Have compassion for homeless

Though I applaud the IDS for addressing the issue of poverty in Bloomington (“Getting By,” 07/03), I took great offense at the article’s moralizing conclusion that “one thing is uniformly detrimental to curing the problem of poverty: giving spare change to panhandlers.” 

Society-wide efforts to eliminate both personal contact with and our personal responsibility for impoverished people (such as the discouragement of begging) are a far greater obstacle to the eradication of poverty than a few misspent quarters. Attempts in Evanston, Ill., and elsewhere to criminalize panhandling are not marked by compassion for the poor but rather by a sanitizing attempt to further push poverty out of sight and out of mind; and indeed such measures are uniformly opposed by advocates for the poor.

The self-righteous insistence that people should not give alms or assistance directly to needy people makes the argument that we have no personal responsibility to respond to the people we pass out on the streets. It is this “passing the buck” to the government and to social service agencies that truly does a disservice to the homeless.

Social servants like the Shalom Center and Martha’s House do inspiring and vital work for the community. They deserve strong support for their efforts, which are indeed central to helping those in poverty. We should not, however, support such agencies to the exclusion of responding to the people we encounter daily. 

There is also a disturbingly patronizing tone to the thought that authors Levin and Wallace, two undergraduate students, know more about what a homeless person needs than a person facing homelessness. It is wrong to presume that because a person is poor, she is not smart enough or moral enough to spend money wisely. We should not dismiss a person’s request for food or money out-of-hand simply because they are not afraid to beg.

And personally, as a Christian, I find the idea theologically untenable. After all, Matthew 25 does not read, “Come you that are blessed by my Father, for I was hungry, and you told me to go utilize a community resource.”

Ross Martinie Eiler
Bloomington resident