Check out this lovely gem of an article from yahoo news
today. It opens with the jolly story of a disabled homeless woman receiving an
eviction notice. Yep, you heard that right. She’s already homeless, can’t get a
job because she’s disabled, and the local government is evicting her from her
TENT. The article goes on to highlight that while although the Silicon Valley
is on the rebound economically, the poor just keep getting poorer and poorer and
the rich keep getting richer. It also reiterates the cost-of-living issues we
have here that I discussed the other day.
I found this quote particularly interesting:
“Before
the Great Recession, about 10% of people seeking food had at least some college
education. Today, one in four who line up at food pantries for bags of free
food have been to college.”
This whole thing just incenses me on so many levels, from
the fact that everything the article points out is totally true, to some of the
asinine and utterly ignorant comments posted below the article by readers.
Particularly one reader who goes off about how education is the key to getting
out of poverty, when the article clearly stated that ONE IN FOUR people lining
up at the food pantries has some college education! And don’t even get me
started on the cost of a college education these days and how devastating
student loan debt is to so. many. people. Oh yeah, and the fact that it can’t
be discharged in bankruptcy, so even if you lose everything financially, you
still better find a way to pay back that 20, 40, 60, or even 100K+ in student
loans. Another commenter that I wanted to throw something at didn’t see why the
woman didn’t just move out of the area. Seriously? Because she gets $826 a
month, and lives in a tent, which leads me to believe that she probably doesn’t
have a car, so what is she supposed to do? Strap everything she owns onto her
back, which by the way, she can’t do because she’s disabled, and walk to some
other area which will miraculously be cheaper to live? Or should she take those
imaginary savings they think she has and hire someone to help her move? Where
she’ll (again miraculously) have enough money to come up with a security
deposit for a room to rent. Or the commenter that said this woman must feel
entitled. Oh right, I’m sure she feels so entitled that she thinks she deserves
to be evicted from her tent. I’m sure it’s quite luxurious living out in the
cold. Let’s let go a little of that pride, lady. Argh. I’m seriously going to
have an aneurism over these peoples’ lack of compassion, sympathy, and just
sheer ignorance of what the reality of being truly poor is like.
So naturally as I’m sitting here in a progressively more
agitated ball of anger, I realize I have to start looking at myself. If I’m so
pissed off about this, what am I going
to do about it? And sadly, I just don’t know. For those of us closer to the
lower end of the income scale, honestly what do we have to offer to folks in
similar or worse economic situations than ourselves besides compassion?
Compassion’s great, but it doesn’t put a roof over someone’s head, and it
doesn’t put food in their mouths. So when you don’t have any money to give, and
you’re scraping by to put food on your own table, just how can we help out our
fellow man?
Maybe
the answer is education. I’m not talking about college education so we can all
make loads of money and afford nice homes and cars, but education of the
“haves” that not all “have nots” are lazy, uneducated, or entitled. That a huge
majority of them are educated, hard working people, that perhaps fell on hard
times, were injured, or were devastated by medical bills or job loss. That
regardless of the reason behind why someone is poorer than someone else, does
not in any way mean they are less worthy of respect as a human being. That
things can change in an instant, and you never know when the coin will flip and
you will wish that someone would show you an ounce of compassion and offer you
a place to sleep, or a morsel to eat. Maybe we all need to stop equating income
with a person’s value and go back to looking at people’s character.
I know a change like that isn’t going to feed anyone,
but at least if the minds and hearts of those in a position to help can be
changed, maybe it will start to make a difference.