Monday, 15 October 2012

The homeless or refugees

Although the homeless are people who have no place to live, refugees have not only no home but also no country. I do not know which the worst is?

According to The New York Times in "Refugees to Turkey top 100,000", Joe Parkinson reports that because of Syria conflicts, over one hundred thousand Syrian refugees suffering from cold weather camp along the border between Syria and Turkey, but Turkish government deny opening country for all refugees.

Many Thai homeless people are mental illness or drugs addiction patients. Although they have their nationality and country, most of them do not know who they are and do not have money. Some of them live along footpaths. Some walk freely through places to places and  rest in any place where nobody kick them out. Some beg for  food or find it in garbage can. However, in some parts of  Thailand, there are many camps for refugees and tribes. These group of people are identified they are no nationality. Fortunately, they have large supports from inside and outside organizations. It means they do not suffer from starvation. Beyond that, they are normal and study as much as they can. Their lives can be as normal as others although they will hurt from official communication. It is wondering whether living as normal or abnormal people is better.

Reference
Joe Parkinson (October 15, 2012, 7:46 AM). Refugees to Turkey top 100,000. The New York Times. Retrieved October 15, 2012 (10:30 PM ) from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443675404578058103242571138.html?mod=WSJASIA_hpp_MIDDLESecondNews

6 comments:

  1. I see many beggars in Thailand, and many kind people give money to them. However, I think that giving money is very bad thing. If they get money easily, they wouldn’t work and wouldn’t learn how to get money, and then, he couldn’t escape this situation forever. When I stayed in the Philippines, I saw many beggar and homeless. My Filipino friends told me that you gave some food or water instead of money. I agreed with them. I hope that Thai people don’t give only 1 thb. If you want to help them, please give food or water. Maybe, that cost is more than 5thb. However, this would be real help, giving money doesn't help them.

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    1. I agree with you that we should not give money to the beggars because most of them disguise to be a beggar. They work in as a gangster and use children to beg in order to drawing our mercy. For example, I saw a child beggar sitting near across road bridge, who always sit beside a cripple man, was hit until he burst crying because he did not express any sad and then did not receive much money. When that man hit the boy, I wondered nobody notice it, but had stood for long time watching it. Maybe, the result was noise from road lives hidden that evidence. If you do not give the beggar money, he will receive some violent attacks. If we give him some money, it means we support beggars' gangsters and they will grow over the country. As you said, if we give them food instead of money, it doesn't mean we can help the child beggar. For example, last time, I saw someone gave them some drinks or food, the gang controller kicked them away or ordered the beggar not eat them. Life is really suffer, isn't it? Even worse child beggars, there are the elder who are not exactly beggars, but they still play with our mercy. Some of them sell some sweets or souvenirs. Do you think that is acceptable because they exchange somethings with money.Many of them are not Thais. When I saw them,I always feel sad and discouraged. I think they don't deserve to be there. They should spend the rest of their lives more peaceful. I think they might be not Buddhists.
      However, what will happen with a real beggars, if you do not donate money to them?

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    2. Perhaps instead of wasting their time interfering in the personal lives of decent citizens who are not harming anyone else, such as gamblers, drug users and prostitutes, the police should be working on real crimes like the sort of child abuse that Aor describes here.

      Rescuing children at risk and being actually abused seems to me something that the police should justly and usefully be involved in. It would do some real good to help both individuals and society, unlike an enormous amount of police activity today that wastes tax money and scarce police resources by committing injustice against citizens.

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  2. I agree with Mori that we should not give money to the begger. This is because some beggers are not really poor and they can collect a significant amount of money. I experienced a begger once when I went sightseeing, she asked for Baht 100 so that she could go back to her hometown. Her voice sounds like she threatened me; therefore, I denied. Then I saw her kept asking other people who were walking pass her. Some gave her, but some didn't. When there was no one around her, she counted the money she recieved. Surprisingly, there were a pile of bank notes. There were like only 100 and 500 bank notes. Therefore, I was depreesed what she did and hardly trust any beggers.

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    1. Peace's comment reminds me of the Sherlock Holmes story "The Man With the Twisted Lip", which I won't say any more about here. It will be much more fun if you watch the video and see how Conan Doyle's story unfolds, courtesy of YouTube.

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  3. If they cannot get jobs, perhaps because of inept or selfish government control, are beggars, street people or others, such as the old, entitled to financial assistance from the government? Why or why not? What should or could be done to help solve such problems?

    Is it OK to use tax money to support people who are unable to get the sort of work they want? How about medical treatment? And education?

    These sort of questions might also be relevant to what we have lately been discussing in Quest.

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