[stinos]

Trust me, you can't buy drugs from those guys

What I don't get about this: most people seem to know (think?) this. So you'd think these guys have no income at all because no-one is trusting them so no-one buys from them. Yet after decades they're still there, in a lot of cities. So there must be something which works in this system. I find it hard to believe they survive off the occasional sell to a tourist. I mean, could be, but seems far fatched to me?

[jdmoreira]

It's not occasional. They sell a lot. There is a lot of gullible people in this world and an endless supply of fresh tourists or kids from other towns landing in Lisbon everyday. They only need to scam 1 person a day to make 50€. That's more than most Portuguese earn per day.

They scammed me when I was a kid (I wanted weed).

Don't you think I know what I'm talking about? You can buy drugs is Lisbon of course but real drug dealers aren't approaching thousands of people in the open streets of downtown Lisbon everyday!

Police leaves these guys alone because there is no real crime. Scamming tourists is hard to persecute. Not worth it!

[galfarragem]

> They sell a lot.

They sell a lot because they will force people to buy whenever possible. Most people buy it to be left alone.

> Police leaves these guys alone because there is no real crime. Scamming tourists is hard to persecute. Not worth it!

Often there is crime: forcing people to buy it's petty crime but most will not complain unless there is violence. It's nearly impossible to jail them with the actual political zeitgeist, making it a waste of time and money. This impunity leaves room for retaliation also.

[polshaw]

I wish they would find a way to deal with it, the constant harassment is one of the worst things about Lisbon.

[npteljes]

Maybe that's why they harass tourists. Tourists are exploited in a myriad of cheap ways everywhere. This long article is just the common ones seen all around the world:

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Common_scams

[mahathu]

It might also be that they don't have a better alternative. For example, in Germany, refugees who don't have a work permit stand around in parks selling laced weed to tourists all day