Comment by crazypyro | Hacker News Reader

Comment by crazypyro | Hacker News Reader

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I understand the idea, but I still don't think this is the right way to go about it.... There are many well organized and already established charities that help out the homeless. If you feel the need to help less fortunate people out, I believe it would be better to donate to one of these charities. It also helps circumvent the potential for the beggar to go use it for alcohol/drugs/unnecessary purchases and it makes sure that only the people that truly are trying to get help out of their situation get the money....

Edit: Playing devil's advocate here, but couldn't this be a way for some "pranksters" to harass the homeless easily as well? I certainly don't have enough faith in our fellow humans to expect this never to happen, especially since homeless already deal with enough assaults... Between 1999-2010, 312 homeless people were reported dead from these assaults and over 800 injured [1].

[1]http://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/hatecrimes.html

I agree with this. I can't speak for SF specifically, but a lot of places with high homeless populations have organizations, systems, and resources to help those in need. From my understanding, one of the problems is people outside of the organizations unintentionally undermining the organizations by giving food, handouts, etc. When people receive this sort of help, they don't see a need to go to these organizations that help identify and ideally fix the root issue.

Fixing the homeless problem is complicated. I don't think that gives you an excuse to do nothing though. I think the app is interesting, and I think could could come from it. I think the effort is better spent focusing on more permanent solutions. Maybe try joining up with a homeless organization and pitching them the idea.

I'm a big proponent of organizations and systems. They're probably the most efficient mechanism but they don't address all of the issues. Sometimes a homeless person doesn't want/need food or shelter, they just want someone passing by to notice them and take a few minutes to chat.

I'm of the mind that if you feel led to do something then you should follow your gut.

I'm always curious when otherwise intelligent people think that homeless people shouldn't have alcohol. I can only think of several reasons why a person thinks the homeless shouldn’t have it:

A) They enjoy alcohol, but feel that someone without a home doesn't deserve to enjoy it. B) They don't drink alcohol which they believe is the reason they are not homeless. C) They think that if that person stops drinking, they will end up with a job quickly and get their life back together.

Only in rare cases is C going to work out and those cases it will probably have nothing to do with whether you decide alcohol is right for them.

If you want to help homeless people, give them some money, not some old, half eaten sandwich. Every time I’ve watched a friend try to give away some old food, they are always turned down by homeless people.

I could be off here, but overtime I have got the sense that the homeless people I see every day are not feeling bad for themselves at all. They view themselves as hustlers, not saving, but just getting by everyday by raising a few dollars here, a few dollars there etc. I view them as capitalists who are making a choice every day to live the way they do.

It might be because some homeless people are alcoholics and it's not really a particularly nice thing to encourage someone else's addiction/disease.

Because I consider alcohol something that is an unnecessary expense and when you are spending money on alcohol when you are homeless, I can't help but think that there are more important things that you could be spending that same money on. Also if I give money to a homeless person, I personally don't want my money going to drugs/alcohol because that is doing nothing to help the homeless person out. I'd rather it go to food or even something like a gym membership for a month so that they can shower and get cleaned up to maybe get a job. That's my view anyway.

This is an interesting discussion. So what's the goal? Is the goal making the homeless person happy/ier? Are you sure that by not allowing that person to have alcohol, or by making him get a job, he's going to be happy/ier? If being happy is not the goal, then what is it? And how do you achieve it?

I see your point, and I'd like to make a mixed argument. As for the App in itself, it might be a a good idea for more urgent needs of the homeless, I say like if someone is in need of medicine quickly, a charity or organization might be too slow, as in, more Bureaucratic than necessary to help the homeless person, some more urgent needs might be quenched by the community of people who would like to help. However, many years ago, when I was younger and wanted to help, I got involved with a group who would go out at night and give soup to the homeless, I remember my first day, there was some commotion going on with a woman who did not wanted to come and get her soup, from what I've been told she was already a friend of the group, when they went to talk to her, then they found out some teenage kids had come and threw fire on her hair, luckly it did not burn her face, but still, an App like that might cause some serious harm if left on the hands of those who would rather have homeless people disappear.

I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand you're right that a lot of people need the sort of organized and consistent long-term help that ad-hoc leftovers and the odd blanket won't provide.

On the other hand my limited experience with organized charity is that the biggest unmet need is agency over their own lives, something productive to do, and contact with mainstream society. If this project developed into something that would allow more people to feel OK having casual 1-on-1 contact with people at the margins of society it could have the potential to do a lot of good.

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