askchapo

I've heard variations on most of these in the USA

• they make more from recycling/begging/whatever!

Afaik it's just flatly not true, and something people say to imply homeless and poor people are faking. In the usa i've heard news stories claiming people make a good living panhandling, and it's always just rubbish, or it turns out the "nice house" the person owns had the mortage paid off long ago and they're panhandling because they can't work and have no income.

• in the us, at least, half of all homeless people have a mental illness, and it's often a severe mental illness that prevents them from getting work.

• i'm sure there are lots of masjids and gurdwaras and churches and whatever handing out food. The people begging might have some other issue, who knows. Even so, cash is cash, and you need cash for many things - paying for a cellphone, maybe, or tampons/pads, or just something to making being desperately poor less miserable.

• I've had folks follow me. I think, if you're in that situation, trying to hustle people for more money probably makes a lot of sense. You're not getting much help to begin with, and I imagine people who do help might be able to be pressured to do more. It sucks, it feels really bad, but I think people do it bc their situation is desperate. Idk, I think the vast majority of people would rather be doing anything else than hustle people for a few more lira.

• idk what the demographics are in Istanbul, but if you couldn't figure out what language they were speaking i suspect they'd have a very, very hard time finding work, dealing with the police, dealing with government services. In the usa people speaking anything other than English have great trouble. Minneapolis has a large Somali people and finding English to Somali translators was always a problem. The little kids who translate for their parents are heroes.

• also from the usa - any minority population here, no matter how good their english is, they face a lot of discrimination in housing, jobs, education, and government services. Cops will do sweeps targetting black people or american indigenous people, things like that. If the folks you were talking to were Roma or another marginal minority there's a good chance they're on the street because society and the state shut them out. I know a little about the Roma struggle in Europe and it is dire - brutal official discrimination at every level of government, frequent violence or even pogroms from Europeans, great discrimination in jobs and work. European racism against Roma, or people they think are Roma, seems insane and vicious even by the standards of America, a nation built on race terror. There are maginalized groups like that all over the world who are subjected to brutal violence by society and the state. Often indigenous people like America indigenous people, or Maya in central america. Or people of "low caste" like Dalits in India or Burakumin in Japan. Society hates them, society creates the conditions that keep them in a miserable situation, and then society use's their situation to justify the hate.

My take is always - i'd rather give money to someone who doesn't need it than refuse money to someone who does. Much worse to withhold help from someone in need than refuse someone who genuinely needs a hand.

It's funny, there are endless stories about beggars being important people in disguise. Jewish people are always expecting Elijah to show up. Vikings could never be sure if the stranger at the door asking for a meal and a place to sleep by the fire was Odin. Many European fairy tales feature a beggar who is revealed later to be a fairy or a prince or a saint who later rewards or punishes the main character. In the Hebrew Bible god sends two angels to Sodom, Lot takes them in and protects them, and the rest of the city is destroyed for violating the laws of hospitality.