Conference turris::womannotes-v1

598.0. "I'M HUNGRY" by STUBBI::B_REINKE (where the sidewalk ends) Mon Dec 14 1987 23:03

    The following article was reprinted with the permission of
    the noter who entered it in soapbox.
    
    I think it is well worth reading
    
    
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Note 475.84              Poverty: Curable or Incurable?                 84 of 84
SAHQ::DCARNELL "EM David Carnell @RHQ/DTN 351-2901" 235 lines  14-DEC-1987 14:40
                                -< I'M HUNGRY! >-
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    I'd like to share the article "And the man cried 'I'm hungry!" by
    Marcia Ann Gillespie, as follows:
    
    The other evening, on my way out to dinner with friends, I went
    racing to ny neighborhood bank's cash machine, card in hand.  And
    as I came tearing up to it, there on the sidewalk  knelt a man.
    He was filthy, but with the sort of wild dishevelment--hair going
    every which way, eyes aglare--that I associate with Old Testament
    prophets.  At the top of his lungs he screamed "I'm hungry!" while
    shaking an open cardboard box with a pitiful few pennies strewn
    inside.
    
    People moved around him, some looked, others seemed totally oblivious
    to his presence.  I walked on into the bank intent on my evening
    ahead, trying to pretend that the man and his plea hadn't wrenched
    me.  But as I stood on line waiting my turn for a cash machine,
    I kept glancing out the window, listening to his wail, hoping that
    someone would put money or food into his hand.
    
    Stood there holding silent conversation with myself.  "Why isn't
    anyone responding to him?  What are you going to do?  You should
    get off this line and give that man some money.  Well, he's not
    your responsibility, girl.  After all, he's white and you decided
    some time ago that you were only going to give, when you did give,
    to black's cause we got to take care of our own.  Besides, isn't
    it futile to give money; it doesn't really change things."
    
    And yet, by the time I'd completed my money business, I knew that
    I could not ignore that man.  So I walked out of the bank and went
    to a hot dog stand and bought him two hot dogs and a cold drink.
    When I handed them to him, he looked at the food and drink, then
    back at me, said "Thank you," and again screamed "I'm hungry!"
    
    I left the food, and as I  moved away, a man who'd watched the whole
    thing said to me, "What do you expect, he's crazy!"  And, yes, I
    had expected something: to have bought his silence; yes, there was
    that, and to feel a warm glow, at least a spark, 'cause I'd done
    a good thing.
    
    But neither came.  Instead I kept hearing his cry.  All the way
    to dinner, all through the meal, long into the night, and for weeks
    afterward I replayed the scene in my mind, his actions and mine,
    my silent conversations and sense of charity, the bystander's
    dismissive words and that man's.
    
    "I'm hungry."  After thinking about his words, I came to the
    conclusion that he meant to be included among the living.  For
    to be one of the homeless in New York City, in Los Angeles, Peoria,
    anywhere in this country, is to be among the missing, to become
    a phantom.  The cynical, of whom there are many, say that "the poor
    will always be with us," implying why care, why even notice.
    
    Yet every morning when I travel to work, and every evening when I
    reverse my route home, there pacing the platforms and subway cars,
    wandering the streets, sitting and sleeping on the benches and seats
    are the every-growing legion of people with no homes, no money,
    no food.  People in varying stages of deterioration.  People seeking
    money and attention; some are skillful, well-spoken panhandlers,
    a few approach with a more belligerent attitude, while others are
    so pitiful, so fragile, that they can barely no more than hold
    out a cup in silence.
    
    I've been in subway cars where a homeless person has walked on and
    the stench rising from his or her body has caused people to draw
    away, hold their breaths, and move to other cars.  Watched a crowd
    gather around a homeless woman and her rabbit, talking to her about
    her pet, giving money, responding more to the animal than its mistress.
    I've walked into the public rest room in the train station and seen
    women attempting to wash themselves, their children, their clothing
    in the sinks while all about them well-dressed women draw away,
    hurrying to get out.
    
    The homeless, their numbers grow, and yet, as they do, the people
    themselves become an ever more faceless mass.
    
    There are days when one cannot travel a block without seeing someone
    begging, or simply sitting in that dazed lost way, or sleeping
    against a doorway, or wandering with their belongings in a cart
    or garbage bag.  And others when no one is about, as if the streets,
    subways, and waiting rooms had been swept clean of our living
    refuse--the only reminder the lingering stench of human urine assailing
    you from a doorway as you pass by.  
    
