Do you believe most people are genuinely good-natured and honest?

mathepac

This is a kind of counter-balance to the "Do you believe some people are genuinely bad?" thread. I'm not sure what conclusions the thread has reached but I had a heart-warming incident happen to-day that came close to making me believe in Santa all over again.

In between calls today I found myself near the shopping centre in Thurles (the one beside the Garda Station). I needed a pit-stop and thought I'd grab a few messages while I was there.

First stop Easons to check the Lottos from the week-end. Friday's ticket, no good - binned, Saturday's a €5, a scratch card and two €1 daily Lotto tickets! Brillo as I never win anything! Next stop The Friary pharmacy for a few cod-liver oil & vitamin capsules to keep the colds at bay (I know, I know :rolleyes:).

On to Dunnes for a few provisions and horror of horrors at the checkout, no bleedin' wallet! FFS! Asking the nice checkout lady to stall the ball, I backtracked and in The Friary I struck gold. A customer found my wallet beside the till and handed it in to the staff who reunited us.

Thanks mumbled to the staff-member in The Friary who gave me my wallet and who told me that the lady who found my wallet was a well-known customer. Back to Dunnes with huge relief, paid my bill and bolted to try to get on the road home before the freeze started.

A small incident in the scheme of things and the amount of money in the wallet was €70, not huge to lose but annoying. The major considerations were the cards, 1 debit, 2 credit and the hoops you need to go through to cancel and get new cards in the lead-in to Christmas.

This incident has restored my faith in us as people; we're obviously not all greedy pigs with our snouts in the trough gorging ourselves on the misery of others.

So boardsies get the thinking caps on. I'll be back in Thurles soon and I wanted to do something tangible for the honest lady who found my wallet. What do ye think - a thank you card, flowers, gift voucher, box-a-choccies and maybe ask the staff in The Friary to pass it on (if that's not a huge imposition)??

username123

mathepac wrote: »

I'll be back in Thurles soon and I wanted to do something tangible for the honest lady who found my wallet. What do ye think - a thank you card, flowers, gift voucher, box-a-choccies and maybe ask the staff in The Friary to pass it on (if that's not a huge imposition)??

Im a wallet returner personally (I have gone to extraordinary lengths to reunite wallets with their owners), and no one has ever given anything but thanks, although one person offered me 20 irish pounds but I said no. But if you are going to be so nice as to offer a thank you gift, chocolates of course!! You cant eat flowers!

Delighted to hear your heart warming story.

girl in the striped socks

Hand in a thank you card with a box of chocolates or a bottle of wine.

Chuck Stone

mathepac wrote: »

Do you believe most people are genuinely good-natured and honest?

Yes I do.


Thread needs a poll (you can add a poll by clicking on the 'thread tools' button on the top-right of the thread page).

joydivision

Book a double room in a hotel and offer them half the bed.

ITS_A_BADGER

and auld box of chocs and card or maybe a gift card for the shop that lady found the wallet in. the asisatant said she was a well known regular so im sure she would like that

I've had some pretty tough life experiences, and it's because of those experiences that I genuinely believe there is more good in this world than bad.

I have gone to long lengths to return phones and purses to people and I've been lucky enough to have gotten my own things back when I've lost them.

I've picked strangers up at bus stops in the snow, I know others who have been picked up the same way.

Just look at the SSF thread, it's tough for a lot of people out there at the moment and yet we've managed to raise €1400 in four days for sick kids. One person has actually offered to match all donations made in 24 hours. One person found €20 on the street and rather than keep it, they donated it.

When I was in a bad car crash, my friends were by my side within an hour, one friend took time off work to bring me in and out of hospital. Strangers fought and fought and fought for the road where my accident took place to be changed, and it was.

That's the world I live in and it's pretty damn good.

OP a box of chocolates won't be expected, but it's a really nice gesture and it encourages people to keep doing the right thing when they see it has been appreciated

Irish Guitarist

I once saw a woman walking towards me drop something which I thought was a piece of rubbish. After she had walked past me I looked down at the ground and saw that it was a wad of €50 notes that she had dropped. I didn't count it but it looked like it could have been over €500, possibly even €1000. I picked it up, ran after her and handed her the money. She barely mumbled something. It may have been "thanks" but it was hard to tell.

