Anger and sadness at this interaction with homeless person

[BlueCupOrangeCup]

Tonight, a polite homeless man named Kevin told me he secured a spot in a 12-week program at St Mungo's after a year of homelessness. He needed £7.50 urgently to go there tonight and had been trying all day. Skeptical, I regretfully declined, later realizing he might have been genuine.

I'm replaying the whole conversation in my head and now I think I recall him almost bursting into tears as he asked if there was any way at all I could help him.

This one might have been genuine and I'm so disgusted with myself.

I could have helped. I had a £5 note in my purse....and I am fortunate enough that I wouldn't miss it or notice it gone.

And at the same time I'm also so angry at scammers of this thing. If someone stood in front of you asking begging for a small amount of money to help them and you knew it was genuine OF COURSE all of us would help! But genuine people don't get the help they need because scammers make people have attitudes like mine tonight.

There is no way to phone st Mungo's now to 'pre pay' for Kevin should he turn up tonight....meanwhile I'm going home to sleep in my warm bed and work my lovely job tomorrow.

Poor Kevin, I'm sorry I didn't help you.

There are organisations that help the homeless and if it was genuine they would have helped him. Always better to give to a charity or support organisation as they can assist the homeless person in seeking all the help they need

In most cases I usually give if I can afford it and won't miss it. I know myself to know I won't lose sleep over it if I helped, but I would if I didn't. To me, it's a bit like the judicial "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer." As long as I can afford it, and is not a familar face I've helped before.

@Burlee why are you laughing? If you google St Mungo's, the very first thing is it tells you how to donate.

If it turned out this thread was a giant marking exercise, good on them, it was quite creative! I needed to donate to a shelter anyway and this prompted me to do so.

I work with people experiencing homelessness. Sometimes I also give to people living rough, sometimes I don't.

My point us, do what you can when you can, and that's OK. You can't save everyone but you can contribute to making someone's day or the long goal of making a better world.

I don't care what a person spends their money on, especially a rough sleeper. Of course many will be experiencing substance use disorder and need to feed that. And who am I to judge? Homelessness is appalling for everyone experiencing it and as a reflection on us all. God knows every homeless person needs their vices to survive the hell that is their reality.

It is a homeless shelter in London

There is some info about the programme here - it's free.
https://www.mungos.org/clients/

In London, there are many people who are trafficked here to beg on the streets, they're the ones kneeling with the cardboard signs usually around Marylebone High Street or Green Park. They're abused and tightly controlled, you can often see the "facilitator" wandering around and checking on them.

I have no idea why the police don't address the issue. Please don't give them money.

Does it matter what he uses the money for ? If he has addiction or mental health problems withholding generosity isn't going to make his life any better. Kind words and a bit of cash could.

Whoever took and shared that photo is an absolute wanker.

He’s on the street because he’s addicted to alcohol, it’s crazy that it annoys you that’s he’s still drinking. If he has had zero support to stop drinking then of course he’s still drinking. Alcohol will also help numb the god awful reality of living on the street.

The judgement is hideous.

Donate to a homeless charity if you want to help

This was obviously a lie. As if St Mungo's turns homeless people away because they can't pay a tiny nominal sum that obviously can't cover a fraction of the charity's costs. It's just very clearly not true.

St Mungo's Recovery Colleges (which sounds like what he was referring to) are free. There is no charge.

There is also no charge to stay in their hostels.

It may be he was asking for money for the transport there, but only OP would know if that's a realistic possibility.

On balance, it sounds like this man was probably a chancer.

People do tend to equate begging and homelessness, which is a mistake.

The majority of homeless people don't beg. A shockingly high percentage of homeless people have jobs (the fact they're not paid enough to be able to secure housing is a national scandal IMO) and most homeless people are not sleeping on the streets - they are sofa surfing or otherwise going from one place to another.

Beggars are, in the main, a different group. A few are homeless, more are trafficked by gangs, and many are addicted. The latter two groups will often resort to tall tales to extort money from others.

They are not undeserving of help but it's best not to part with money on the street.

If you feel guilty OP, I would make a donation of whatever you can afford to your local shelter / St Mungo's.

I'm reading a different thread i think? There is no "berating" going on. There are people saying what they do when confronted with this kind of thing.

But i see why there are so many threads about how horrible MNetters are, if people explaining what they do when they see a homeless person is described as "berating".

FWIW - i don't donate to homeless charities (or many charities) tbh. Mostly because i do think a lot of them spend too much on admin and not enough on the target of the charity. I do give clothes directly to a friend of one of my DC who works in a homeless shelter. They tell me now and again what they're looking for in terms of support (often it is large sized underwear for women) and i rootle round and see what i have. Or blankets. Or winter coats, scarves, hats and gloves at the moment.
We donated an old trolley-type suitcase to one chap who carried his things in 2 plastic bags but he has back problems. He's very happy with that. etc etc

Everyone should be able to decide for themselves what they do, if anything. And should we feel bad about homelessness? Sure. I do. It is one of the things i ask our local councillors about when elections are coming.