    It's on those days that I'm reminded of a story I was told aabout
    how Duvalier made Port-au-Prince's homeless people disappear in
    preparation for a visit by the Pope.  The story goes that the army
    was instructed to round up all the city's beggars and trasnsport
    them to an island in the harbor.  They took them to a place called
    the Isle of the Dogs, so named because it was overrun with wild
    dogs.  Left them there with neither food nor water.  And never went
    back.
    
    Although that nightmarish tale may be apocryphal, it also plays
    out a wish that exists here, that the problem would simply go away.
    The need so many of us have to look the other way suggests that
    in our heart of hearts we would like for them to disappear, not
    shipped to die on some godforsaken island, just away from us, out
    of sight and mind.  As we walk past them with our eyes averted,
    or simply stare right through them, refusing to acknowledge their
    presence, we are in essence attempting to deny their existence.
    
    And when, as happened here in New York City, community after community
    rises up in protest against shelters being created in their
    neighborhoods, we are asking that they be put someplace far away.
    
    But then who does wish to be reminded that in this world's richest
    nation, people in ever-increasing numbers go homeless and hungry?
    The comfortable notion of homelessness in America has been that
    those who live in the streets choose to because they're crazy,
    or lazy bums, or alcoholic derelicts or dope fiends.  Any or all
    of which puts them beyond the pale and exonerates us of responsibility.
    But lurking somewhere underneath that blame-the-victim rhetoric
    is also the terrifying throught that their poverty, their seeming
    inability to cope with the world, like AIDS, might be catching.
    
    For lots of reasons, none of which has to do with money in the bank,
    that's not my fear.  The loss I worry about is internal.  It's the
    one I first recognized while still a child.  One winter's night,
    long after I'd been sent up to bed, someone knocked at our door
    so loudly that it woke me up.  I heard my father call out "Who's
    there?"  And a man's voice respond saying, "Please help me, my and
    children are out in the car."  Ever curious, I immediately climbed
    out of bed and went to my favorite watch post at the head of the
    stairs.
    
    Daddy went outside and shortly returned, calling my mother.  Along
    with him came the man, his very pregnant wife, and several small
    children.  All of them were much too thinly dressed for the weather;
    they looked car-weary, unwashed and unkempt.  Poor Southern folk,
    migrant workers, I believe they were going further out on Long Island
    to the camps, in immediate need of a bathroom, a chance to get warm,
    and some food.  My father pointed the women and children up the
    stairs to the bathroom, so I retreated to my room watching them
    all the while.
    
    Mama silently went into the kitchen and got food together, some
    for them to eat right away, some to take with them, while my father
    talked to the man asking where they were from and all.  They didn't
    stay long, maninly because my mother, who was always so hospitable,
    never asked them to, ever said much at all.  And when they'd gone,
    my parents had a tremendous argument.  He accusing her of being
    uncharitable and unchristian for not asking them to stay.  She
    countering by charging him with being thoughtless of the welfare
    of his own family, saying as she went about scrubbing the bathroom
    with Lysol, that they were filthy dirty and God only knew what all
    diseases they might be carrying.
    
    At the time I thought she was being terribly cruel, because that
    woman and her children looked so sad and so very needy.  I can still
    see their eyes as they looked around them at our house, which was
    nothing special, as if it were a palace.  It was only years later
    that I came to understand her position.  She did as much as she
    felt she could do while still keeeping her family safe.  But still
    some voice inside me wants to believe that had I been in her position
    I would have let them stay the night.
    
    And yet, I haven't opened my door to any one of the hundreds of
    homeless people I pass in the street.  Because I too, like my mother,
    fear their dirt and disease they may carry, and because I also fear
    the possibilility of violence.  Even when I give food or money,
    I do so carefully avoiding any contact with their clothing or person,
    often holding my breath against their smell.  And for everyone one
    person I do give something to, there are many more I simply pass
    by, every day.  Some don't ask, some I pass judgment on, some because
    I simply don't have any more change, some because I don't make time
    to go to the store and buy food.  Besides, I know only too well
    that one act of kindness can't change a condition, especially
    one as engulfing as poverty.
    
    But my father's words, like those of that man who kept yelling "I'm
    hungry!" haunt me--and well they should.
    
    Oh, yes, sure.   I've given money to those organizations that work
    with them and lobby on their behalf, given money and food directly
    to a few, but I haven't laid a welcome table, haven't brought them
    in from the cold.  Haven't moved from charity to engage in the actions
    that could change the conditions that create their state of hunger
    and homelessness in America.
    
