You are walking down a dirt road in the Philippines and come across a group of listless, filthy, rag clad children clustered around a toy made of a partially inflated plastic bag. They spot you and and run to you with hands up, then hang on your sleeves, singing ”give me, give me”. What do you do?
This is the most heart wrenching regular occurrence. The shockingly stark contrast of have and have not, and the truly vast gulf between the two. It can happen within a few miles of what used to be your home, or thousands of kilometres away. Over the years I have reacted in many different ways along the spectrum, and I offer my thoughts. I well understand that this is an philosophical refuge, without the corresponding acknowledgement of the moral call to action.
Begging is absolutely a learned local cultural choice. I have been relentlessly asked for lucre in many places (South Africa) and utterly, happily, ignored in many of the neighbouring places (Namibia).
I can not fix the system or the government, or unlucky geography, or resource distribution, that permits so many people to be so terribly poor. I can not provide healthcare or jobs. Any handout from me will result in only a very short term benefit. Contrast begging with the more substantial animal, charity.
For me, it burns up too much bandwidth to individually evaluate and address every request for money. Instead I pick an arbitrary amount, give that away each day, and be comfortable saying ’no’. My current guiding principal is to throw my daily begging budget money at the terribly crippled, and absolutely refrain from encouraging a new generation of relatively healthy beggars.