Dear friends,
If you look up the words "beggar" and "beggarly" in the dictionary, it will help you to understand why you are having such mixed feelings about giving to street beggars. Below is what my Funk & Wagnalls has to say:
Beggar: 1. One who asks alms, especially one who makes his living by begging. noun 2. A person in poor or impoverished circumstances; a pauper. 3. A fellow; rogue; used contemptuously or humorously; as, a sulky beggar, smart little beggar.
Beggarly: adj. 1. Miserably poor; like or characteristic of a beggar; mean; sordid; contemptible.
*********
You can clearly see that there are two kinds of people who might beg: those who are truly very, very poor, and in great want, and those who make their living bybegging. The truly poor usually don't beg on the streets in Canada because there is government and private help available to them that doesn't demean them. Also, since it usually is their habit to make their own way in life, they don't want to humble themselves by begging on the streets.
Most of the people here who are street beggars are runaway youth, alcoholics, mentally ill, or drug users. Much more rare is a person who really is in desperate need. 0
You and I would like to help only those who truly are in need. We don't want to help those who make their living off begging, because they are like parasites. It is their profession to live off the rest of us, without contributing to society.
The same two kinds of people can be seen in the definition of the word "beggarly". There are those who are miserably poor, and then there are those who are mean, sordid, contemptible. If you are "miserably poor" for long enough, you probably still will not become "mean", "sordid", or "contemptible." These involve life choices. However, if it continues for a second and third generation your descendants may become degraded. It's important that this not be allowed to happen to people.
Language takes a long time to develop, and those old words in the English language clearly define both kinds of people. "The poor", and beggars have always existed. It is the "beggars who *sit* and beg" whom we are not to help. The word "sit" indicates that they are not contributing any effort to change their condition. They have become parasites.
If you know that your country of the PRC has a social net that is adequate and approachable enough to help those who are truly in need, then don't feel at all sorry about not giving to street beggars. Just give a little helping hand to those you know for sure are struggling with poverty.
When we were in Mexico there used to be many little Indian women street beggars with babies tied in shawls to their backs. If you gave to one, others quickly joined them and sometimes became very demanding, walking along with you and thrusting their hands out aggresively. Lately that seems to have been stopped. More often now you find these small women on the street busy making traditional little native dolls from colourful yarns to sell to visitors. The government probably caused the naked begging to stop. It is a way to maintain the dignity of the native women from the mountains. Old or crippled people usually wait on the steps of cathedreals waiting for those who have gone in. I think they have found hearts softened by contemplation of the infinite are more likely to give charity. In Mexico, beggars trouble my heart as they don't in Canada because I'm not sure how good the social safety net there is, yet.
Most people who fall on hard times try to hide it. They will even refuse help that the government makes available because they never had to ask for help before, and to be in need is already a blow to their pride. To have to ask for social assistance is a further blow. If it is possible to get out of the difficult circumstances one has fallen into, then it is better not to accept help, but if it is not possible, then it is wiser to accept social assistance until you can change your circumstances. Otherwise health may be damaged, or one may get in so deep they can never dig their way out again.
Such proud people won't accept money. You can try to help in other way, such as giving a small gift that you call a birthday present, or give a house-warming gift if they move to a new place. Something like that can lift the heart, and cause them to remember your thoughtfulness forever. Some may try to pay you back by doing something like what you did, for someone else in need. I know some people who tried for years to give to others what they could never repay to their benefactor who didn't need help.
Really, that's all there is to it. Your heart won't be warmed by giving a coin to a professional beggar, but giving a little needed gift or some kind of practical help to someone, in a way that cheers and helps may have done more than you might imagine.
Only a passing genuine smile may warm a stranger's heart, and has even been known to save a life. We never know the true value of what we have done in life, do we?
I know a couple of women, best friends, who go together once a month or so to a pond in a mountain. There they toss little pebbles into the still waters and watch as ripples spread out to the edge of the pool. They contemplate their actions doing the same through the world, something worth serious thought! The same way, on a very dark night, on flat and open ground, the light of a little candle flame has been observed from as far away as three miles, "Shining like a good deed in a naughty world." There is something pure, refreshing and renewing about kindness. Maybe as enough of us spread our thoughts and deeds the spreading ripples will changed the balance of our world from a negative to a positive state. You know what I think. Now what do you think?
Affectionately, Mary
