Obnoxious, although I am more willing to give them a little pass if they seem genuinely interested in the food and not cash. I suppose a big factor: if she asked while mid-bite, it is way more offensive than if you are about to pay the check or waiting for them to bus your dishes.
The closest I’ve been was after dining in a casino restaurant, a woman asks me for a bite while I was sitting at a slot machine waiting. I gave her the whole thing, and a big part of me
taking leftovers is not because I want them later but that I don’t want to waste it.
But otherwise, STOP FUCKING APPROACHING ME AS I’M GETTING INTO MY CAR, MAKING ME ROLL DOWN THE WINDOW. Payphone too, if that ever happens to me.
Like most Bay Area natives, living close to SF, you quickly learn to ignore beggars.
I stopped giving anything to beggers/panhandlers about 15 years ago. I saw a guy on the side of the road with a sign that said something like “Hungry and cold. Will work for food”. I proceeded to go to a Burger King drivethrough and order a Whopper meal - hey, not the best food in the world but if you’re hungry it’s filling and fairly tasty.
I proceeded to pull up with the bag of food and held it out of the window to give it to him. He asked “What the f*** is this shit?” I told it is was some food for him. He took the bag out of my hand, threw it to the ground and kicked it into the street, telling me “I don’t want your food, just give me money”.
After that experience, I haven’t given a penny to any beggar I have met, with the exception of one guy in Vegas who had a sign that said “Why lie…I want beer”. He got 2 bucks from me for his honesty. Now, I ignore any panhandler and don’t even make eye contact.
Why is one experience with a person acting like a jerk considered sufficient reason not to help anyone else? They are individual humans that probably have nothing to do with each other.
IMO, begging is lucrative enough for lots of beggars to have “territories” and to hang in the same area, day after day (as long as the weather’s nice) and do nothing but take money from people. I have no qualms ignoring them, and anyone getting near my dinner is asking for their hand to be stabbed with my fork.
I used to always give to beggars. Over the years, various therapists and social workers (all left wing bleeding heart liberals like myself) convinced me that giving money was a bad idea. They all told me if I wanted to help, I should contribute to charities that feed the homeless.
I agree that if you feel you must give, give food. My sister, after noticing that there were many folks with signs along her drive to work, keeps packets of non-perishable food items in her glove compartment.
I don’t give to beggars, I call the police on them. I’m sure the police can tell them about the local services for homeless people in the area while hurrying them on their way.
I have a grocery store we don’t go to any more because their parking lot is a nightmare, and the street parking there requires that you buy a ticket from a kiosk. Panhandlers stand next to the kiosk and ask people for spare change as they’re digging through their pockets for money for the ticket…
Cynical me thinks she didn’t want your food, she wanted you to give her money and probably trashed the food you had packed up for her. Kind-hearted me thinks you did a nice thing. Yeah, it’s manipulative - that’s what they count on.
Sometimes, though rarely, I will give money to someone panhandling, but mostly I just try to ignore them. If they really bother me outside a business, I look for a manager to make them go away. I lost all compassion for the scruffy looking guy I saw frequently at the plaza between the liquor store and grocery store when I saw him one day at the new mall down the road riding a bicycle way nicer than the old one I own. I can’t help but think, clean up and suck it up and get a shitty job like the rest of us.
I did have someone ask me for money for a coffee as I walked into McD’s once. Asked him how he took it and offered to get him one. He refused, said he’d rather get a coffee at the restaurant across the road. I thought about it for a moment and gave him the dollar I would have spent. Something about him made that seem like the right thing to do.
Yeah, I think the askng for food thing is just a ruse, she’s hoping you give her money. Similarly, there are beggars who hang out the Metro asking for a very specific amount of money, like $1.75 so they can “get home,” but the guys always there, either he still hasn’t gotten the $1.75 or he is being less than honest.
Wrong. For one, I’m not looking for an excuse to not just give my shit away because I don’t need one and I know it. “Because it’s mine and I don’t want to,” is good enough. It’s not like not giving to panhandlers weighs on my conscience and I feel like I have to justify my actions. For another, the guy in my example was just that, an example. Just the very most recent example – happened earlier this summer – in a long line of examples of shitty behavior by shitty people who think the world owes them, and apparently their dog, something. It’s not “one asshole”, it’s a whole bunch of assholes who clearly have never heard the phrase “beggars can’t be choosers.”
