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R2Icon
Joined: 10 Sep 2009 Posts: 1444
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Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 12:08 pm Post subject: Should we give a home to a homeless person? |
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I’ve often wondered this. We have a few spare bedrooms here at home and there’s lots of homeless people who could usefully use them. I speak to the homeless people of our town quite often- feed them now and again, and feel a bit guilty that I don’t invite them home for a bath and a proper meal and a bed. But where would it end? At what point do you say- well that’s your lot. Homeless people tend to (but not always) have other issues (health, drugs, alcohol, financial, crime etc), so do you take on that as well? Do you try to turn their lives around or just give them a place to sleep and let them get on with it? |
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ruddlescat
Joined: 16 Sep 2010 Posts: 18010 Location: Near Chester
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Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 1:11 pm Post subject: |
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Whilst I have great sympathy for anyone homeless especially in winter's freezing conditions my experience is that any help would have to be limited to the minimum period necessary to ensure they stay alive
As you say Rach, most but not all come with lots of problems and I have a close friend who took in such a person but simply could not live with the alcohol abuse and violent tempers which went with it
At one point there was a real danger she might have had to leave her own house so I would be very wary of getting involved on anything other than a temporary basis _________________ Are you ready for a Ruddles? |
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R2Icon
Joined: 10 Sep 2009 Posts: 1444
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Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 1:32 pm Post subject: |
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For me it’s not enough to just give them a warm bed for one or two nights, surely that just postpones whatever happens to them next? I think if you are going to intervene in their life, it should be to make a real difference, and for that you’d have to take on all their issues and then help to sort them out- rehabilitate them in effect, back into society. How successful you would be as an individual doing this, is questionable: you could put months; years even, of your life into one person only for them to fall straight back where they came from, the moment you release them into the wild, so to speak. The best way I think is sort the problem out collectively at a society level by providing properly-funded hostels with enough capacity so that no one should have to sleep rough other than by choice. In a nutshell we either need to pay more tax or spend the taxes we pay already in a way that redefines what it means to be a civilised country. |
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ruddlescat
Joined: 16 Sep 2010 Posts: 18010 Location: Near Chester
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Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 2:07 pm Post subject: |
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Well Rach,if we abolished the foreign aid budget and replaced it with a smaller emergency fund controlled by the Foreign Office to cover one off disasters around the world where our help is really needed there would be plenty of funds available to make sure every British citizen had a warm bed every night
And of course if the Government ceased wasting public funds on pointless military exercises in Afghanistan,Iraq and Libya then who knows - disabled people and cancer sufferers might not have to have their benefits cut
Never a more typical case in my view where charity should begin at home _________________ Are you ready for a Ruddles? |
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littlepieces
Joined: 10 Jan 2010 Posts: 1098 Location: Lowestoft
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Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 6:20 pm Post subject: |
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I have worked with the homeless in the past and some of them are the funniest and warm hearted people there is.Yes there are problems with drugs alcohol and mental health but then again you could say that about life in general
Don't get me wrong i don't think i could have someone from the streets living with me but don't write them off _________________ I found out how you can hurt an insect.It's the bees knees |
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R2Icon
Joined: 10 Sep 2009 Posts: 1444
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Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 4:05 pm Post subject: |
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I was going to start a new thread on Homeless people cos Jezza was talking about them again today, although today it was about feeling guilty for not giving them money but this thread was just a few down the list - so it's back at the top again. My thoughts haven't changed other than to say , don't feel guilty about not giving homeless people money- money isn't what they need. They need massive investment of time, not of individuls but at large organisation/government level, resources, homes, food, care, education- all the things we need to live and to feel part of something worthwhile. It should be a criminal offence for Governments to leave people on the streets:- we can't claim to be civilised if we allow, turn a blind eye, deliberately ignore those people whom are forced to sleep in a skip behind Asda or Tesco ( other supermarkets are available - but the posh ones lock their skips).
We spent billions building a park to house foreign atheletes for a few weeks, we spend virtually nothing on our own homeless people. |
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becky sharp
Joined: 01 Dec 2008 Posts: 6853
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Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 3:29 pm Post subject: |
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R2Icon wrote: | don't feel guilty about not giving homeless people money- money isn't what they need. |
Much to my surprise I was stopped (literally) in town this morning by a youngish, quite well dressed but very nervy man ...ex marine he said....asking me for money for a drink of tea ....I said I would take him for one whereupon he quickly turned on his heel and said he had to be somewhere else. |
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