    Nor can I claim political naivete or ignorance.  I know all too
    well that if real change is gonna come, it won't be because we all
    do a good deed a day, but only because we commit our money and our
    energies to solutions, give true passion to massive social and
    political change no different from that we once gave to civil and
    women's rights movements.
    
    I feel sometimes, too many times, as if I, and most folks I know,
    have all been lulled into inaction by accepting the notion that
    American's resources are running dry, or that it's on this current
    crop of young folk to raise the banner, be the idealists and change
    makers we once were.
    
    But those easy-out words, like my charity, aren't quelling this
    voice inside that keeps asking, "What makes your attitude any different
    from that of the average 'decent' white American who said in 1963,
    'Why should I get involved in civil rights?  I never did anything
    to those people.  I'm not holding them back."
    
    Walking by them day by day, not working to make the necessary changes,
    I feel diminished someplace deep inside.  As if I were leaving pieces
    of my soul.  How long before I discover myself hollow, before I
    too cry "I'm hungry!"
    
    That's the end of her article. I just have one or two thoughts.
    
    When will we have governmental leadership which does not seek power and
    wealth and who works for the good of all the citizens of this country?
    When will we draft everyone, not for armies, but to help those less
    "lucky" at birth, enabling everyone to relate to the poor by getting
    everyone to help in the slums and poor homes for at least one year in
    their lives. 
    
    When will we stop spending $330,000,000,000 a YEAR for missiles and
    armaments, OUR TAX MONEY, and spend a little for our poor and homeless?
    Just "who and what" is being protected by all those missiles and
    armaments? 
    
    When will we say as society that the welfare of the poor homeless few
    takes precedence over the comfort and high standard of living of the
    majority, or perhaps better stated, the wealthy 20% who own 80% of the
    wealth and land?  Here's a hideous thought of a nightmare: 
    
    What if all the universe was but a single entity, divided into a
    zillion pieces, each living a different life, each piece lost in
    ignorance of its true nature in a make-believe temporary existence of
    being this, and becoming that.  If this were so, how horrible the
    nightmare, just considering the way human beings, just on this single
    planet, both in this country and throughout the world, treat one
    another, most ignoring those in need, as they live their lives,
    questing to satisfy personal desires for wealth, power, land and other
    satisfactions. 
     
    What a nightmare, in both how we act, and fail to act.
    

    
    	I've seen that a recent course offering claiming that it's mentally
    healthy to take care of "plants, pet's and people". It's a course
    on Altruism, the "unselfish concern for the welfare of others" or
    selflessness. I'll post the detail's if anyone's interested...
    
    	I believe that I'm somewhat of an "Altruist"; I was somewhat
    shocked at the course description, as it sorta sounded like me.
    I have plants, a pet cat (Mr Jinx) and have been known to take care
    of people (even though it's illogical to do so).
    
    	There are limitations to what I'll offer, however, and I'm certainly
    not committed to Altruism nor am I "God's gift" to mankind or anything
    like that. It is a tendency, though.
    
    	For example, when I attended a course in Ann Arbor, Michigan,
    I befriended a "street person" whom I had met whilst meandering
    around the university one evening. I saw and heard him playing
    guitar at the "diag", which was a sort of crossroads where people
    would meet and hang out. I took him out to dinner before I left
    Ann Arbor, where he inquired "how come you like me?" I could not
    give him a specific answer. He *did* have some great stories, 
    though. Now, while I didnt offer to share the place I was staying
    in, nor did I provide transportation for him in my rental car, I
    did give him my home address here in Mass. Wonder if he'll ever
    write?
    
    	Joe Jas
    

	That strikes so close to home.  I'm so comfortable with
	giving money to charities and doing no more.  Yet I feel
	so guilty.  

	Just a couple weeks ago I was in Boston doing
	some christmas shopping.  We were scurrying down the street
	to get to a store when a man asked me if I had some loose
	change.  I kept walking.  I hadn't really expected to be
	asked for change, and was already a couple steps past him
	before I even realized what he said.  My companion mumbled
	that he should get a job instead of begging.  I thought to
	myself, well he can always go to a shelter in Boston.  After
	all, I give money to that shelter so I can help that way.
	And he'd probably just spend it on booze.  And there's that
	niggling fear that I could be attacked.  You're brought up
	not to talk (or interact) with strangers, and as a woman
	I feel more vulnerable.

	So I'm a little afraid physically, a little afraid of being
	conned, and I'm ashamed that I have so much yet can't give
	except through anonymous charities.  And I'm mad at that
	man for putting me in that position which makes me feel
	worse.

	So what will I do about it?  Maybe nothing.

