The Philosophy (Psychology?) of Poverty
Walking around Shanghai, which contains very very few hobos and not too many poor people, at least in the area where I reside, it is clear that China has experienced rapid economic development over the past few years. However, there are still signs of poverty: the trash-digger, the beggar, the wandering poor miscreant. But even with relative wealth, their fellow comrades refuse to help.
Thinking about this, and relating this back to the situation in the United States, I’ve conjured up some interesting thoughts about the natural human reaction to poverty. There are basically two reactions to seeing a hobo on the ground: 1) sympathy, or 2) immediate revulsion. Why? Well, besides some kind of evolutionary mechanism that helps people avoid danger (a hobo could carry a disease, or his/her condition could lead to desperation), I believe that poverty is something that all people fear, and thus a hobo is that fear incarnated. Thus we seek to avoid that fear, and turn away from the hobo.
And why sympathy? Because despite all signs to the opposite, humans, like other animals, can show a sense of compassion, if only for evolutionary reasons. Yet many times we are determined to walk on, because society dictates that they’ll just booze the money away, reject the help, etc. For better or worse?