Another time I left €20 change in the self service checkout in Tesco. I realised what I had done as soon as I got outside so went back in. There was already a queue at the checkout so I walked back out thinking someone must have put the money in their pocket. A man then came up to me and said "did you leave money in the machine?" I replied "yes" and he handed me my €20.

Just give the woman that found your wallet something small like a box of chocolates. She more than likely won't be expecting anything at all.

Madam_X

Yes I do. Because it's what I encounter most. Not saying most people are absolutely lovely, but most people are ultimately good. The emo misanthropic stuff about how people are sh1t is just posturing. And it comes across as bitter, world-is-against-me stuff. If everyone is so awful you need to ask yourself whether it's you...

LivelineDipso

People are less decent and honest in Ireland compared to say 20 years ago.

Larianne

Half and half I'd say.

But like attracts like so if you're a kind hearted soul you are going to attract the same back.

Praetorian Saighdiuir

I have seen a fair bit of bad stuff which outweighs the good stuff I have seen. Personally, if I have an opportunity to do some good, however little I will do it. I don't believe in Karma or "paying it forward" it's as easy to be nice as it is to be bad.

Why make someones life harder if you can help make it better. I know I would appreciate being helped out if I needed it.

Fair play to any and all of you that go that bit out of your way for someone else. It may make all the difference, more than we may even know.

Plumpynutt

Most people are cool yeah

castletownman

Me and my father were driving home from town one evening when we noticed that some woman in the car ahead of us had inadvertently left her purse on the roof of her car before driving off. We only noticed it of course when it came flying towards us on the road. He stopped the car and checked for ID etc, knew who the woman was and where she lived and made a little detour to drop it back to her.

Two days later, she arrived at our house with a huge hamper of fresh fruit as a gesture of appreciation.

shrewd

yes,

this reminds me of an incident that happen to me a couple of months ago.

So i went out on a date with the missus, it was my birthday, she bought a classy and expensive watch. we had fun and now it's time for us to go. As i was saying goodbye to her because she has to work tomorrow. i saw my bus fly past me like a racer bike. this bus was the last the bus,so it was all or nothing.

the bus was destined to stop at the top of dame street near the city hall. i was running from the bottom of dame street, in front of trinity to be exact.
i do athletics so i presume this will be no challenge, so i set my myself and ran like i was been chased by hound dogs.

luckily i caught the bus just in time. As i was settling behind the queue, two guys bump into me. they were out of breath, one of them unable to stand properly due to tiredness. i gave them a curious look and to my surprise, one showed me my new gifted watch. he gave it to me and all i could mumble was "thanks". i was shell-shocked.
i have never been so grateful in my life.
That moment always remind me that there are people who are genuinely good-natured and honest

mathepac

Chuck Stone wrote: »

..
Thread needs a poll ...

I was tempted, but some threads get derailed discussing the poll options and it can become divisive. (A thread with me in it divisive - never!! Moi getting red cards and bans - never!!)

To-day was a very good day and I really just wanted to spread the nice warm glow the experience brought me, a bit of the "How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix" vibe.

Mardy Bum

Mutual reciprocity. We are hard wired to be good natured to a certain extent. Most especially to blood relatives.

B.A._Baracus

I think there is a grey area in your average person. Both good and bad.
But ultimately, people show their bad side more often. Everyone is out for themselves. Weather they admit to it or not.

Madam_X

Well it's human nature to prioritise our own self interests and those of our family, but that and helping people out when they need it, feeling compassion etc are not mutually exclusive.

jaffacakesyum

I don't think most people are genuinely good-hearted and honest. But, to rephrase, I don't think the majority of people are d1cks either, they may not mean harm, but I think the majority of people are only concerned for themselves and will let you down in one way or another in the end.

mathepac

Just to finish the story I started. ... I chickened out in the end and bought a gift-voucher in Dunnes. (I know folks, the last resort of the unimaginative) I left it into The Friary yesterday where the staff said again that they knew the lady (one mentioned a first name). They agreed to keep the voucher behind the counter until her next visit. <b> Sincere thanks and Happy Christmas to all concerned.

