What have poor people ever done for me?
This is the question I keep returning to, as I wait for my bus everyday. They shuffle up to me and ask me can I spare some change. What rhetoric! Of course I can! They can’t just come out and say it, can they? ‘Give me your money.’ No, friend, it’s called my money for a reason, and I’m not going to part from it for some clichéd, worn-out line. You’re out of your league, I’m afraid. This angel-eyed, candy-skinned, high-class, hyphen-loving honey ain’t gonna give it up for some stinking, cheap-ass line. If you’re not packing some pretty sharp sound bites, you best keep shuffling on by.
I used to give it up easy, but it gradually dawned on me that I was handing over about twenty Euros a year. That’s about four cheap lunches. Who knew that handing over some change could be so costly? Would you even recognise the different symbols on the various tails of the Euro coins? What ignorance! It takes a well-travelled person to identify them, not some ignoramus who refuses to leave his grubby corner of the world. I ask you, have you never seen a Venetian sunset? Or gone skiing in St Moritz? Ever become imbibed with wine at Chateau Mouton Rothschild, or awestruck at Schloss Neuschwanstein? Countless cathedrals, monuments, restaurants, and museums await you – only a short plane journey away – yet you have decided to stay put.
It’s worse when they ask you to buy them a sandwich. These poor folks have been conditioned by sanctimonious-as-fuck types who like to demarcate themselves with their distinguished ethics (They don’t call them moral values, as they’re too refined and individual). Buying them a sandwich is reminding them that you have the power to judge them, because you have money. What does it matter anyway? If they have an addiction, they’ll find the money for drugs or alcohol. A sandwich isn’t going to help them more than just giving them change. In any case, what they need is high-spiritedness, a stiff upper lip, a knack for launching a gambit, an indefatigable work ethic, the will to seize one’s destiny, the inner strength to grab fortune by the horns, modesty, and sacrifice. Only these put bread on the table. The only sandwiches they need are solid moral values sandwiched between determination and self-motivation. Dignity lives in the human mind and heart, not in the food pyramid.
And before any of you get on your high horse and tell me that I shouldn’t make fun of the down and outs, you should know that I have many friends who are beggars and junkies, and they think my jokes are funny, so stop taking offence for them.
