Homeless people are not scary, damnit. They're not.
Probably you read that first line and laughed to yourself. Or, maybe, you didn't.
In any case, I'm typing this in total earnestness that someone will sympathize my point, and in total earnestness that I will not forget my own words (even though I will).
I'm so tired of homeless people being stigmatized like outcasts of society, like untouchables. Society has told us many a-time, "They're homeless because they messed up and lost everything" or "They'll only use your money to feed their addictions" or "They're always high on drugs or drunk off of booze-- probably both" or, my favorite, "They're dangerous." Dangerous, huh? So, if I stop to offer a homeless man something to eat, he's going to pull a knife on me? In front of all the people on the busy sidewalk where he stopped me? I find that highly unlikely. Yet society ducks its head and avoids eye contact anytime it passes one of "them."
Sometimes, homeless people don't even try to ask for spare change. Sometimes, they just want to talk. Sometimes they just want a cup of coffee to keep their hands warm. Sometimes they just want a soda to calm their acid-reflux.
They graciously accept five-dollar cheeseburgers that you grab for lunch when you're in a hurry.
But, most importantly, homeless people are people, damnit. Like people who have a permanent residence, sometimes they have drug and alcohol abuse issues. Like people struggling to pay for college or support their families or pay their bills, sometimes they go hungry for reasons we have no right to judge.
It's our privilege, our right, our responsibility, to, as we are able, provide for people when they are without, whether they are without food, shelter, or just someone to listen. Sometimes they only want to tell their story, to justify why they are where they are, to make it known to someone that they are trying to improve.
Sometimes we don't remember how alike we all are.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Thursday, February 11, 2010
career vs. the real world
Most people would think of the "real world" (not the stupid MTV show) as the job world, the place where adults put on their business clothes and put in their 9-5 and then go home. I've been thinking lately about how misconstrued this conception really is. Only a small percentage of the world's population actually gets up and goes to work in an office every morning, so why is that considered the real world?
It's been drilled into me since day 1: go to school, learn what you need to get a good job, save up lots of money, and then you get to do whatever you want when you're old. This was presented to me as the perfect life plan. Occasionally, phrases like "find your passion" and "do what makes you happy" were thrown in, but, for the most part, the focus is the career. Well, what if I don't want to have a career? What if I really hate dealing with business and money and business-people? All the adults in my family would likely consider that to be immature talk and, trust them, I'll want all those things when I get older. Plus, you're going to have to deal with all of those things for the rest of your life. That's just the way life is.
I'm finally discovering that the business world really isn't "life" for most people in the world, and I'm tired of being deluded into thinking it is. I don't want to concern my entire life with only the people of a small percentage of the population-- the people at the very top. I want to informed and involved with the real "real world."
All this to say that I've really been contemplating my college education and what I'm called to do with my life. I've come recently to the conclusion that I want help people be better in the best way that I can. I want to find what I'm good at and use everything I have to love people with all that is in me. And maybe that sounds broad and naive and idealistic, but it's the first time in my life that I've ever felt so much passion for anything, and I'm going to follow it as far and as enthusiastically as I can.
It's been drilled into me since day 1: go to school, learn what you need to get a good job, save up lots of money, and then you get to do whatever you want when you're old. This was presented to me as the perfect life plan. Occasionally, phrases like "find your passion" and "do what makes you happy" were thrown in, but, for the most part, the focus is the career. Well, what if I don't want to have a career? What if I really hate dealing with business and money and business-people? All the adults in my family would likely consider that to be immature talk and, trust them, I'll want all those things when I get older. Plus, you're going to have to deal with all of those things for the rest of your life. That's just the way life is.
I'm finally discovering that the business world really isn't "life" for most people in the world, and I'm tired of being deluded into thinking it is. I don't want to concern my entire life with only the people of a small percentage of the population-- the people at the very top. I want to informed and involved with the real "real world."
All this to say that I've really been contemplating my college education and what I'm called to do with my life. I've come recently to the conclusion that I want help people be better in the best way that I can. I want to find what I'm good at and use everything I have to love people with all that is in me. And maybe that sounds broad and naive and idealistic, but it's the first time in my life that I've ever felt so much passion for anything, and I'm going to follow it as far and as enthusiastically as I can.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
"technical" equality
Today in class, my Journalism professor, Dr. Jensen, had our class of about 130 students sit in only the front and middle sections of the lecture hall.
Jensen began the lecture by insisting that the politics and economics of today are undeniably interrelated, and how important it is to understand economics when dealing with the government of our country and those around the world. As the topic of our class has been Democracy and the people's participation in government, he began discussing the differences in the economic statuses of people in the U.S. One statistic he showed us claimed that the top 10% of the nation (in terms of wealth) contains over 70% of the nation's wealth. The remaining nine-tenths of the population shares the rest.
He drove the point home by randomly choosing 13 students sitting in the front section of the lecture hall and ordering the rest of the front section to get up and move to the middle section. So, these 13 people had an area of probably 80 seats all to themselves, and the rest of the class crammed into the middle. Many people were without seats and stood in the back of the big auditorium. Some sat in the aisles (and were laughingly yelled at by Jensen to "stop being stupid and get in their places"). But he then spoke about how all of our educational experiences were "technically" equal-- we could all listen to the same lecture, take the same test, write the same paper. However, no one in the back of the room could agree that they had the same learning opportunity as the 13 sitting in the front.
As Jensen released everyone back to their original seats, he connected the dots: each of us in the U.S. gets one vote in elections, each of us has freedom of expression, each of us is free to form our own political alliances as we choose. The questions he posed to us were: Do you have the same potential for political influence as does Bill Gates? Do you have the money to fund a multi-million dollar campaign? Can you pay hundreds of lobbyists to flood Congress and persuade politicians to pass the bills you want to be passed? Of course not. Few people in this country have such abilities, and several of our policies reflect that fact. Wealth inequality equals political inequality.
He concluded that the only way to overcome the effects of concentrated wealth is with concentrated people.
Jensen began the lecture by insisting that the politics and economics of today are undeniably interrelated, and how important it is to understand economics when dealing with the government of our country and those around the world. As the topic of our class has been Democracy and the people's participation in government, he began discussing the differences in the economic statuses of people in the U.S. One statistic he showed us claimed that the top 10% of the nation (in terms of wealth) contains over 70% of the nation's wealth. The remaining nine-tenths of the population shares the rest.
He drove the point home by randomly choosing 13 students sitting in the front section of the lecture hall and ordering the rest of the front section to get up and move to the middle section. So, these 13 people had an area of probably 80 seats all to themselves, and the rest of the class crammed into the middle. Many people were without seats and stood in the back of the big auditorium. Some sat in the aisles (and were laughingly yelled at by Jensen to "stop being stupid and get in their places"). But he then spoke about how all of our educational experiences were "technically" equal-- we could all listen to the same lecture, take the same test, write the same paper. However, no one in the back of the room could agree that they had the same learning opportunity as the 13 sitting in the front.
As Jensen released everyone back to their original seats, he connected the dots: each of us in the U.S. gets one vote in elections, each of us has freedom of expression, each of us is free to form our own political alliances as we choose. The questions he posed to us were: Do you have the same potential for political influence as does Bill Gates? Do you have the money to fund a multi-million dollar campaign? Can you pay hundreds of lobbyists to flood Congress and persuade politicians to pass the bills you want to be passed? Of course not. Few people in this country have such abilities, and several of our policies reflect that fact. Wealth inequality equals political inequality.
He concluded that the only way to overcome the effects of concentrated wealth is with concentrated people.
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