This is probably the last place I should post for help... so it is.

[speLLsy]

Probably asshole-y for asking for this, but proof? Picture of gas bill? Picture/screenshot of bank account?

[asrmatt]

just provide ssn and other pertinent financial information and identification

ill take care of everything

ot: gl and if you still need help in a months time or so i can help

[Zigrakil]

My issues are internal.

No kidding.

Boom.

[5-s]

just provide ssn and other pertinent financial information and identification

ill take care of everything

ot: gl and if you still need help in a months time or so i can help

I think we're asking cuz we don't know phazed very well. I've helped out other NADota'ers before with similar situations I just want to confirm that things are as he says they are.
Phazed: I'd feel much more comfortable donating / lending if I knew a bit more about your situation and exactly what your plan is. Add me on skype (jsm60dl) if you have that or steam (Ask one of the many nadota'ers who have me added already).

[m0rphl1ng]

To the OP, you have my sympathies and understanding of your situation. I hope you turn it around because you seem like a decent person.

Also, I'm touched that without even posting anything or acknowledging ironstove's existence, he still cares enough to bring me up and try to take pot shots at me. There seems to be a lot of reflection going on here. When you encounter people who are smarter than you, and point out how imbecilic you are, do you often resort to telling yourself that their personal lives are in shambles, just to make you feel better about yourself? I'm happy, stable, and financially well off, but I'd rather not talk about these things in a thread where the OP is in such a state.

Gotta go change that ban Nenglm thread into a ban ironstove thread for the amount of insensitivity and bile he spews.

[ironstove.]

When I relate examples, I try to bring specifics forward with concrete analysis versus hitting a lot of vague notions that allow the reader to run wild with their imagination on what it is that I mean, so when I reference someone as being an 'overly smug reality-beta-internet-alpha', in this community, you and ziggy are my staple go-to guys that pretty much encapsulate that image perfectly.

And don't talk to me about lacking sensitivity. There is a war going on and people are being massacred as we speak and everyone here digs into their pockets to donate to the dude who went broke buying monsters and cigarettes instead of gas to get to his job. My heartstrings are being yanked out of my chest cavity, oh lord, the sympathy I feel for this man is astounding. But honestly, forgive me if I'm coming off as cold.

On a more serious note, I've said already that I've been in a similar situation. I feel the need to reiterate this because I didn't grant myself sympathy and so thus, I don't grant other people it either. It just doesn't make sense.

[GranDGranT]

Dang, this guy makes fun of me working at walmart and the truth comes out eh?

[Live]

Maybe I missed this part - but what exactly is your level of education? High school graduate? College/some college?

With just a high school diploma you can easily bring in 9-10 bucks an hour 30+ hours a week at most jobs with just some basic interviewing techniques. Retail stores and supermarkets are ALWAYS hiring. As stated before you and your wife both need to be working - paying your bills takes precedence over DOTA/shopping/luxuries like cigarettes and energy drinks.

Shopping correctly for food was a really hard thing for me to overcome. Just consider that the average fast food meal runs anywhere from 6-8 bucks (this is in the South, forgive me if it is much different in Pittsburgh). You can make several days worth of food for both you and your wife for the cost of that ONE fast food meal. Treating yourself to a nice dinner once every month or so is fine - if you have the funds to do so.

[dima]

how does your wife handle all of this? Also good luck

[Haxity]

I smoke weed every day does that help???

[Ryan]

if you invest in a $70 rice cooker and buy rice & chicken in bulk, you can cut your spending to about $10 a week for both you and your wife

even stovetop $1 box of rice can feed both of you for a meal

[Legato]

So I know Ironstove is doing it possibly the douchiest way possible, but he makes a valid point.

Fact of the matter is it's beyond fishy for someone to come on here and ask strangers for help. It's also questionable because Phazed has definitely done a lot of posting on here that comes off as some combination of entitled and condescending. This isn't to say that Phazed is certainly lying, or that any of you are doing something wrong by being willing to help him. But it does raise the important question of what is the point of sending him your money? Even if his account of events is true, and he pays you back, having a few extra dollars to get him and his wife back on their feet is not a solution to the sort of problems endemic to the situation/circumstances that he describes.

