Many willing to mitigate the homeless situation
By Lethbridge Herald on August 10, 2022.
Editor:
Several years ago, I wrote a blog (that a few people read) about the long historical evolution of the idea of the “deserving” as opposed to the “undeserving” poor.
In the Middle Ages and Early Modern periods in England, parish and poor taxes helped alleviate somewhat the plight of the “wandering poor” without rigidly sorting out the “deserving” from the “undeserving.”
As the more modern world emerged in the West, some elements of Protestantism and Capitalism promoted the exaggerated belief that our singular exercise of individual autonomy and authority shaped us, which further drove the notion that some few poor but not all deserved assistance from the rest of us.
The idea of parsing who is deserving from who is not is nonsense. In fact, the simple notion that we have created our own successes and failures primarily through our own efforts ignores fundamental and profound determinants like geography, history, parentage, inheritances, access to education and health, innumerable special circumstances, bad luck, and on and on, which have nothing to do with our individual hard work, initiative, or choice.
Now, with the diminution or “end” of welfare in our neo-liberal western world, all of the poor seem to have become undeserving “losers” and the rest of us, especially the lucky rich, proclaim loudly our right to keep all we have: “how dare you tax what I have made all on my own?” I hope we will soon be turning the corner on these absurdist propositions and recognize at least some of our collective responsibilities including compassion and empathy.
Locally, we seem to have come to believe that some of the homeless are wholly “undeserving” and our sole responsibility is to protect the rest of us from them. Too often, the message is that we need to shove them into an inappropriate, inadequate shelter or – better – out of town. That “solution” will not work.
The homeless do “wander”; they must; and, the poor “will always be with us,” as Christ said (the emphasis being on the word “with,” meaning inclusion, not exclusion).
A person cannot be expected to get her/his life together without first having a safe, secure place to live, with water, toilets, and some privacy.
My wife and I say this as people who live just over one block from the now-to-be dispersed encampment. We are not opposed to the creation of appropriate shelter for the homeless near us nor are we alone in rejecting the “not-in-my back yard” reaction of some.
We know many others in our broader neighbourhood who would willingly accept real attempts at mitigating the problem in whatever location best suits.
James Tagg
Lethbridge
14-13
Well James what’s the chance of you and your wife offering over-flow capacity in your backyard to these poor and disenfranchised homeless people, since you are so close? You could set-up a food and beverage stand also to help alleviate their hunger. Or would you play your “Not in my backyard card?” That’s what I thought!
I like the Out of Town solution. Works for me.
Mr. Tagg
Brilliant commentary! Thank you!
As a society we all have an obligation to contribute to it meaningfully, at whatever level we are capable, whether money, time, effort, assistance, etc.
Those who are needing more help than others can still contribute one way or another.
Why is it always incumbent upon those who do their part to have to endlessly and unconditionally support those who do no nothing to contribute society and even work against it by engaging in crime, violence, vandalism, destruction, and so forth, including making no effort to get well and sober?
Most of us want to, and do, help, but to be scolded and lectured ad nauseum about not doing enough, and shame on us for working hard and supporting ourselves has run its course, especially when the receiving side is unwilling to do their part to help themselves or to contribute to society in any way.
It is highly entitled and morally wrong to be okay with take, take, take, and no give. No one is worthy of that. No one. That is not a society.
By the way, it is those awful capitalist and wealthy people who keep the economy running through what they earn and spend in the community, the jobs they provide, and the taxes they spend. Without them who would fund all of these social supports that are now rampant in our Liberal society? Look to the debt Trudeau has racked up for that answer.
What’s the saying?
Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and feed him for a life time.
It’s time to stop handing out, and start teaching.
Please, tell me, what do you know about the link between the adoption of neo-liberal policies, which we can date from the mid-1980s, and the growing wealth/income gap in Western-Industrialized countries. And can you please tell me what you understand about the impact of wealth/income inequality relative to a range of issues currently facing society?
Tell me what do you know about the link between addictions/cause of the addictions and encampents and that the indigenous have had addiction issues along with high rates of domestic violence, violent crimes and housing issues for several decades.
Can you explain to me please how refugees running for their lives with only the clothes on their backs from war-torn countries, where they face true tyranny, torture, rape and abuse, saddled with a debt to be repaid to the federal govenment for transporting them to Canada, within only a few years have repaid that debt and have provided for their families a home with a vehicle, which was not paid for by the government, but from them working often working 2-3 jobs, coupled with a langauge barrier.
We all have choices in life and many of the people in this encampment have refused accommodations offered. Some should be under the care of mental health professionals, but unless they are proven to be a threat to themselves or someone else, nothing can be done. Others have short term mental health issues that are directly from the drugs. The well known ‘meth shuffle’ can appear to be a mental health issue but subsides if the drug use has ended as well as the flailing of arms.
Mostly, there are gang members, selling drugs and trafficking their ‘wives’ to support their addictions and habits found in these encampments.
We need to stop enabling them, allowing them to slowly kill themselves. They won’t reach out if we keep giving them everything they need like food/water/clothes/tents so they can spend all their funds on drugs.
