I feel absolute sympathy about the situation w/ the dogs, but this lady can’t afford her own housing for her, her child and her dog. Yet she is trying to take responsibility for 8 animals by asking strangers to buy her a house, insisting it’s for the dogs, including very sad stories about the dogs and forgetting her dog & changing the GFM to include her own dog.

I couldn’t fit the long GFM in slides so I just added pertinent slides. The full GFM is in the link below.

https://imgur.com/a/bnAOhd6

EDIT: OOP provided an updated comment. She has an autistic daughter and she’s homeless. One’s dog’s meds are $2K/mo so that’s why she can’t take on a mortgage. Sure, I believe that she’s paying $2K/mo for the dog’s meds while she and her daughter are homeless so she would prefer to “buy the house upfront” w/ community help.

https://imgur.com/a/2KVShuj

Someone from my writers group is a self-published author through a vanity publisher ie one who will publish your book for high fees.

When he’d finished his latest novel and needed it formatted, he was quoted $600 and a turnaround of two weeks.

He emails me to say he’ll pay me $300 if I can do it in a week. He suggests watching YouTube videos to teach me how to format his 110,000 word novel, which I “should be able to do in an afternoon”.

(To format a book, professionals use Adobe, which I don’t have, never used, and is a paid subscription. Formatting a book involves making the words sit nicely on a page ie having margins, all the words sitting in a block, no words alone on a line, no one sentence alone on a page etc. Improves readability and makes it look nice.)

My answer was, $1200 plus subscription fees as it’s a rush job. Funnily enough, he didn’t accept 🤷🏻‍♀️

Edit: happened a few years ago before AI was widely available.

Came across an absurd post in a sub meant for those struggling and in need

For reference, this is a very feature-heavy pump, and reasonable substitutes can be gotten for around $100. They're not as good but they will get the job done. Insurance and WIC will also help cover pumps. But instead this person wants a fancy pump and won't even pay shipping.

seems familiar but I can't find the original post(s) (I believe there were several).

A recent injury plus some other issues have made it difficult for me to
work a standard job... so in the interest of survival without government
assistance... I've started a mail club for my lil' monthly zine, The
(redacted) Report! It's about everything and nothing... the pulse of our
planet as observed from my little corner of the world. It's small but
overflowing, 100% hand-drawn and written (then printed), and dedicated
to upbeat and positive.
Something you can look forward to getting in your mailbox each month,
made by human hands, that you can hold in YOUR hands! Art for your
heart. Some people are giving gift subscriptions...
My goal is to get to 100 subscribers by Sept 15, so I can pay my car
registration and inspection, and, like, eat.

Earlier today, I (woman in my late 30s) was about to go into my local post office when I was approached by a woman who looked to be in her 60s. She asked for cab money, saying she needed to get to the pharmacy to pick up her asthma inhaler but didn't have the money.

I told her I don't carry cash but asked where she was headed. The location she mentioned is a ten minute drive away. I offered her a ride figuring that I had the extra time and didn't mind helping her out.

She seemed surprised by my offer and declined, saying she didn't feel safe getting into a stranger's car. I'm not sure what she thinks a taxi is if not a stranger's car but okay?

I was in the post office for about five minutes, and by the time I left she was gone.

Choosy begger or outright scammer? Interested in what you think.

Posted on a local fb group. Screenshots courtesy of my wife

I found one in the wild. Comments from people who are being nice are suggesting Go Fund Me. The Go Fund Me generation is wild.

Went to check on the post to see if the OP responded to any of these comments, but it appeared to be deleted.

Just make it look like it was never there when your done

I found an ad on our local city sub-reddit, looking for a "nanny share", and I was shocked by the compensation (or should I say the lack of it?)

"We already have a wonderful nanny caring for our 6-month-old daughter and are looking for another family with a similarly aged baby to join us for a nanny share!

Schedule: Monday–Thursday, 9 AM–4 PM and Friday, 9 AM–1 PM (32 hours/week).

Care would take place at our home on the xxxx Side, within walking distance of xxx Park. My husband and I both work remotely and are home during the day, although we work from our offices and our nanny handles the babies’ day-to-day care.

We’re already set up with pretty much everything a second baby would need! We have an extra crib that can be set up either in our daughter’s nursery or in a separate room, a high chair, plenty of toys and play space, and a double stroller. Our nanny takes our daughter on walks and to xxx Park almost every day, so we’d love for both babies to be able to get out of the house and enjoy those outings together.

We’d also be happy to provide breakfast and lunch for both babies as they’re eating solids/table foods. The other family would really only need to send diapers and bottles/breastmilk/formula, plus anything specific their baby needs.

The nanny-share rate would be $25/hour total, split between the two families — $12.50/hour per family, or $400/week.

We’d ideally love to find a family with a baby around our daughter’s age. We love the idea of the babies having a built-in little buddy to play, learn and grow with while still getting the individualized attention of a nanny in a home environment.

We’re hoping to find a family interested in a consistent, longer-term arrangement and, most importantly, a family that’s a great fit with ours and our nanny. If this sounds like something you might be interested in — or you know someone who might be — please send me a message! We’d love to chat and see if it could be a good fit."

