That didn’t used to be me. In my youth, I was happy to lend what I saw
as a helping hand to the few people who asked me for spare change on
the rare occasions I visited a big city.
Harvard Square, contrary to its liberal reputation, has soured me on
the whole panhandling scene. You can’t walk through it without getting
hit up by three or four large, able-bodied, aggressive regulars. These
are not homeless, jobless, needy people–these are successful
businessmen whose business is embarassing tourists and shy young
couples with their shouted “requests.”
Last summer, there was a beggar who kept a dog chained on top of a
supermarket cart, with a cardboard sign saying, “Please, we need to
eat.” It didn’t seem like much of a life for the dog, but I figured it
would be a cruel world that took away some guy’s pet because he was
homeless.
Today, I saw him again–I don’t know if he was somehow un-homeless when
the weather was bad or whether begging is just some kind of a summer
hobby. Last year’s dog is gone–the man has upgraded to two pets, a
puppy and an old cat.
What irks me the most about all this is that Harvard Square makes
homelessness look cozy, cuddly, and safe to young people like Io Nachtwey, murdered in 2001 by 6 “friends” she met there. Teens
from the suburbs hang out in the “Pit”, begging for spare change when
they run out of cigarettes, and every summer a few of them decide to
shed the hassles of home for an exciting lifestyle under the
stars.
Cambridge officials reject the idea of shooing kids away from the Pit
because they would then go somewhere even less safe. On the other hand,
the Cambridge officials have no way to keep the Pit kids safe there, or
to deter unsavory types from preying on them.
Isn’t there some middle ground possible here? I don’t want to
criminalize homelessness or begging–but couldn’t we do something about
the guy with the dog and the cat? And maybe, next to the Pit, a
memorial to Io Nachtwey would remind kids that the “freedom” of
homelessness can have real costs.