Homeless newspaper Street Roots has launched a downtown poster campaign about panhandling, one aimed at the pandhandlers themselves. They plan to give businesses big poster-size prints of the photos below, in hopes that the messages will create a better relationship between the change-askers and the change-givers.
Says the Street Roots blog:
Street Roots knows that the issue of panhandling is a reality in our community, and one that needs to be met with a more original approach.. the only way to address the issue is to be proactive and experiment with out of the box projects that will encourage tolerance and respect among both the general public and individuals begging for change.
Yes. I imagine the street kids swilling High Gravity on the corner outside of Carl’s Jr. on 5th will pay close attention to these signs.
If I’ve learned anything, it’s that homeless anarchists respect signage.
If I was a business, I’d be worried about retaliation from an offended panhandler if I hung these signs.
Spot on Reymont.
Demanding something in exchange for nothing does not quite define mutual respect.
Actually, the vast majority of these posters are going to non-profits downtown who work w/people experiencing homelessness and poverty. We are giving them to businesses that request them, but the idea is to target our own community to have respect and to know that you will actually make more money if you’re nice to people.
– Israel Bayer
Street Roots
So all the Bank of America and Starbucks locations around town just need signs in the windows with black-bloc anarchists holding cardboard that says, “Riot with respect.”?
The main problem with panhandling, for me, is that it’s become a fad for people that don’t need money. I work partially at a school where tuition is $20,000 a year. The parents often talk about finding their kids dressed down and asking for change downtown saying things like, “I would just give them money if they wanted it.”
Sadly, that more or less closes my pockets off from everyone as I have difficulty in discerning who needs it and who is trying to find an illusive piece of legitimacy in pretending to need my help.
Immortal Goon,
In my young 20’s I met a few people through normal social circles who related that they used to panhandle as a hobby, way to kill time, whatever.
I don’t give change very often, but never ever to anyone who is visibly under the age of 40 (unless they’re disabled.)
I go for the big three rules to aid in assistance to panhandlers. To receive funds from Fruit Cup you must either:
a) Be physically crippled
b) Be playing a musical instrument
c) Has a facial tattoo and/or facial scarring (minus of course defensive wounds resulting in aforementioned facial scarring)
Pretty easy rules!
I know this whole comment is going to make me sound like a wacky right-winger (only in Portland, naturally), but I don’t give change to anyone. The practice of giving complete strangers hard-earned dough instead of donating it to a charity that will use it for good like Sisters of the Road is asinine. Even if you need a buck for luck (instead of meth/heroin/alcohol/prostitutes/video poker) why bother devoting so much time of your day to that instead of more fruitful endeavors? I have no respect or pity for panhandlers. The ones who are aggressive about it deserve to be locked up or taken off the streets somehow. Asking politely isn’t solving any kind of problem.
I thought Street Roots was about working to take away the need to spange? I don’t get this. Also, we’re in peak spanging season people. Prepare your iPod and carry plastic only. It’s going to be tough.