	...Karen

    I used to walk by too, out of some sort of undefined
    unease/distaste/"why don't they get a job" reaction.  But anyone
    who's been paying attention lately knows that many people are homeless
    thru no fault of their own.  even if it is their fault, they're
    still suffering.
    
    Then awhile back I started studying Islam, and one of its precepts
    is to give alms to the poor.  So now whenever someone on the street
    asks me for money, I give them enough for a decent meal.  I feel
    a lot better since I've been doing this than when I used to just
    walk by.  Of course, I know it doesn't begin to approach a real
    solution, it's just a drop in the bucket.
    
    I too think this is one of the places that the obscene amount of money
    spent on "defense" should go.  Eisenhower called the wasting of
    resources on "defense" instead of human needs "humanity hanging on a
    cross of iron." 
    

    When we visited Ecuador, our local friends (an advantage of being
    involved with ham radio - you know people everywhere you happen
    to go!) warned us to buy loaves of bread, and when the children
    come up to you and beg for "bread", you give them pieces of bread.
    They really are in need of food (at least, a lot of the Indians
    are), but if you give them money instead, the older ones and the
    parents (well, usually it's the fathers) take the money and buy
    alcohol instead of food.  We did give some of the older people money
    (we paid them to pose in their costumes - usually they won't allow
    photographs to be taken; a lot of the Indians still believe that
    the photograph has somehow `captured' their soul), and then noticed
    where they went with it - to the local bar!  So, I guess Pedro was
    right.   It's hard to tell what the people who appear to be in need
    REALLY need: food, clothing, job training, sympathy, a semi-independent
    shelter to live in, or something else.  I feel guilty, too, when
    I pass a beggar, but less so than I did when I was an idealistic
    kid - no I see the paper bag with the bottle sticking out, or notice
    that the "beggar" is really a pickpocket, or that the person who
    asked for food didn't want it when I provided some, but really wanted
    money for drugs or booze!  While we can't let ourselves become
    inhumunely tolerant of any kind of misery others find themselves
    in, we shouldn't be too naive, either, and help to foster the kinds
    of misery people make for themselves.  It's a tough call!
    
    /Charlotte

	I used to work weekly in a community food line.  It was a good
	experience for me.  I still do some volunteer work for the poor
	(unfortunately, my present/near-future schedule of work/school
	prevents weekly time for this).

	Those of you who feel guilty, you can be giving of your time and
	concern/love.  Many people do.  I most respect and admire these 
	people who give this kind of support of all people I know.

	I used to make excuses about why I couldn't help others.  But I
	feel good about myself when I am of services to my neighbors, and
	I no longer would trade this feeling for anything.

	Especially at this time of year, extend yourself.  Give more of
	yourself than 1/2 of 1% of last week's paycheck.

I once was asked for money by a woman in a street one night off of Harvard
Square. She was dressed in what could have been normal student atire:  beat up,
none too clean clothes, torn down vest, a backpack of sorts. 

My first impression was how did I know this woman really needed the money? For
all I knew, she could be a student, begging to support herself through college.
I am sure that with the right tactics, you could do quite well. (not to imply
that most beggers do)  I asked her what she needed the money for, she replied,
'for my children, for food and clothes'.  I was still not convinced, it sounded
like a pretty standard line...

Then I noticed that she had around her neck, a piece of twine with a beatup
whistle on it.  I realized that this woman was often in situations where she
feared danger, appraoching strangers, or alone on streets late at night or
whatever.  While not proof, that was what made me decide to give her money, for
whatever reason she needed it, for whatever she would spend it on. 

At the time I happened to have a pocket full of change, but mostly pennies. When
I started pulling it out, her reaction was 'wow!'.  I replied that I was sorry
that it was mostly pennies, but she said that it was all right.  She scooped
a good handfull of change into the pocket of her vest, and left.

I did not want to give this person money.  What I would much rather have done
was offer her a place to live, and a job.  I don't think that giving money,
food, or clothing to beggers or organizations is enough.  I don't think that
welfare is enough.  Maybe I, anyone, or everyone cannot cure poverty.  But I
wish that it had at least been within my power to say to one person, 'here is a
bed, here is food, here is some work to be done, the rest of your time is yours
to improve your lot, I will help in any way that I can.' 

Jim.

    It was within your power to say that Jim.  We may not be able to
    help all of humanity but we can all reach out to a single human
    if we choose to.

    Why not?  I've done it.

RE: .10

Because at that point, *I* didn't have a place to live...

Tell us of the situation where you have provided someone with home, food,
and work...

Jim.

    Well it happened to me, really and truly, and it was not really
    such a good experience.
    
