The Homeless

On my trip to Detroit this weekend, I saw a few homeless people wandering the streets of Detroit. One was at an intersection that we stopped at and was holding up a sign "Will work for food" and I just concentrated very hard on the dashboard in front of me so that I wouldn't have to make eye contact with this person. And then there was after the hockey game when we had a screaming homeless lady a few feet away screaming to "Please help her because she was so hungry. Oh god please help me." I walked away from her as quickly as I could.

Part of me feels bad for these people, but a part of me wonders why they aren't doing anything to help themselves. There's no way that I would open my purse on the streets of downtown Detroit to give anyone anything.

But the people that I don't feel bad for are the ones that are standing in front of McDonald's with a sign that says "Will work for food" when they have a sign up that says "Now hiring."

What causes this attitude towards the homeless?