Panhandling -- the rise of it and the legality of it -- has for some time been a topic of discussion, and news stories, in our fair city of Little Rock.
You've seen intersections that are always populated by a guy or gal holding a cardboard sign asking for donations for various reasons. Also, if you're like me, you've been approached and asked for money outside a store, inside a store, as you waited in a restaurant drive-thru line, maybe even as you were leaving church.
I've gone to other cities and seen panhandling done on a bigger scale than it's done here. But, returning to a major tourist-attracting city this month after having visited it just last year, I was struck by how much panhandling appears to have increased there.
Every 10 feet we walked in New Orleans, it seems we ran into a panhandler or someone "flying a sign" (displaying a cardboard sign asking for money). They outnumbered buskers ... the cool jazz bands, the child tap dancers and drummers, the "living statues," that one off-key a cappella singer.
If you're like me, your feelings about these requests for aid can change from day to day, from incident to incident.
• If you're a church type, you've tried to take comfort in all those Scriptures about being a giver and are of the understanding that the giver gets a blessing no matter what the receiver does with the money. But you still wonder if you're being had whenever you're hit up, especially by the more aggressive panhandlers who demand, rather than ask, or try to get a certain monetary amount.
• There are the times you're hit up and feel frustrated at having been hit up at what you consider to be a bad time or a bad day.
• There are the times you're asked for money and wonder why the panhandlers always seem to target the "brokest person in town" (you).
• If you would rather not open your purse or wallet on the street, you may kick yourself for not having tucked a dollar or two in your fist or an easily accessed pocket, as you had promised to do the last time you were hit up. You may feel helpless: "There are too many people who need help."
• Sometimes you don't have cash on you, and say so in good conscience. (Well, there was that young guy in Walmart who followed up with "Do you have a card?" Like I, a woman shopping by myself, was going to say, "Why yes -- let's go to the ATM.").
Sometimes you have cash, but, again, don't feel comfortable going into your purse or wallet on the street; in a number of instances, I've asked the person to wait while I went inside somewhere and fished out the money.
• Sometimes you have cash on you, but you're in a hurry, your hands are full, or again, you don't feel comfortable reaching for it.
• You think of all the debates you've heard for and against helping panhandlers, especially the arguments that there are those who would rather be given a fish -- to heck with being taught to fish.
• Above all, you just wish a giant arrow, visible only to you and bearing a "give" or "don't give" sign, would suspend itself from the sky every time you were hit up for money. Matter of fact, such an arrow would come in handy in a lot of your financial matters, wouldn't it?
While in New Orleans, I read online comments about the panhandling problem. As has been the case here, folks told of seeing panhandlers who work the intersections get into and out of nice vehicles. (One homeless advocate I know says that yes, there are people with nice vehicles who transport these individuals to and from panhandling spots in exchange for a cut of the take.) And there are websites where panhandlers and those who are into sign-flying exchange information, as well as online slide shows of the funniest or most attention-getting signs.
The "31 Shockingly Funny Panhandling Signs" feature at offbeat.topix.com offers such photos as that of a handsome, smiling man with salt-and-pepper hair and mustache holding a sign that says "wife has been kidnapped! I'm short 98 cents for ransom!" Another guy, dressed as Darth Vader, bearing a sign saying "Help me -- I am a disabled clone war veteran. Need $$$ to build deth star." And pictures of guys with come-hithers similar to those I've seen in other cities -- "Will Take Verbal Abuse for $100" and "Why Lie Need Weed."
If you know the value of giving, if you have any kind of heart for those who may be homeless or going through rough times, if you have any desire or unction to come out on the side of compassion-ism, no matter how big a pushover it may make you look like -- here's a sign you may want to fly, at least in your heart: "Will help when I can."
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Style on 05/19/2019