Campaign to Demonize Homelessness Provokes Massive BacklashBy Michaela Whitton Nottinghams council implemented the campaign by displaying a number of large posters throughout the city that contain bigoted and hateful slogans. Claiming beggars are not what they seem, they portray a young man in a hat and photographs of cans of strong lager. They contain slogans stating, Begging: Watch Your Money Go To A Fraud, or Begging: Watch your money go up in smoke, and even Begging funds the misuse of drugs. Clearly not everyone who begs is homeless, and not all homeless people beg, but it is without doubt that those sitting for hours on Britains streets in freezing temperatures are some of societys most vulnerable. However, it seems the leader of Nottingham City Council, Councillor Jon Collins, disagrees. When announcing the launch of #givesmart, he told the Nottingham Post: These professional beggars can make up to 800 a day and have in the past waved notes in front of officers. After succeeding in labelling and stereotyping those forced to beg on the streets of the U.K. as addicts and alcoholics, the stigmatising ad campaign has provoked uproar with the public most of whom are perfectly capable of choosing how they spend their money. Unsurprisingly, the sound of a slow hand clap for Nottingham City Council has rippled across Twitter, with users demanding answers and using the #givesmart hashtag to express their outrage. Notts Young Greens (@NottsYGreens) March 25, 2016 @MyNottingham the #givesmart campaign stigmatises the #homeless and shows appalling policy towards the vulnerable in your city! Cath Mattos (@Cathos1) March 25, 2016 V (@green_decision) March 24, 2016 Those #givesmart posters piss me off. Homeless people are people too. #Nottingham Minotour de France (@SmallTownBrows) March 24, 2016 Pete McCats (@thisisnotawar) March 23, 2016 How much is this vile and slanderous hate campaign costing @MyNottingham #GiveSmart #OpPayBack #OpSafeWinter pic.twitter.com/3TzU87Rwlt Rick Rolls (@R1ckR0llS) March 21, 2016 Rick Rolls (@R1ckR0llS) March 16, 2016 #MyGeet: Do unto others as you would have them do to you. #quotes #karma #quotestoliveby #givesmart #GoodFriday pic.twitter.com/gWVc4sRYS8 Geet (@theofficialgeet) March 25, 2016 This article (Campaign to Demonize Homelessness Provokes Massive Backlash) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Michaela Whitton andtheAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, emailedits@theantimedia.org. Spending public money to tell the public how to spend their money. Oh the irony. Pissing the public off in the process is just the cherry on top of a steaming pile of dung so typical of what passes for thinking in western gubmints. 