{"id":19319,"date":"2016-04-18T22:01:31","date_gmt":"2016-04-18T21:01:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diaryofanadi.co.uk\/?p=19319"},"modified":"2016-04-18T22:01:31","modified_gmt":"2016-04-18T21:01:31","slug":"beggars-banquet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/?p=19319","title":{"rendered":"Beggar’s Banquet"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s been a bit of a kerfuffle in Nottingham recently following the placement of new posters such as this one:\"Begging<\/p>\n

A true story. Some years ago, I was on my way home from a squash match. I used to use public transport so I could have a few beers afterwards, and this naturally led to the ceremonial purchase of a kebab close to the bus stop where I\u2019d catch my bus. One night a beggar approached me and said \u201chave you got 50p for a cup of tea?\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019d always been told not to, but for whatever reason I gave him \u00a31 \u2013 and I have never seen anyone run off so fast and into a pub about 200 metres away.<\/p>\n

Since that day I refuse point-blank to hand over money to anyone. They can dress up as pathetically as they like \u2013 dirty blanket, another for the ubiquitous dog, woolly hat, the lot \u2013 but they\u2019re not getting a penny. If they can afford to keep a dog and chain smoke roll-ups, then they should not be begging. Even the ones who are genuinely homeless are frequently \u2013 and I mean \u201cfrequently\u201d \u2013 after money to fuel habits, be it Special Brew, roll-ups, or something stronger and which doesn\u2019t go in via their digestive or respiratory systems.<\/p>\n

At the London Road roundabout there is a hostel for the homeless. Like most hostels, it has a no-alcohol policy. Yet those waiting for it to open are usually to be seen standing nearby with their cans of Special Brew or Strongbow, and these can be seen strewn around during the day. The police also seem to be in attendance a lot of the time. Any money you handed over directly to these people would <\/strong>go to fuel their drink or disciplinary issues, and don\u2019t let anyone try to persuade you otherwise.<\/p>\n

Anyway, the aforementioned kerfuffle is to do with the claim that these posters \u201cdemonise\u201d beggars. To me, that\u2019s a bit like saying rain is wet, and then being accused of saying bad things about rain.<\/p>\n

All these posters do is state plain facts. Money given to beggars will<\/strong> usually end up going on alcohol, tobacco, and drugs. Sure, there might be some genuine beggars who live clean lives, but you have to walk around with your eyes shut not to see the way the majority of them are. I don\u2019t see how stating the plain truth is in any way \u201cdemonising\u201d anyone.<\/p>\n

Money should be given to charities \u2013 which is what this campaign is all about. But the problem with that is that the beggars then only get what they need \u2013 not what they want.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s been a bit of a kerfuffle in Nottingham recently following the placement of new posters such as this one: A true story. Some years ago, I was on my way home from a squash match. I used to use public transport so I could have a few beers afterwards, and this naturally led to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19319\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}