VAGRANCY IS ON THE RISE among young people everywhere who are slowly coming to the realization that housing is for fools and vagrancy is for the cool (and enlightened). Be a vagrant...
Don't listen to any propaganda you may hear that says that vagrancy is a
negative thing. True, it may be difficult to live as a vagrant, particularly when
it comes to obtaining food, sustenance, and shelter from the elements. However, the positive aspects of vagrancy are manifold. Vagrant living fills one with a strong feeling of being at one with the world.
One also must take careful consideration not to confuse vagrancy with homelessness as the two are very different. Vagrancy is a choice. The vagrant makes a conscious choice to reject society's mandates and laws to live freely according to his or her own rules, whether the choice is to live in the city streets,in the woods, or underneath a bridge. With this choice come several hardships, but the eventual benefits the vagrant will reap are endless.
What / Who is a Vagrant, and Why Should You Be One?
Vagrancy is defined as : The act of wandering about without employment or
identifiable means of support.
However, there is much more to it than that.
Here's Britannica's formal explanation:
Traditionally a vagrant was thought to be one who was able to work for his maintenance but preferred instead to live idly, often as a beggar. Punishment
ranged from branding and whipping to conscription into the military services and
transportation to penal colonies. In the U.S., laws against vagrancy were used by police and prosecutors to proscribe a wide range of behaviours. Many such laws were struck down as unconstitutionally vague, thus largely decriminalizing vagrancy, though in the 1990s many local laws were implemented to curtail aggressive panhandling, begging, and other activities by vagrants on city streets. ("Vagrancy." Britannica Concise
Encyclopedia. 2003. Encyclopędia Britannica. 17 Sep, 2003 )
The previous was an old definition. Vagrants usually will rarely be reduced to panhandling, unless it is absolutely necessary. Also, to be a vagrant is not to be "idle" as this definition suggests. A vagrant is actually making a very strong political statement through his or her actions, namely against society's structural rules and the total "uncool"-ness of housing.
Who is the typical Vagrant? Vagrants hate to be labeled into a sterotypical group, but generally a vagrant is a youth (often misguided or disgruntled) who makes the conscious choice to alienate himself from the suffocating soiety of housing and rules in order to promote anarchic living. The typical vagrant
is not a fool, though he or she is often (especially before choosing to become a vagrant) viewed as someone who is somehow foolish and inferior to the rest of society. This condition is best elucidated by the following quote:
"And these children that you spit on
as they try to change their worlds
are immune to your consultations.
They're quite aware of what they're going through." -- David Bowie
With that in mind... show them some respect. It isn't easy being spat upon as
you attempt to change your world.
So..
Why should YOU be a vagrant? Uh, to rebel against society... doi. Most vagrants will tell you that the vagrant lifestyle is, though at times difficult, quite gnarly.
Ready to be a vagrant? Or... not? Well, if you still think you need more information... you're probably not ready to accept the responsibility of having no responsibilities.