    I was about 19, had begun earning my life after dropping out of
    University, had a small 1 room + kitchen appartment of my own. I
    met this very dishevelled guy on a bank in the park (lots of parks
    in Geneva). He had no money, no place to stay, no work, no food.
    I was very idealistic at the time and offered him to come to my
    place and stay there until he found a permanent abode. He accepted
    eagerly. He stayed two month, during which time I fed him and gave
    him pocket money out of my very small pay (it was my first job ever).
    He did absolutely nothing all day: did not look for a job, did not
    even try to keep a little order in the appartment. He smoked all
    day (even though I did not smoke) and kept me up all night explaining
    the unfairness of the world which did not accept him and embrace
    him as he was. He got me in trouble with my boy-friend (who couldn't
    believe anybody was that innocent), with my employer (I got so worried
    and so tired in the end I couldn't concentrate on my job), with
    my parents (who thought I was crazy), with the bank (you cannot
    have an overdraft when it's your first job and you've only had it
    3 months...). I listened to him and talked to him until I realised
    I would not be able to help him. I finally got the address of his
    family in Paris, called them on the phone, and begged them to come
    and pick him up, or send money so he could take a train back to
    them ... or to anywhere else.
    
    Looking back, it was not entirely a bad either. It went wrong
    I think for two main reasons:
    
    	1) I was too young;
    
    	2) I was unlucky the first person I had really tried to help
    	   by myself was somebody who wouldn't help himself.
                                               
    The problem is that I was so bewildered for such a long time that
    now, when physically I could, it is mentally that I can't: "my God,
    if it were to happen again ..."
                                                  
    Joana

    Rosie's Place is a shelter in our neighborhood for women.  It is
    extremely successful.  It was founded by an exceptional woman Kip
    Tiernan (correct spelling if it is wrong).  Kip began servicing
    the poor with a basic attitude that they were her guests.  She 
    accepted them for what they were, did not attempt to change them
    and built her organization around the needs of her guests.
    
    Whenever I think of helping someone I think of how my influence
    will change them.  I find over and over that this rarely happens.
    I have become street weary in the neighborhood I live in.  There
    is a code in the streets and I am somewhat familiar with it.  If
    I were to have seen a person sleeping in a doorway last night I
    would have called the police and they would have come and got the
    individual and brought her/him to a shelter.  This is what the 
    homeless hope will happen.  Especially the alcoholic who waits to
    the very last minute before he goes on that eight hour fast.
    
    Those of us that live in neighborhoods where there are many homeless
    can do many little things that are positive.  We leave our bottles
    out for them to redeem, we smile and joke with them as we pass on
    the street, and many people volunteer at the shelters.
    
    I feel that it is not within my scope or ability to resolve even
    one homeless person's problems.  I prefer to support people and
    organizations like Kip Tiernan and Rosie's Place.

    We also tried  to give a home to a homeless person. There was
    an older woman who allowed a lot of people down on thier luck
    to stay in her house. When she died the man who inherited her
    home did not have her patience and was not able to continue
    to provide homes to all of the men who had been living there.
    One of them, an elderly alcoholic lived with us for the month
    of February when we found that he had been living on the streets
    of Boston and Fitchberg. It was about the roughest month I have
    ever spent! He stole from us, wandered around the house at all
    hours, almost set fires several times, drank everything that had
    any possibility of having alcohol in it, etc....
    
    After that, like Joyce, I support the homeless with my donations
    but I would not take a person like that into my home again.
    
    My oldest son has worked as an intake person at a shelter in our
    town (which opened the year after our experience). He found it
    to be exhausting - and he could leave and come home after working
    8 to 10 hours.  
    
    I have tremendous admiration for the people like Kip Tiernan who
    have the internal resouces to do such necessary work.
    
    Bonnie

RE: ...

I feel that an important part of trying to help people is their willingness to
help themselves.  And I do mean work to help support themselves however they
can. 

What then should we do with those who will not help themselves?  Are they
any less human?

Jim.

I usually end up with kids or slightly older.  One boy (about fourteen at the 
time) lived with me for about two months before social services worked things 
out with his father.  The longest I've ever taken anyone in for was a little 
over two years.  My son brought him home and asked if he could stay with us for
the weekend until he found a place to stay and a job... the weekend stretched
out a bit...through several jobs.  
    
I've taken in about six in all.  I've never had anyone with the kinds of 
problems Bonnie described,.. just kids (or slightly older) who were alone 
and in trouble and needed some help for awhile.  

RE: .16

Hurah!

Maybe the kids are the ones who need or can use (not the same) the 'help'
the best...

Jim.