Si Han's Reflection ( 1a )

One thing that I had learnt and really understood from last week's CID lesson is that everyone has a background story and that we should never ever make judgements about people without knowing the background story of them.

In the two pictures that our CID teacher had shown us, I chose to help the man under the given circumstance as I felt that the man was able to get help from his family members when given the extra dollar. He had a board in front of him that stated that he would use the money that people gave him to call his family for help. I also find the woman carrying the baby really pitiful but if only given one dollar, I would help the man. The dollar that I give to the man can help him get back on his feet and stop being a beggar. But if I gave the one dollar to the woman, she might live her entire life as a beggar and not want to work anymore since she can get money by begging. When our teacher revealed the background story to us, we were all shocked as we didn't expect the lady to come from a syndicate which uses beggars to gain money. I guess this shows that there is always more to what it seems and that we should always know the background story first before setting judgments. There is no way to know whether a person is good or bad just by looking at his/her appearance. Only by knowing their background story and interacting more with them then only can we set fair judgments about them. That is the reason why more people are starting the hesitate when giving money to beggars. There is no way to know whether the money given to the beggar would be used to buy necessities or be used to buy alcohol and drugs. We might be helping them to get back up on their feet if we give money to them but we might be harming them even more by giving them money because we are encouraging them to continue begging. I believe that I am helping them by giving them money but then again, who knows? Society has shaped us into people who doubt everything and question the intentions behind everyone and everything. While that might be a good thing, the problem is that we can no longer give money to a beggar and think that we have done a good deed when we in fact, we might be harming them even more by giving them the money.

      

 This cartoon shows a man hesitating before giving spare change to a beggar, showing that people are now starting to hesitate before helping the needy, in fear that they might be causing more harm to the beggar.