Loathe Largesse

The ladies have determined that they want to give money to the poor. However, they don't want to be exposed to too much. Too much pain, too much grime, too much anger, too much ugliness. Too much. The are proper ladies. High-society ladies. Ladies who were cosseted by proper, high-society mothers. They don't understand the gravity of poverty; they are doing what respectable young ladies do.

When they see the poor, the ladies see them as unfortunate wretches. The ladies believe that they are bestowing wonders upon the pitiful. This largesse that they dispense is a handout. A "here you go, you poor little soul, you" kind of handout. The ladies view themselves as superior angels, sent from the heavens to offer relief.

The recipients of this largesse see the truth. The ladies are ignorant, free of care from troubles like having to use a newspaper as a floor-covering. They go through rituals of self-flattery by troubling themselves with this missionary endeavor, but they decline to bear witness to the truly down-trodden. Instead, they seek out those who are troubled but have tolerable presence. Their condescending manner is more insulting than if they ignored poverty on principle. It is as Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote in Letter from Birmingham Jail, "Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection."

The largesse is "loathe" by all parties involved. The recipients loathe the ladies for being conceited enough to think that their half-hearted attempts at charity were enough to qualify as authentic generosity. Negligence would be better than empty "love." The ladies themselves loathe to be immersed in the nasty life of the impoverished and its absence of niceties. To escape, they turn to the "worthy" poor, and when that is done, they retreat back to their cars.