Supporting "Beggers"?

Driving near South Station at rush hour is like trying to drive through the Running of the Bulls at Pamplona . As the driver, it is frightening to see how quickly people dash out into the road with no regard for passing vehicles. As a pedestrian who has already taken a turn as the driver, it makes one wait for the light to turn and still shocked at how concerned people seem to be about missing their train, so much so that they put their lives in the hands of impatient motorists. With all the hustle and bustle, one may not notice the man standing on the sidewalk near the entrance to the T. Dressed in a flannel shirt and jeans, holding a pile of newspapers in front of his chest, head held up, white hair under a cap, he yells “Spare Change.” People appear to pay little to no notice. When he catches your eye you see a glimmer of hope, one he probably does not see often if he stands on this median strip every day (I hope for his morale that he does not).

Spare Change is a newspaper based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that strives to empower the homeless by providing useful skills, the ability to make money, and moreover the ability to help themselves change their current state. Spare Change works with the Homeless Empowerment Project to promote all of the above. According to the Spare Change blog, the newspapers are “produced by volunteers and sold by homeless and formerly homeless vendors in need of extra cash” (www.sparechangenews.blogspot .com). While the reason I have most heard cited for not giving change to people begging on the sidewalk is that these people have the ability to work and are choosing not to, this reason is now debunked when a man is selling newspapers. He now has a product to sell and is not simply begging. So why would people choose to still ignore him?
Since consumers have the right to choose to purchase anything that for one they have the money to purchase and two that is in their legal right to purchase, it is important that we ask ourselves why a consumer chooses to or not to purchase a good. First of all, the people rushing past Mr. Spare Change as we will call him, were clear in their actions that they were busy, had little time to give, and really only wanted to get to their train or other form of transportation. Their sense of apathy about social issues may have been heightened by their need to return home after a full day of work. Or maybe the call out of “spare change” only made them think of the beggers that try to entice them to drop their hard earned money into a plastic cup daily, money that may then be used for any reason-alcohol or food or drugs or medicine, they will never know.

Without doing a full psychology/consumer behavior study on the behaviors of the people who chose to walk past instead of stop and purchase the newspaper or who bumped into the man without a glance back, the only thing that rings true is the feeling that a person gets when they take a moment to look at what occurs around them. To see the man standing in the mass of swarming people, holding what may be his only source of income, while apathetic, over-worked America ignores him or pushes into him is disconcerting. The picture had I been holding a camera, would have been worth more than anything I can say on the subject. It is clear in these moments how a person could feel a sense of hopelessness, when the community that should be supporting them, is taking the indifferent approach and carrying on seeking out what may be the survival of the fittest mentality, but definitely not a community-based approach. The lack of community in American cities and towns provides the ability for people to walk by a person truly trying to make a living and ignore them as if they were just a begger on the sidewalk. The point is that everyday when you are going about your daily routine you should take a moment to think about the actions that you take, and how they not only affect you and your family, but the community as a whole.