Everyone's Got an Ipod

That's the response, isn't it? When someone reveals that they don't have an ipod/Facebook/lap-top/you name it? I mean, the little white ear-buds do seem to be everywhere, but I had one of those epiphany type moments today as I breezed past a homeless man offering me a flower for some sort of charity with my five dollar coffee in hand and entered into a loud, overly-fragrant orgy of purchasing (otherwise know as a department store).
In reality, no, everyone does not have an ipod. Everyone does not have a home. Everyone does not have food. Everyone does not have water. It's really sad when we get to the point where we live in this little bubble in which everything's ok... so long as we refuse to acknowledge any problems, or justify our cold fronts. For example, immediately after my epiphany I thought to myself "Well, I volunteer" and the rational part of my brain went "Yes, ___, helping white, middle class young girls feel comfortable with themselves because their minds have been poisoned by the media that they're over-exposed to as a result of having five TVs in their over-large house, is a worthy cause". I do believe that helping these young kids is a good thing to do, I think that low self-esteem and all its problems among young girls is a social problem, and I'm obviously exagerrating over the characteristics of these girls. It's just that one can't justify something like denying that there are people who need help, on our streets, that we breeze by every day.
The media does a great job at helping us to "turn the other cheek" portraying the homeless as drug-ridden or crazy or criminals. But not everyone on the street is like this, and even if they were does that mean that they don't deserve the essentials? That they aren't human enough? I have a theory that if everyone above the poverty line (who wasn't one of those "shell" families) gave five-dollars to various organizations working to help these people, or donated one hour of their lives every week to working with the homeless the problem would be remedied. But that will never happen, and homelessness will always be an issue, even in societies of Communism. It is a fact of life, and, in some sociological views, a necessary part of society. Without the poor we could not have the rich and without the rich we could not have a successful economoy. But without a heart we would not be human and without humanity there would be no service.
It's very sad to see people sitting out in the cold, begging, people who once upon a time could have shopped on that very street. People who no one really thinks of as "people" anymore. We just walk by them, and they blend a little further in to the background. I know that there will never be a solution to people's disregard of the poor, but I do believe that everyone has the power to make a difference in at least one person's life. I was not that person today, and I am ashamed of that. The man walking ahead of me who put the apple in a homelessman's hat as he held a sign - "Food?" - was, and that makes me a little more optimistic.