I went in to a church the other day and a lady approached me to ask if i knew of any food banks in the town. Unfortunately im not from that area so wasn’t able to help. She told me she was homeless but didn’t want any money, just to know if there was somewhere she might get a bite as her social welfare hadn’t come through the day before. I tried to give her a fiver, she refused to take it.

she said she had been offered a job and accommodation but didn’t know how she would pay it as she had not received her payment. She would not accept a penny from me but asked me to pray for her.

on my way out I met a local anc asked them to advise her where to go for a meal.

they’re not all fake!

You should never give money to homeless people directly, it just encourages scammers and professional beggars. The money you give doesn't even go to the person themselves to spend on drink or drugs in many cases, it goes to fund terrorism and organised crime.

If you want to help people who are genuinely homeless then give money to charities and organisations that are set up specifically to help them.

I think I've mentioned this before but my council used to run an ad campaign in the centre of town with the message "spare change doesn't make change" - giving a few quid to individuals just leads to more begging and more homelessness.

Also the specific sum, the time pressure and high stakes (needing exactly £7.50, RIGHT NOW, otherwise I will lose a place at a 12 week programme after 1 year of homelessness) are all classic marks of a scam aimed at putting psychological pressure on someone. It's a similar thing with online scams. I've been on the receiving end of a scam whereby I received an email apparently from a friend (in reality from a scammer who hacked her email) saying they she needed a specific sum of money in her venmo because she was stuck at x and had her bag stolen and needed to get a taxi to her airport otherwise she was going to miss her flight back home and be struck in a foreign land.... The time pressure/high stakes/very specific request are a classic tactic.

Kevin may well genuinely have been going through a lot, but he wasn't being honest.

If anyone is still in any doubt that this is a scam, ask yourself how "Kevin" found out that he had won this coveted place on the life changing (fictitious) scheme? Did St Mungo's phone him? In which case why didn't he say thanks so much but I don't have the means to get there, what shall I do? And they would send a volunteer to collect him. Or he could use his phone to work out how to get there (walking to somewhere with free WiFi).

Did they write to him? In which case he's not strictly homeless and does have access to an address and certain services.

I'm not saying everyone is a scammer but this is a well known scam, and the people commenting about kindness obviously haven't been regularly exposed to it.

Its really difficult, yes perhaps he needed the money for a bed, alternatively he may have used the money to buy the drugs that would kill him, or would profit human traffickers. I think most experts suggest buying food for the homeless and then donating to charities that help them. If you want to help then donate that £5 to a charity that helps local homeless people.

It astounds me how many people on here are happy to endorse and support the drugs trade and everything that stands for.

Because by stating that “it doesn’t matter what they spend it on, it’s not for me to judge” that’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re supporting the people who stand at your children’s school gates enticing them into drugs.
You’re supporting the people who will lure your children or their friends into dealing.
You’re supporting human trafficking, prostitution, county lines….

No, maybe the drug dealer on the street isn’t involved in all those things, but he’s a pawn in the bigger picture.

So by standing there and saying that it doesn’t matter if someone spends your fiver on a hit (which might well be their last), you’re lining the pockets of the organisations who represent all that.

Hey but if virtue signalling that you don’t judge makes you feel better, who cares who else suffers because of it.

@MayThe4th im not sure what crappy kind of area you live in but no one stands at my DC school peddling drugs

Yep it is a dilemma, i want the authorities to win the war on drugs. I know that this is a "war" nobody is going to win any time soon.

Homelessness is a hugely complex issue, which is why i prefer to donate food to the person, or clothes to my daughter's friend's place. But sometimes i will give money. I try not to beat myself up about the decisions i make.

Edited for spelling

I'm sure the people who think you're bang out of order don't live in an area where begging has reached the point that people can't use certain areas because the antisocial behaviour associated with begging and those who do it.

My DD used to attend a regular club in a city. I would wait outside in my car. Drug deals at 11am, deficating on the street, hostile, aggressive behaviour outside cash machines and intimidation in stairwells of carparks, violence. It is not good to enable this crime/ addiction with handing over money. I have offered to buy food and drinks and been to told to fuck off.

I have been told to fuck off bitch in a deserted stairwell of a carpark with my young DD when I declined to give over cash. I thought he was going to attack us.

Police are also going a round the area removing these people as a lot are not genuine homeless people.

I know we are told to talk and make contact but how do we know who will be aggressive towards us as a woman I feel too vulnerable to do this but will donate to homeless charities.

I once bought a lady formula milk and nappies when she approached me at a supermarket telling me she can't feed her baby (who wasn't actually there). I just couldn't have that on my conscience. I then did my shop went back to the car park and there she was asking help from others (must have given the things I bought her to someone in her group). Was a strange one as she wasn't asking for money and maybe did need those items but I felt a bit deflated and that I'd been scammed when I saw her approaching people straight after.

Some 'lifestyle'...

It was to get there (allegedly)

Maybe not outside, but don’t kid yourself that your kids couldn’t easily get hold of drugs if they’re secondary age.

It was to get there, not a charge!