post by eradown

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Who's to say what is actually doing the poor good? Are handouts and unearned freebies thereby subsidizing their poverty good for them? Is making their state of poverty so uncomfortable and unbearable as to motivate them up and out of it helping?

If they are angels as you claim then I suppose I should be prepared to plead my case to the lord himself.

Here's a Ben Franklin line for ya:

Why don't they just get rid of the benches?

If they have people sitting on them to keep the homeless off, it is going to keep everyone off, right? So why not get rid of them instead of wasting those people's time?

Other thread got closed, so I copypasta my comment across.


Yeah great community initiative

Maybe these people would benefit more from spending three hours volunteering at a homeless shelter, or trying to help these people get back on their feet instead of sitting on their butts to spite less fortunate humans.

As to the Ben Franklin quote there, I don't think that homeless people exactly have it easy. There are some people who do actually choose to live like that, but for the rest, many are caught in a catch 22, and many have degraded into other problems like drugs and alcohol which make them unemployable at all. Whilst that is their own choice to take the first step into drugs or alcohol, there's no way they can really get out of the hole they created unless someone reaches a hand down to help them.

I believe Benjamin Franklin was a wealthy man himself, or his chronic alcoholism would have numbered him amongst the poor as well.

I'm sure they afforded him a good, cheap source of labor though, and he felt all warm and fuzzy inside for being so altruistic.

reply to post by LLoyd45

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Mr. Franklin aside I'm not rich and I don't drink yet I've always believed a boot in the ass was worth more than the change in my pocket for these people. Personal experience has proven it true not just for myself but for anyone I've ever met whose slammed into rock bottom. They're always much better off than the guy I know living in section 8 housing and trading their EBT (paid for by my taxes) for drugs.

Let the addicts die under bridges. They chose to use. Let those who chose to be vagrants be vagrants but let's also allow people to decide to give rather than force them to give through taxation. I know April 15th always gives me a fuzzy altruistic feeling.

At least there are a few people who give a crap about their fellow man.

Tough love sometimes works, but other times, it's just the more convenient choice, and a way to fool yourself because you don't want to deal with the problem.

Selfish attitudes of "It's not my problem" get society nowhere.

Turning a blind eye never helps, the problems still there, and it always will be unless we do something positive to help.

Which, returning to the original topic, does not involve spiting homeless people out of a place to sit.

Are homeless not part of the public? If not, what are they a part of?

It's not easy at all to get a place to live after you are homeless. In order to have a place to live (address) then you need income. Income usually means having to have a job. With no address, phone number, place to bath/shower, etc, you are highly unlikely to find a job.

I'm definitely not rich and I don't drink either. Sometimes a "firm hand" is needed to mtivate people into doing for themselves, But a "boot in the butt" might be at bit extreme. "Yes", some of these people do choose this lifestyle, but they're in the minority.

I've met very few people that are homeless who enjoy their situation. Most ended up that way because they lost a job, became injured, suffered from an undiagnosed mental illness, or just had a run of bad luck.

What makes me an authority on the subject, I was homeless once myself. I lived in a hole, in a vacant lot for almost a year. Believe me, I didn't enjoy the experience. What saved me was someone cared enough to give me a helping hand, not a "handout".

After I got back on my feet, I went to school and made something out of my life. I worked as a counselor for several years with the homeless, the mentally ill, the developmentally disabled, and chronic substance abusers. All these groups are not mutually exclusive either.

Many of the homeless people you see today are families. They ended up on the streets due to the crappy economy and economic setbacks. Most people statistically speaking are only a couple of paychecks away from being homeless as well. If you have no family to bail you out, you're scr-wed for the most part.

Once you become one of the disenfranchised members of society you become invisible. Nobody wants to talk to you, or even have you around. You're a constant reminder of what can happen to them. Some people do care though, and I thank God for them.

Haha. Well, if they start sleeping on our side walk we might have a problem - a SERIOUS problem! Murder would probably be justified! I've already organized the cardboard box sleep in, and am in the planning stages for the dumpster security guard coalition.

I've been to poor countries where homeless people are just considered normal. They lay around anywhere and everywhere. I remember going to Manilla and seeing a bunch of people sleeping in the grass on the median in the middle of the day. Young kids too.

It's something that you don't except in a more urbanized environment I suppose. The attitude displayed by the article is somewhat disgusting, I would suggest - but what would you do if your front lawn became a habitat for a homeless man named Bob, who was 43 years and and became homeless after a fire destroyed his house and killed his wife and three children? In reality, most homeless probably have horrible sob stories, so why chose one over the other? Guilt? Desire to help? The common citizen is put in a rather sticky situation.

People and government have the right to property, and that includes not having a bunch of people (homeless or otherwise) sitting on donated benches, or those that tax dollars have paid for. I've never heard of anyone organizing a group to actually allow homeless the use of public tax payer benches.

A bunch of idiots taking bench duty sounds pretty ridiculous to me. If I was about to eat my lunch on a bench and saw a homeless guy sleeping there, I'd probably just give him my lunch instead of trying to kick him off of the bench.

reply to post by Jessicamsa

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You're right on all points Jessica. Without those things it's very hard to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. First of all, you have to have some bootstraps to pull yourself up with. Thankfully there are a few people willing to lend you a pair. Thanks for your post.

Why can't these people pay the money they're going to pay these others to erect special benches or areas (or even pay for a hostel) FOR THE HOMELESS, that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

It's corporatism gone stupid, paying for people to keep the benches away from those who need them when they could use it effectively FOR THE GOOD of those who need them...

Makes me wish I didn't have business degrees because it looks bad on everyone who does when sick-minded business types come up with 'executive plans' like this.

It's a BENCH not a private jet or their front lawn...