The 31st annual Belvedere College Sleep Out at the Bank of Ireland, College Green, Dublin this morning 

Last night.

A traditional sleep out for the homeless by warm-hearted ‘Belvo’ pupils.

The very essence of noblesse oblige.

Or something more jesuitical.

…And yet, for me, passing those students at the Bank of Ireland this morning, something about the scenario made me uncomfortable. In a city where homelessness has become a crisis, is it really appropriate for students at a fee-paying school to express their solidarity by sleeping out on thick rubber mattresses, with plenty of warm sleeping bags and clothing? The students texting away on their phones, surrounded by plastic boxes of Roses and Celebrations, looked more like they were between gigs at Electric Picnic. In fact, Kodaline appeared yesterday at the GPO to perform for them.

This is not what actual homeless people look like, nor how homeless people live. Also, I’ve seen real homeless people sleeping both outside the Bank of Ireland and outside the GPO; people now ironically displaced by those raising money for them.

Nobody could disagree with the fact that the three charities [Peter McVerry Trust, Focus Ireland and Home Again] the Belvedere Sleepout support are worthy recipients. But what was appropriate 31 years ago as a charity endeavour is surely now outdated. It has become distasteful. In a city where so many are homeless, it looks plain wrong to see what amounts to people simulating being homeless on our capital’s main streets. Perhaps 2015 is the year Belvedere College needs to rethink how it does its annual fund-raiser for the homeless.

Is a school sleepout best way to raise awareness of homelessness? (Rosita Boland, Irish Times)

Judith Goldberger writes:

Jesus is that churlish stuff in the Irish Times. A newspaper that can be safe in the knowledge that their major contribution to alleviation of the plight of the homeless is to help keep them warm at night [using discarded copies].

Oh.

Pic via Vinnie Quinn