COLUMN: "Sympathy and Spare Change"

From Andra Fogel and Darren Fogel's "Sympathy and Spare Change," Fall '92 Do you get annoyed when, in the course of walking one block on Spruce Street, three different homeless people ask for spare change? Does it frighten you when you are walking home late at night and the only person between you and your destination is a man who appears to be playing charades with himself? Even though you can smell the alcohol on their breath, you are still convinced that you can give homeless people your money, and they will invest it in a wholesome meal. You are conned to believe that you are making an intelligent decision. Deep down, you know the truth. There is no way in hell that a man with a bottle of Thunderbird is looking for bus fare to get to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, or for a meal with food from the four basic food groups. We often wonder about the rights of the homeless. We lean towards liberal social programs when we see how bad life can be. We wonder how we can help the homeless. Penn community organizations such as Kite and Key, Penn Musicians Against Homelessness and Circle K have created numerous programs to aid the people who are less fortunate than ourselves. People at Penn are interested in helping others. Whether it is due to a genuine interest in cleaning Philadelphia's streets, or a desire to make a resum look good, Penn's manpower has had a significant impact on the surrounding community. Tutoring programs have done a remarkable job investing in the future generation of West Philly, and University students are responsible for creating, developing, organizing and completing numerous projects to help those around us. Our generation is putting forth a great effort to prepare tomorrow's adult population for the rocky road ahead. But didn't our parents do the same thing when they were our age? And aren't there still street dwellers hanging out in front of Chili's, at the Quad entrance and next to 7-Eleven? These people are the ones that make us wonder if our efforts will pay off. In any large city, one can find many homeless people. However, even people from New York City comment on how frequently they are approached by street people asking for money in West Philadelphia. But what can we do about the masses of people who insist on harassing us? Every once in a while, a police officer will come along and provide a temporary solution to this problem. However, as soon as the policeman leaves the area, the man asking for your pocket change will return. Maybe strategically placing a scarecrow dressed as a law enforcement agent outside of all campus convenience stores and campus residences would permanently solve our troubles. But then the homeless would probably flock to areas of off-campus housing. Transferring the problem is not a viable solution. Where does the solution lie? And is it our problem to solve? Perhaps the existence of street dwellers is inevitable in such a populous society. Maybe such a problem would never exist if we did not insist on creating a welfare state. It is time to separate our hearts from our wallets. How can our situation possibly improve if we continue to allow our less fortunate neighbors to be dependent on us? Isn't that how our problem started? What claim do these people have to our money? Why don't we give our money away to everyone? Of course we can spare a few dimes a week, but giving handouts allows these people to manipulate our good nature. Instead of using our generosity to give the homeless our cash, we should use it to help them in the long run. Most Penn students have spoken to a street person at one point in time. We know that they are street smart and we can safely conclude that they have the potential to contribute what they know to our society. Many big cities have programs that give the homeless the opportunity to work in exchange for three well-balanced meals each day. This work does not include making the underprivileged do ten push-ups on the sidewalk in exchange for 23 cents. A basically simple, stress-free task that takes more time than energy serves as the foundation for the type of work involved in such a program. Of course, there is no guarantee that people would participate. Before we can help the hungry, they have to want to help themselves. We cannot improve the current standard of living for the homeless by ourselves. However, handouts do not seem to be an effective solution. Our sympathy often overpowers our initial reaction to ignore those who are less fortunate. When it comes down to it, we can not approach this problem from either extreme. We can't give away all that we have, because of our own self-interest. At the same time, our hearts won't allow us to say no to the pleading homeless person all the time. Things would be much easier if we remained ignorant. Unfortunately, we are human. Darren Fogel and Andra Fogel are siblings from Rydal, Pennsylvania. She is a College freshman; he is a senior Entrepreneurial Management major. "He Got the Bigger Room" appears alternate Wednesdays.

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