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0 pointsbradleyland13y ago0 comments

Ever heard the aphorism, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions"? Your intent is to tap a negative to achieve a positive. Unfortunately, you also reinforce a negative.

Clothing a homeless individual with a rival's garb as a means to insult one's rival reinforces the idea that it is ok to use a homeless person as an instrument of insult. It is not. It is dehumanizing, and treads dangerously close to the line of thinking that leads to projects like Bum Fights [1].

1 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bum_fights

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3 comments · 2 top-level

jinpan13y ago· 1 in thread

It is certainly not our hope that people use this as an avenue to dehumanize the unfortunate.

But is it more acceptable to see the unfortunate clearly wearing thin clothing when it's 20 degrees out and maintain the idea that they are people who must maintain their pride, or offer them the chance to sell out? It's a hard question to answer, but I think society has already answered that for us. Fast food restaurants already offer young professionals a chance to sell out by offering higher wages than many starting jobs in alternative industries [1].

1 - http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/25/magazine/skills-dont-pay-t...

bradleylandOP13y ago

> It is certainly not our hope that people use this as an avenue to dehumanize the unfortunate.

There is no way to use a homeless person as a prop that doesn't dehumanize them.

> But is it more acceptable to see the unfortunate clearly wearing thin clothing when it's 20 degrees out and maintain the idea that they are people who must maintain their pride, or offer them the chance to sell out?

I wholely reject this line of thinking. Doing one thing right does not absolve a wrong. By that line of reasoning, the people in the Bum Fights videos were better off, because they were paid. Net positive, am I right!?

IsaacL13y ago

I agree. Also, I imagine homeless people aren't short of jackets - cheap clothes are very cheap these days, relatively speaking. (I don't know about the States, but in the UK a cheap jacket in a bargain shop might be <£10. (Then again America is a lot colder than the UK in parts))

And there's plenty of jumble sales, charity donations of old clothes, etc. This reminds me of that guy who did the (failed) million-tshirts-to-Africa project. Good intentions, bad idea.

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