I sent them a message to ask if the nanny is aware of this, and agrees to do twice the work with no additional payment. We'll see if they reply...

5 days ago, OOP asked for help w/ food as he ran out of $ while in Guatemala. When asked questions, he trolled, called pple names refused to answer questions bc he already got help. Welp he screwed up and lost his SS and now in his more humble beg he needs $ to survive and a ticket to get out of S. America. Since his SS will take months to reinstate, he also needs some $ to sustain him when he comes back. Too bad he was such an AH.

Many comments included.

Read an article in Monopol Magazin today that perfectly encapsulates the "do it for exposure" mindset of the elite.

https://www.monopol-magazin.de/alexandra-grant-nuernberg-empowerment-oder-ego-trip

Artist Alexandra Grant (who dates Keanu Reeves) reached out to four prominent writers to use their texts for her massive new museum exhibition. She told them it was a "low budget" project meant to empower women, so she could only pay them absolute pennies for their work.

Fast forward to the opening: It's a massive, lavish, media-heavy spectacle. Her artwork (featuring their writing) is being bought up by the museum’s society and backed by a major high-end gallery.

She used the classic "poor artist" excuse to get cheap labor from other creatives, while throwing a Hollywood-level event to sell the final product. The writers had to fight to get their pay renegotiated after they realized they'd been played.

Never fall for the "it's great exposure and I have no budget" line, especially from people with infinite connections!

Big edit: This post got a lot more attention than I thought it would! I shot it off last night because I saw the pizza/beans post and it really was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I’m going to step away from this post, but before I do, here are a few last responses to people:

You’re wasting your money buying pizza for random people! You should be donating instead.

Trust me, folks, I donate both my time and money to non-profit organizations. My job also involves helping new immigrants adjust to school in the US. There’s plenty of “official” aid happening in my house.

What actually happens:

I’m scrolling FB with an extra $20 in my pocket or whatever

I see someone asking for something I have in my house that I’m not using, or for money for a “frivolous” reason.

I figure that the item would be better used in someone else’s house and/or I’d waste the money anyway, so I offer it.

I have helped someone, and they are hopefully motivated to pay it forward.

That’s it. I’m not trawling the internet to find people to buy takeout for. I’m not sinking all my funds into this. I have two kids to take care of. 

You’re saying that we should be giving to everyone who asks for something.

I am not. Nobody is doing that. What I am doing is saying that shaming people just for asking is not a helpful strategy for helping people.

In a couple of my comments, I mentioned the difference between ask culture and guess culture: https://jeanhsu.substack.com/p/ask-vs-guess-culture

I come from an ask culture. I believe that people can ask for anything. It doesn’t obligate you to give them what you ask for. Just the act of asking something doesn’t make you a choosing beggar. It just means that you’ve noticed that you want or need something that you don’t have.

In my professional life, I often wish that people would ask for what they need more. If a family doesn’t ask, I don’t know what they need. So many people would rather suffer in silence rather than ask, precisely because asking is shameful. That’s a problem.

We should be shaming people

I think that there are people whose asks should be shamed because they’re absolutely unhinged. But if someone is genuinely struggling and is asking for something that you don’t think that they deserve, I think shaming them is pretty shitty. Poor people don’t need to perform poverty to be worthy of help. Poor people are allowed to want/ask for nice things! 

When considering how to help people, I think it’s important to consider solutions that maintain the dignity of the human being. Direct aid, or at least providing choices, is often more effective than traditional, paternalistic charity. Giving someone in need $20 to pick out their own groceries is more effective and efficient than giving someone $20 in canned goods from the food bank. 

Here are some sources below: 

https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2018/12/the-problems-with-philanthropy

https://behavioralscientist.org/paradox-helping-endorsing-others-oppose/

https://www.forbes.com/councils/forbesfinancecouncil/2020/11/03/direct-aid-a-simple-solution-for-a-complicated-time/

You should be donating to drill wells in developing countries

International aid is often inefficient, paternalistic, and is more about the egos of the donors than the needs of the communities. Please vet international aid agencies extremely carefully.

https://healingwaters.org/reasons-why-water-wells-fail-for-developing-countries/

But I prefer to donate to my local community, both through direct/mutual aid and through local agencies. Your mileage may vary.

You’re a bad/obnoxious/stupid person and you should feel bad

Okay, Reddit stranger. I’ll take that under advisement.

Anyway, I’m out. Be kind to each other.

Some of the stuff that people post here is legitimately unhinged. But lately, I've seen folks mock people for simply asking for stuff. I've also read some downright hostile stuff about parents asking for things for their kids-- a lot of "don't have kids if you can't take care of them."

Listen, at least in the US, not everyone has access to reproductive health care. Not every pregnancy is a planned one. And even for families who carefully planned their kids and limited their family size to what they can afford, it's possible to fall on hard times.

I also think that if we value community and human connections, we should be okay with folks asking each other for stuff. Mutual aid is an underrated community resource. Have some compassion and help your neighbors out.

ETA: I'm stepping away from commenting on this post because I feel like I've said all that needs to be said.