Lately, I have been thinking about the concept of pity and the amount that is actually given to homeless people. This interest in pitying the homeless was sparked while reading the first section of Kenan Heise’s The Book of the Poor: Who They Are, What They Say, and How to End Their Poverty. It was at the very beginning, following the experience of Thomas Jefferson, where a number of homeless people were trying to avoid the pity by trying to present themselves as other than what they were: homeless.

These homeless people had a sense of pride that they were striving to hold on to. I think that people come across a homeless person and their mindset falls into the stereotype that they are out on the streets to beg, because they lack the drive to support themselves. The more privilege’s perspective is to pity them, ignore them, or throw some change their way. I tried to think back to a time where I felt like I was being pitied and vice versa. What I found was that myself, nor the person receiving my pity, didn’t want it.

So what is the point in pity? Pity is nothing more than an emotion that fails to benefit the giver and the receiver. No matter the class or situation, no one strives for looks of pity from strangers, yet alone loved ones.  The point that I am trying to make is that homeless people aren’t so beneath us that they need the pity in order to survive. We need to remember that the blame for their state of living has two sides: it is either due to choices that the homeless themselves have made or the choices made by the surrounding privileged society.