Them: don’t give money to the poor and destitute, they’ll just use it for drink and drugs!
Me: what do you think I was going to use it for?
Is that you steve hughes?
Nice, someone knows where I got it from. I love that whole video. He makes so many great points.
Same story, but I turned around and gave him another 5 bucks with the words “oh, sorry, I know that stuff’s expensive, have a nice evening”
Legitimately? Spend some time homeless in a US city and you will get fentanyl for free or next to nothing. I do not recommend it.
I’m curious, why would that stuff be passed around for free? My first thought was conspiracy-theory like nefarious suppliers want to addict & ruin & eradicate the homeless population, and doing it via addictive pleasures would be an indirect innocuous-seeming way to do it. Watching the homeless population drop like flies: “THeY DiD iT tO tHeMsELvEs!”
Its just super potent compared to other opioids/opiates using the same source material (opium). Its like 100x more potent than morphine and 50x heroin.
If you were slinging heroin and have a lab to make the stuff you just increased your production rate by that multiplier.
I’m sure there are some geopolitical PvP factors as the other commenter eluded to, but the economics of supply/demand were the enabler.
Honestly not sure, my stories on such come from a recently ex homeless addict coworker (food industry) I had last year. My understanding is it is just so cheap and plentiful that people will just offer you some pretty often.
As for why fentanyl is fucking everywhere and dirt cheap, that’s a bit more complicated but has a lot to do with China.
I think is just human nature solidarity and bonding. I have given my friends plenty of drugs, that I paid good money for them, for free, and they have also shared plenty of their drug with me.
You silly. He’s obviously gonna put your $5 into the stock market, wait for it to grow 1000x and then use that money to buy drugs.
Funnily enough, that’s almost exactly what I did, except stock market = crypto.
And then I lost everything as smb rugpulled an crypto exchange market
Always move it off the exchange ASAP!
Yeah, like before you even put in in the exchange.
Heyooo~
And you deserved it for keeping your crypto in an exchange
🚀🌙
Not everyone knows this but you can actually combine multiple notes to make a bigger purchase
No way, I’ve been looking for a £150,000 note for years so I can buy a house and you’re telling me I could have bought one by adding others together???
That’s something big notes wouldn’t teach you.
He’s not spending only the $5 on drugs! Responsibility means financing your hobbies with proper budgeting: it’s called Adulting.
I used to beg for money. I was a homeless heroin addict. I learned some interesting stuff begging for money. Being white myself. When I asked white people for money they would often look at me with disdain. Ask black people and they’d usually help ya out. It always seemed crazy to me that the white guy with a suit would treat you like garbage, but the black guy with gang tattoos on his his face and a car that needs work would throw ya a couple of bucks. I’ve heard black people say it works the other way around for them, but I had no way to test it heh.
I’m completely opiate free now for better or for worse. I say it like that because I suffer from crippling depression. Life is not enjoyable to me anymore. But, there are a lot of homeless guys where I live. I give them money, and blankets in the winter. Honestly, I give zero shits what they spend that money on. I don’t care if it’s drugs, alcohol, toothpaste, or socks. The money, once it leaves my hand is theirs to do with as they please. As long as that money brings them even a moment of happiness. As long as I make their life a little more bearable. I’m fine with that.
Consider growing some magic mushrooms to help enjoy life again. Good on you for crawling out of that spiral.
You know what? I did grow some and did the whole micro-dose thing. I loved it. But, it made my migraines more frequent. I’m currently working on the migraines with the local charity hospital. So, I want to give it another try soon.
As a matter of fact. I have 3 Petri dishes with mycelium right now that need grain.
“ This homeless guy asked me for money the other day. I was about to give it to him and then i thought he was going to use it on drugs or alcohol. And then i thought, that’s what i’m going to use it on. Why am i judging this poor bastard. People love to judge homeless guys. like if you give them money they’re just going to waste it. Well, he lives in a box, what do you want him to do? save it up and buy a wall unit? Take a little run to the store for a throw rug and a cd rack? he’s homeless.”
- Greg Giraldo
There’s a similar story about CS Lewis that’s much older. I originally saw it in some print source, but this (unsourced) quick Google copy-paste gives the gist:
One day, Lewis and a friend were walking down the road and came upon a street person who reached out to them for help. While his friend kept walking, Lewis stopped and proceeded to empty his wallet. When they resumed their journey, his friend asked, “What are you doing giving him your money like that? Don’t you know he’s just going to go squander all that on ale?” Lewis paused and replied, “That’s all I was going to do with it.”
Obviously it’s funnier when a comedian says it, just thought it was interesting that the general idea has been around for a while. Probably as long as there’s been booze and beggars tbh.
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So willing to tell people how to live but I bet you don’t lift a finger to help them.
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I’d like to know what part of your comment you think indicates otherwise.
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So, you can’t?
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Before weed was legal in my state, I knew a guy who would sell a single gram for $5. That’s like, one bowl? Just the tiniest little single nugget of weed.
When I was growing up we had trouble breaking $10 a gram :/
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The original was fine. The OP confronted the homeless guy, so the word “him” works here.
no you literally broke it. You’ve misunderstood the joke.
The swerve is you think Nom here is going to confront the woman, but then he talks to the guy he gave money too.
Why would he talk to her, she doesn’t know where to get $5 drugs.
Supporting an addicts habit is not supporting them, you are enabling them.
The old lady gender swapped pretty quickly
They confronted the homeless guy, not the lady.
Some beggars make bank. Like, more than you do.
If it’s such a good gig, nothing is stopping you from doing it yourself?
Self respect and morals as mentioned in another comment.
Money has no morals. The amount of money you have is probably the worst way to judge a character. More often it’s circumstances and I see no reason to kick someone when they’re down like you do.
I’m not big on relying on charity to pay my bills. If you could get it by doing an actual job and just beg because it’s easy you’re stealing from those who actually need it.
How is it stealing when people are giving it to you voluntarily?
He (hopefully) means fraud.
Charity is a limited resource so if you are relying on charity when you do not need it, you are taking it from those who do.
You aren’t taking anything.
The word you’re looking for is fraud, not stealing or theft.
I’m saying that the available charity is limited. When you solicit charity while not needing it you remove that charity from those who do. So while it may be a fraudulent appeal for charity it also steals a available resources from those in need.
The downvotes from ignorance on Lemmy are simply astounding. People can’t believe things outside their tiny bubbles.
Car window washing: $375/day, $150 in “a few hours” https://thewest.com.au/news/perth/a-16-year-old-perth-window-washer-reveals-what-life-is-like-on-the-roadside-ng-b881029234z
Begging: $400/day https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-07-15/professional-beggars-intimidate-women-tourists-melbourne/6621824
Begging, $40 before lunch, then went to work: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/164e6f/comment/c7sm5b5/ (the whole thread is really good, fantastic content in this post. There’s a link to a blog where guy begged in different ways, and logged the results. Worst: “ex-wife” ($3.30/hr), best: “wheelchair” ($23/hr))
For 38 studies, $20usd-$60usd/day: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/10575677211036498 - which is what most people are thinking about.
