What I said to someone when I was told "Homless are lazy!"

I was just reading a post here that reminded me of something that happened a little under a year ago...

I was walking with my friend Worran and his exchange student downt town when we came accross some homeless people, naturally they asked us if we had any spare change so that they could buy some food. I gave them the change in my pockets (which sadly wasn't very much :(.. ) and Worran and his friend just looked on.

Once we were out of the view of the people, Worran turned to me and said "I hate homless peole, they're so lazy!!! why don't they go out and get a job?!"

At that point in time I had a very short temper, and I lost it. I went on an all out hour long rant at him. I said, "Get a job?! Would you hire someone who couldn't aford to bathe or buy decent work clothes? would you hire someone who society tries it's best to ignore?! No. I thought so. Niether would any one else. And that's the problem with todays sosciety! You only get 1 chance in life,and if little mistake is made, you could be thrown out on the street and labeled lazy. Have you even tried to understand why they're out on the street?! I have talked to some of these people, they are from abusive homes, if they're from any home at all, and bad situations. They didn't wake up one morning and say, "I think I'll be homeless today... hmmm, yes, that is my career choice, I LOVE begging for food and for people's charity." no! These people have tried and are still trying to live their lives to the best of their ability at the moment..." And my rant went on something like that for some time..

After the rant though, all Worran could say was, "I didn't call them lazy! What I meant was that they were.. uh... well, if they would have gotten a job in the first place!...."

At that point I gave up and we agreed to change the subject. People who give ignorant opinions like that gererally make me mad. But please don't frown upon my friend, the homless hater, because he has been spoiled all his life, and it's inconcievable for him to even think about the different situations peole have to put up with, it's just the way he was brought up. I don't hate him or tell him that his thinking is flawed though, (even though it might have seemed that way) I just tried to give him a little more information to mull over while he was condeming people. I didn't force my point of view on him, or I didn't try to and if I did I sincerely didn't mean to, I didn't argue my point until he "switched sides" I just let my point of view be known after his was, and dropped the subject. (as all "thin line" arguments should be..)

YOu might be wondering why I posted this. Well, I just thought you all might want to know where I stand on the homless issue, and where some others may stand. Just make sure that before you form an opinion on anything, to look up all the facts.

That conversation made me realize that there seriously are people out there who think that homless people are homeless by chioce, and that's VERY sad.

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