Homelessness : Share Your Opinion

Homeless. What images and feelings come to mind when you hear this word? Does it evoke compassion, hatred, anger, disgust, love, happiness? Homelessness is a very powerful topic. It ignites passion in a lot of people. For some, enough can’t be done to help our fellow human beings who are struggling in life. For others, it’s easier to turn their backs and blame the homeless person for their situation.

I know for myself, homelessness is a subject that touches on many feelings. My first instinct is the desire to help in whatever way possible. I’m sure this feeling was always there but, it was reinforced in 1985 when I watched a movie called “Stone Pillow” starring Lucille Ball. I loved Lucy and couldn’t understand how people could have treated her Bag Lady character so horribly. I know it was just a movie but, it was my first experience of separating and seeing the person as a person in need of help rather than seeing her as her situation in life.

I also feel hatred, anger and disgust about homelessness. I hate that any human being in this day and age has to live in the streets. I’m angry with myself and society that we can’t or won’t do more to help our fellow humans. It disgusts me when people turn their backs on all homeless people because of their preconceived notions of what a homeless person is. I can tell you with certainty that all homeless people aren’t lazy drunks, drug addicts or people who want to take advantage of the system. I’ve seen thousands of my neighbors become homeless after Hurricane Andrew blew through town. I’ve seen women with their children at PADS because they were trying to get out of an abusive relationship. The list goes on. Why would anyone choose to be homeless?

Love and happiness I’d bet weren’t feelings you would expect to be associated with homelessness. I became aware of the true meaning of Love for your fellow humans in a book called Cadillac Man. Cadillac Man is a homeless man in N.Y.C. and he describes what life is like living on the streets. The story that touched me the most was how Cadillac Man cleaned up a fellow homeless man who was in the end stages of life and couldn’t care for himself. The man wasn’t able to get up and had been laying in his own feces for days. How many of us would show that same level of compassion to a fellow human in need? Happiness in homelessness is also possible. I can tell you from personal experience how happy eating a warm meal can make our homeless neighbors. When I serve dinner at PADS, most of the program participants stop by the kitchen to say thank you and give us the most valuable thing they have, a smile.

So, where does that leave us. Considering the passionate discussion that went on yesterday, many of us feel the need to discuss this topic. Here’s your chance to vent in an appropriate forum. There are no right answers or wrong answers. Just the opinions of the people who choose to post them. Please don’t attack each other because chances are pretty good that not many minds will be changed on the topic. My hope is that once everyone has vented their opinion. We can start working as a community to better support our homeless neighbors in their quest to get back into a home.<!--DIV {margin:0px;}-->