Downlinz

whoopsadaisyboobies wrote: »

Just look at the SSF thread, it's tough for a lot of people out there at the moment and yet we've managed to raise €1400 in four days for sick kids. One person has actually offered to match all donations made in 24 hours. One person found €20 on the street and rather than keep it, they donated it.

At a time of year when it's customary to be charitable, offering nudity as an incentive, stickying a thread so that absolutely everyone in a community of thousands see it daily along with the board user peer pressure factor as peoples contributions are named for all to see.

How generous do you think the sum would be if people were asked once (not repeatedly), at a time of the year when it wasn't custom to donate money to charity, through anonymity and without any incentive other than the satisfaction of helping someone? Say you sent a pm to every AH member asking for a donation for your cause and nothing more was ever said about it. What fraction of your current total do you think you'd have? Because when you strip down the bells, whistles and the fun out of it and make it purely about the charity and absolutely nothing else you're getting closer to peoples true nature.

Downlinz

Downlinz wrote: »

At a time of year when it's customary to be charitable, offering nudity as an incentive, stickying a thread so that absolutely everyone in a community of thousands see it daily along with the board user peer pressure factor as peoples contributions are named for all to see.

How generous do you think the sum would be if people were asked once (not repeatedly), at a time of the year when it wasn't custom to donate money to charity, through anonymity and without any incentive other than the satisfaction of helping someone? Say you sent a pm to every AH member asking for a donation for your cause and nothing more was ever said about it. What fraction of your current total do you think you'd have? Because when you strip down the bells, whistles and the fun out of it and make it purely about the charity and absolutely nothing else you're getting closer to peoples true nature.

If people weren't encourage,
if people didn't have it in their faces,
if there weren't *targets* set,
if mods didn't agree to get be the object of the joke,
if someone hadn't offered to match all donations within a 24 hour period,
if Devore hadn't posted all the excellent things that will be done with the money, if I hadn't put it in my sig,
IF all of these things hadn't happened, the money raised would undoubtably been lower.

But people were encouraged because someone cares enough to encourage them.
People posted it around the place because they cared enough to take the time to do it.
Mods risked ridicule and put their bodies on the line, because they care.
Beasty doubled all donations, because he cared about the cause.
Devore set up the charity and posted how it spends the money, because he cares about helping children.
I, and other mods and posters put it in their sigs, because they care.

You can choose to find negativity in this wonderful cause if you wish. But at the end of the day, noone here had to put their time into this, noone here had to be brave enough to post naked pictures of themselves on the world wide web, noone here had to donate, they could have ignored the thread, ignored the encouragement, ignored the stories of where the money was spent, but they did it because deep down, they're good people.

Praetorian Saighdiuir

Downlinz wrote: »

At a time of year when it's customary to be charitable, offering nudity as an incentive, stickying a thread so that absolutely everyone in a community of thousands see it daily along with the board user peer pressure factor as peoples contributions are named for all to see.

WOW.............. I personally donated a small amount because I could, not because I felt obliged or pressured into it. It's for sick kids man, this may be the last Christmas for some of them.

Even if there was no novelty nakedness, DeV would still have got that donation from me.

I imagine most, if not all of the people who donated are the same. You need to take a step back and take a look at yourself. If you don't believe in what is going on, then don't bother interacting or offering an opinion on it.

Senna

I've returned loads of things, I work in a hotel and the amount of camera, phones and wallets left lying around every week gets annoying.
Two people said in this thread already that when they were handed a lost item they just mumbled "thanks", if someone does something nice for you, then thank them properly, shell-shocked etc is just bollox, shake their hand and genuinely show your appreciation.

wp_rathead

I remember I found a wallet outside Eyre Square shopping centre in Galway- I went up to a security guard to ask was there a "lost and found" or something I could give itand he just went "It's not mine" and walked off..?

I looked in the wallet and there was luckily a mobile number which turned out to be the son of the guy who lost the wallet- long story short I got the wallet to him

The guy offered me some money but I said it wasn't necesary
Was a broke student at the time though so could have done with a €20 :pac:



In general I think most people are decent- but some DO cúntish things rather than plainly be a cúnt- if ya get me?