This Thing Called Hunger Part III: Personal Abdication

I know, I know—I only wrote Part Two a few days ago, but something else popped up in the “hunger” category that just absolutely slayed me.

On the way to Sam’s Club last Sunday, there was a man on the side of the freeway off ramp with a “hungry” sign. This man wasn’t hungry—well, maybe he was hungry RIGHT THEN. He, too, had fallen and couldn't reach his McMeal.

You know how I could tell he was a fraud? He was wearing a leather coat, had a spare tire fat roll, and was cleanly shaven and dressed.

It seems to be time for a WWWD question: what would Wenchypoo do in this situation? For starters, I’d hock or sell off everything I absolutely didn’t need for survival. Second, I’d take advantage of all the resources these so-called “poor” people have available to them, like the wide array of free meal outlets and such. The LAST place you’d see me would be next to a freeway off ramp begging for money.

What I DID do was to keep driving by, for fear I'd lurch off the road and kill him purposely, sparing the public from any more of his deception. Doing society a favor still lands you in jail, sadly.

Bums, street musicians, and the so-called “blind ”and“ homeless vets" you’re likely to see in any metro area, on any sidewalk or roadside, are personally abdicating their care and feeding to you, the taxpayer and hapless bleeding heart citizen. They're doing this to themselves willingly because it’s easier (and tax-free) than getting a real job and joining society proper.

When I lived in Italy, there was a little town called Mondragone (supposedly the birthplace of Al Capone) that was literally infested with street people—easy for a town the size of a thimble. Unfortunately, the nearest autostrada exit to my town took me right through this town first. Every motorist in the area was accosted at every stoplight with windshield washers, musicians, begging women with babies, and people in damaged wheelchairs—the scam parade in action. A local in my town told me that those scamsters make enough tax-free money each year to put their children through college and live a life of veritable luxury!

Another pitiful, tear-jerking sight where personal abdication in boxcar lots goes on is at the Mexico border: when we lived in Texas, we visited a border town and crossed into Mexico on foot. We had to cross a fairly wide fenced bridge that was absolutely crammed with “trolls” (the people underneath it) who had plastic milk jugs tied to really long bamboo poles to reach the bridge sides—they were begging from underneath! Of course, there were elderly, infirm, and mothers with small children—the usual riffraff fare. Ahead of me, I noticed nobody putting money into anybody’s jug. BEHIND me was a different story: one woman had brought rolls of quarters with her expressly for the purpose of giving something to everyone with a jug out. The beggars had found a bleeding heart that day.

As I crossed and saw the waves of people under and near the foot bridge, standing around and begging, I understood the enormity of life as dictated by the Catholic church, birth control (or the lack of it), and basic education. Thank God I’m an American with a choice and a pretty good BS detector.