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Comment by jseeff | Hacker News Reader

I agree that it is not always the best solution to give money (rather than say food etc) but "because they like to live like that" is (as far as I am able to ascertain) a huge over-simplification and in many cases probably an outright falacy. It is well documented that (as with the prison population) there is a high occurrence of mental disorder in homeless people.

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Right, that was oversimplification from my side, and cost me 4 precious carma points so far. Sure. But I live in city with loads of tourists, and most so called "homeless" people here are not people struggling to live trough another day, but rather making good living out of scared tourists.

I'm still quite new around here so don't fully understand how all this Karma thing works - sorry if I somehow caused you to lose something! (Incidentally, I would love to understand it better, know how to search and track replies to comments etc without having to re-read the whole thread, but I digress...)

I think the point you make is different to "choosing".... and is the main reason I prefer to give something that a truly needy person will definitely appreciate (e.g. food, shelter) rather than something that could be spent on alcohol, drugs or be taken by someone who isn't really needy.

In sum though, I think as long as someone is trying to help, each can choose his or her own preferred way to do that :)

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