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hosh

The larger themes are:

1. Community has always supported people in times of need, more so than government services.

2. The Internet had created distance amount community members

3. Use of the Internet for funds like this (or for Gofundme, etc.) is bringing that back, though with strangers

4. Shifting attitudes and values on whether this is acceptable

5. One Millennial is now setting aside funds for direct contributions. I would not be surprised if that trend continues.

6. Continued pressure on Millennials to make ends meet with access to new technology has been leading to this.

7. Disadvantaged groups and their economic struggles are becoming more visible, along with means for the community to help.

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> Community has always supported people in times of need

Sure, if you are the right gender, race, and religion.

The third definition of community from dictionary.com:

a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharing common characteristics or interests and perceived or perceiving itself as distinct in some respect from the larger society within which it exists

A prerequisite for finding community support is to be a member of one. There are many communities. The commonality and social bonds between members form the basis of trust and the expectation of reciprocity.

When people perceive that their resources are simply being expropriated to benefit people they have nothing in common with, may never meet, and certainly cannot expect reciprocal investment from, they tend to withdraw from voluntary participation. Without that participation, communities simply die.

It's true that some communities have a larger pool of resources to share than others. But consider this before you condemn a synagogue for helping out a local Jewish family with money that could have gone to taxes to help someone arguably more in need.

It's sad that not everyone has a home, but the solution is not to demolish the entire block and apportion to each person an equal share of lumber.

Citation needed for #1

The larger theme is

"Technology makes it easier for individuals to beg strangers for money".

I can't open social media without seeing kickstarter/indiegogo this, gofundme that, need money quick, can someone paypal/venmo me money for thing, etc. Then a day, week, month later you see pictures of their brand new cabinets or of their vacation or they are hitting people up for money again for something else because people gave last time so now they expect regular handouts.

Instead of getting creative, people now just go "hey, stranger, you have it better than me, give me your hard earned money!"

I think both of these themes are equally true. Informal (and formal) community organizations have long supported those they feel are most in need, and people have long begged strangers for money. The internet simply makes it easier to do both.

I'm having trouble figuring what you're actually saying here.

Do you not like that people can beg? Or that they have to at all?

>I'm having trouble figuring what you're actually saying here.

I'm saying the internet, specifically social media and payment apps/crowd funding sites, allow people to unabashedly give their (true or otherwise) sob story and beg complete strangers for money, I imagine the vast majority of people on sites like gofundme would hesitate to even phone family for financial assistance and I suspect nearly all of the people begging on social media simply wouldn't ask if they had to walk up to random strangers in person and ask.

Keep in mind, I say this while my nephew currently has a gofundme trying to raise 260,000 USD (!!!) for his mother for some experimental, questionable (cryotherapy for her kidney cancer, when it's usually used for skin cancer for example), cancer treatment in China.

I think these sites/methods serve a useful purpose, I think however trying to get gas money to give to your mother to go see your undocumented step-father in another state because he was drink driving and is likely to be deported or remain incarcerated... or hitting people up for beer money... is not a valid use of such sites/methods.

> gas money to give to your mother to go see your undocumented step-father in another state because he was drink driving and is likely to be deported or remain incarcerated... [...] is not a valid use of such sites/methods.

Why not?

But that is creative, utilizing a medium/tools outside its usual purpose.

> Instead of getting creative, people now just go "hey, stranger, you have it better than me, give me your hard earned money!"

This isn't new. This is the basis of some rather infamous socio-economic systems which have resulted in the deaths of tens of millions of people.

Didn't think I'd see panhandlers get equated to Nazis today.

[flagged]

Maybe. Equating panhandlers to Stalin is just as weird, though.

It's more like deKulakisation.

Either way, it's pretty damn weird to try to connect begging for money with mass slaughter.

Also straight up ignoring the millions of people who die under capitalism.

It looks like you've been using HN primarily for ideological battle. Doing that is against the site guidelines, and we ban accounts that do it because it destroys the curiosity that HN exists for. Could you please stop posting like this? Also, please don't post in the flamewar style generally.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[flagged]

Please don't do this here.

I’m a little confused why I would be flagged when most of my comment history is on topic, and it seems most of the comment history of the account I was replying to is political and divisive.

Two reasons. One is that it was you who first swerved onto a generic ideological tangent, which was the original sin of this subthread.

The other is simply that we don't see all the comments—there are far too many. It's understandable that people want us to be consistent and even-handed, but that's not fully possible. It's also not fully necessary, since someone else violating the site guidelines doesn't make it ok for you to do so. (You can get pulled over for speeding even though others were going faster—which of course they usually are.) But I've taken a look at the other comments now, and did some additional moderation.

Ok, I think that's reasonable.

Thank you for clarifying.

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