[Reader-list] Begging on the streets of London.

[fmadre at free.fr]

In Paris, there are lots of beggars here, you never see a black person 
beg. all
other kinds of people but no blacks. Most beggars in the subway are whites,
they often shout a brief explanation of their troubles (most of them 
lost their
jobs) and either ask for money or try to sell stuff that the beggars
organisations produce. actually they are not beggars organisation but 
so-called
SDF orgs. SDF stands for "sans domicile fixe" which means homeless.

There is one guy on the RER line that I use most often who is totally 
agressive,
he's maybe 25 years old. Tanned and has close cropped hair, every day he has
different sports-like clothes, nowadays he recites the weather that he has
learned from the newspapers that are given away in the tube (metro or 20
minutes). He says so, before delivering the weather in a manner which can
difficultly be heard, and then he adds: if you do not help me I have no other
solution than to resort to crime. he makes a hard face. then he walks 
along the
aisles and he talks to people who do not look at him, very agressively. 
He's the
bad conscience of the metro.

Personnaly I exceptionnaly give money to beggars, I think it is a waste and a
bottomless pit. On the other hand I like to pay my taxes, I disapprove of the
way that they are used, sure, and I think that companies should pay much more
than they do, but I feel that the state must provide food and shelter to all.

On the other hand Lenin, after st augustine, said: he who does not work 
does not
eat. I assume that this will be applicable after the revolution only.

f.