The fact of the matter is the $10 or $20 or $100 dollars you donate to Phazed could just as easily make a much more significant contribution to the lives of a family on another continent. Phazed is supposedly over $1000 in debt; $1000 in the third world is enough to fund a significant, sustainable small business venture. Even beyond the question of whether Phazed is telling the truth, it is important to consider the issue of "deserved-ness," i.e. whether throwing $1000 Phazed's way is, in terms of utility, better than utilizing it somewhere else. For Ironstove, that utility lies in clothes purchased at American Apparel, and even though he said it in possibility the rudest possible way, that's a valid stance to take.

As far as helping Phazed goes, I know for a fact that if his rare binder is worth ~$100 I can find buyers. Posting the eBay bids for his MtG cards would certainly generate a tangible exchange of goods that would allow me to feel more comfortable answering his plea for help.

I also think drmaul raises an important point that there is no tangible evidence of Phazed's situation other than his own account.

[tsUmuGi-]

what do you have in your mtg binder

[Goody]

Not that i can help you because i've lived like that for years now..

My dad also smoke's and since he cant quit (he kinda tried a couple times) and cigarettes are so expensive here he found a way to spend less by buying the really cheap ones, like the normal box costs like 25bs (which may be like 5$) and the one hes using most of the time is like 3-5bs (aka maybe 1$) Maybe you could go for that, i assume there has to be a similar thing there.

Also both of us only eat 1 good meal per day, we dropped breakfest and dinner at night long ago.
That also saves money.

[Lahnas]

you should do what brood_star did for money, worked out well for him

i have money but without any sort of proof, and taking into account this all sounds shady as fuck
even i wouldn't help you

[ironstove.]

A dollar spent supporting phazed is a dollar spent supporting domestic terrorism. I will report you to the department of homeland security you bunch of anti-freedom, anti-independence scumbags.

I would rather drop $500,000 out of a plane flying over an active volcano than donate to this ridiculous cause because I'm confident that my money burning up into carbon has a higher % chance of returning back to me within the next 10 years. It's utterly ridiculous how irrational people become when conartists appeal to their emotions, this is the same as that guy who walks up to you with an empty gallon of gas begging for 5 dollars so he can get home to his family, the same as the guy who made that stupid Kony 2012 video, and the same as basically every single person who wants or feels entitled to other people helping him/her out of the situation which they dug themselves into.

'Donate in the name of the lord.'

*nobody donates*

'Yea, yall have a nice day, in hell.'

lululululululululululul

get trolled by pathos more plox. Even when I was living off like 10 dollars a week in food, I wasn't doing this pathetic shit... I even had friends who offered me help and I turned them down because I wanted to do it myself because I knew it would make me stronger when I came out of the other end alive.

It's like the butterfly trying to break out of the cocoon, if an outside force helps it, the muscles will never develop and said butterfly will spend entire life grounded, unable to fly because it did not accomplish what it was supposed to do on its own.

Listen to me phazed. Continue on with your struggle. Eat grass if you have to. You must finish your metamorphosis otherwise be doomed to a life of crawling on the ground instead of soaring in the sky. Stop being a catepillar, instead go be a butterfly.

Go. Soar.

Fly!

[Brood_Star]

...jesus fucking christ

spit-wad do something

[asrmatt]

holy shit

ironstoves on a level

think im witnessing the second coming

[Legato]

I think the edit detracts from the message. It's too cluttered, now.

[ironstove.]

We all begin as catepillars, eating away at leafy, delicious goodness, but not all of us will become rainbow colored butterflies. Some will get picked off by nature's fury in the form of a sparrow or pidgey gobbling us up for food, while others will get helped by nadota and thus, never complete their evolution because they figuratively had the b-button pressed on them mid-process.

forever metapod.

never butterfree