Nobody (nobody I know anyway, and certainly not me) gives to these people expecting a pat on the back and a bunch of ass-kissing but, absent actual gratitude which, IME, is definitely absent, they need to shut their damn mouths and walk away regardless of what has or has not been given to them. They’re getting something for free that somebody else had to work for. Tough shit if it isn’t up to whatever high standards they’re imagining for themselves. Berating the people they’re relying on for their day to day needs, assuming they aren’t full of shit, is just bad business and, unfortunately, it’s going to affect everybody in that business.
Just like this: I think McDonald’s is complete shit. I haven’t been to every McDonald’s, of course, but every McDonald’s I have been to has been dirty and gross with rude, stupid staff who, despite being painfully slow, always ALWAYS manage to fuck up my order. So if I take a trip to somewhere Not Here, is it so unreasonable to pass by the McDonald’s in favor of something that has a better chance of not sucking? Sure, maybe the McDonald’s in Toledo is the one McDonald’s that is clean and well-staffed by people with more brain cells than fingers but why would I waste my time even stopping when nearly every other experience I’ve had has left me so frustrated and annoyed?
Asking for change for a bus or to get home is a wide-spread scam story - I’ve heard it a few times here, too.
Being panhandled while eating outside is not cool - while I genuinely feel badly for homeless people, I am aware that there are many, many services available for them in my city (some of which I contribute to). I’m not going to feel guilty for having a better life than they do, any more than I feel badly because I don’t have as good a life as some people. We all have our own row to hoe.
I have a nice® story about a homeless guy. Way back when my SO and I were really poor, we were walking downtown one beautiful fall afternoon. All of the trees were in full bloom, and I had picked a couple of blooming sticks/twigs. I was carrying them, when a homeless guy approached me to ask me for some money.
Now we had a place to live, so we were marginally better than him, but not much. I really didn’t have any money. I went to hand him one of the flowers, and he sort of flinched back and I said, “What’s wrong?”
And he said, “I thought you were going to hit me.”
I said, “I would never! I just wanted to give you some flowers, because that’s all I have.”
And he smiled this nice little smile, and he said, “Thank you, pretty lady.” And he took the flowers.
I actually do want to help people who actually need food.
However, while I don’t believe that ALL beggars in ALL cases are only looking for booze or drug money, I do believe that most of them are, based on my experiences. If I offer food and money to someone who is holding up a “WILL WORK FOR FOOD” sign, and I am told that he only wants money, and I do this several times…I tend to believe that most people who hold these signs are just looking for money. If I offer to buy some food for someone who approaches me for money “for food” in a grocery store parking lot, and I’m told that she just wants the money, then I tend to believe that all the people who approach me in parking lots for food money are just looking for money, not food. And if someone approaches me in a gas station parking lot, claiming to need gas money, and I offer to fill up the vehicle’s tank on my card, and the person only wants money…guess what I believe?
I used to work in a mall, and I used to see the same little kids, every day, hitting people up for money. They’d want a quarter to be able to call home, or they needed bus fare to go home. For some people, having a prepared sob story and hitting up everyone they can is a way to make money…and they learn this skill pretty early. Sometimes their parents teach them, sometimes they figure it out by themselves.
If I’m approached by a stranger who begs for something, I assume that s/he is not actually needy, but simply finds begging easier than other ways of making money. Yeah, this is a rather cynical response. I also assume that telemarketing calls for charity are scams, and anyone who calls me up and claims that they’re from Microsoft and my computer is infested with a virus is also a scam. Because of my experiences.
A couple of years ago I was getting gas at a station on my way home, in a somewhat sketchy area where I ordinarily wouldn’t stop, but I had to get gas or I wouldn’t make it home. A woman approached me and I tensed up, prepared to be solicited for money. She asked me for seventeen cents. I don’t think she said why.
She seemed reasonably well dressed, not at all threatening, and I didn’t see a reason not to give it to her. I’m pretty vigilant, but if this is a scam, it’s a new one on me. If she’s making bank hustling gas station patrons seventeen cents at a time, more power to her. She’ll be there all night to buy a 40. Plus, one day I might be in a situation where I’m a few nickels short for something.