During spring break I had the opportunity to visit the city of Santa Monica. In comparison to everyone else who was there to see the beautiful sights, I noticed the amount of homeless people in the streets. I was immediately reminded of the documentary Taylor’s Campaign that was shown in class and saw for myself how accurate the film was. Not only was I able to see, but I had the chance to hear a couple conversations that the homeless were having among themselves. In one of them a male was explaining how it had been a very slow day for him only being able to make five dollars but that will have to do one way or another. I was also aware that none of them would go up to the people walking by. A few held signs quietly sitting down while others did some kind of entertainment for the tourists, and several of them just sat around the park benches.
I was surprised to see that the dolphins which were set up to replace panhandling were located at the pier. Although they were set up around the city of Santa Monica, no one stopped and took the time to read the purpose of them nor to make any kind of donation. I realized that if I had not watched the documentary, I myself would have thought that they were simply figures to make the pier look nice. Never would I have thought that they were purposely placed in order to replace panhandling. This really made me reflect on the kinds of methods that our government uses in order to attempt to solve this issue.