Watch this . . . it old, but informative.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUPRDwBc_NM
or these
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZP_8LuuKAK4&t=30s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5FXoEjEmNw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjThU76UF2o&t=4s
BC has enabled and even encouraged addicts with their failed harm reduction programs and all the supports that only allow them to slowly kill themselves, rarely reaching out for help.
We need to change this! Tough love is needed, which is employed often in addiction cases.
It seems to me that you don’t know anything about the Inter-generational Transfer of Trauma, or if you do you reject it. Interestingly, the concept can be traced to the work of a doctor from Toronto who observed a range of anti-social and self-destructive behaviours in the children of Holocaust Survivours. It has since been applied in other contexts including but not limited to Residential School Survivours and subsequent generations. Imagine, if you had been separated from your parents, community and culture as a child, what do you think the impact would have been on you?
And, BTW, Youtube is not a source I rely upon for research or information on important questions.
Oh Boy!!!! I am aware of ACE’s, PTSD, and that one of the best treatment programs draws from both treatment programs with a high success rate of over 83% for opioids!
I spoke with the person in Tennessee that developed the program in 2013 and I since have watched some similar programs initiated in Alberta with high success rates.
In order to heal, one must forgive and forget, while moving forward and taking responsibility for ones actions!
AND BTW . . . YouTube didn’t develop the videos. They a only the media used to view them!
They were developed by the Government of Montana! Did you read? Sad, too busy trying to find a reason to argue instead of reading what was stated. What a sad life!
“I spoke with the person in Tennessee that developed the program in 2013 and I since have watched some similar programs initiated in Alberta with high success rates.” My emphasis. A sample of one?
Also, sorry about the YouTube dig; it was a low blow on my part.
Good point, that it is only one example of it working well, but no other jurisdiction has employed it as they did and they have had great success. Some of it is now used in Alberta, beginning in Edmonton with 78% success rates.
My point is that if harm reduction worked, then we should have seen tangible results after 19 years, but fatal overdoses, numbers of addicts/homeless, crime, etc, have all continued to grow. People are dying because many will not accept the fact it doesn’t work.
Don’t worry about the YouTube thing . . . I am passionate about finding a solution and sometimes get carried away and have to take a step back. Sadly I have watched this crisis take too many lives of people I either tried to help, knew or dealt with. These tents are part of the impacts on peoples lives when suffering with addiction, but not all are addicts.
hmm, this is hard to fathom. a good look at hollywood and the entertainment world, the mass media, high finance, judicial systems, medical doctors, university professors, political circles – including those elected and those appointed to plum and powerful bureaucratic and inner circle cabinet positions – are all over represented in per capita terms with peoples of jewish ethnicity. and please, do not call me a conspiracy hate monger – just stating the obvious on this note.
we have, then, one ethnicity that has had families torn apart by the likes of genocide and further subjected to bigotry, but has by and large become quite successful in terms of the western definition of success; however, we have another also torn apart by genocide and further subjected to bigotry, but has by and large struggled to find success in terms of the western definition of success.
jewish peoples had long been integrated into capital economies and outlooks; they also “blend” in readily. native peoples have had to overcome a vastly different outlook to life and the planet, as well as a “different look”. that, coupled with far higher incidences of fasd, may be more the issue.
this is a good entry, as it focuses on what has been tried, and what may and may not be effective. the most difficult cases will be those with fasd, and with the most severely internalised trauma. in the case of fasd, what we have are people that cannot with near enough consistency make rational life decisions. mentally, emotionally, they are similar to youth but in adult bodies. we do not leave children to fend for themselves – why do we leave severely affected brains to fend for themselves merely because their bodies are developed?
Biff
You have nailed it with the FASD comment.
https://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=AwrWpyzohP5i.C0A5QwXFwx.;_ylu=Y29sbwNncTEEcG9zAzUEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Ny/RV=2/RE=1660876136/RO=10/RU=https%3a%2f%2fwww.torontocas.ca%2fnews%2ffasd-rates-canada-higher-we-thought-study/RK=2/RS=aeO4iUfwr3wSKPg1hiS.bcf6bG8-
https://www.torontocas.ca/news/fasd-rates-canada-higher-we-thought-study#:~:text=FASD%20rates%20in%20Canada%20higher%20than%20we%20thought%3A%20Study
I was going to say this, but saw it already in one other comment, but I am going to say it anyway: “How many of them have you offered your backyard to stay in?”
Words are cheap! Action states it all! Stalin murdered over 100 million of his people pushing socialism his people and Hitler murdered over 50 million pushing socialism.
All of these people have been offered alternative housing, but refused it! Some were housed, but destroyed the accommodations and/or threatened the neighbours. I suspect you have walked by, looked and not understood the full spectrum of the issue. Some are gang members that are dealing or trafficking their women, that they call their wives, but are slaves to pay for their addictions.
Some of us work with these people and have been researching the issues of addiction/homelessness for over 6 years, speaking with people who have tried programs across North America, and the most successful programs to get these people off the streets and back into society have been a tough love approach with firm policing, no tolerance for drug use, drugs courts to get them into effective treatment programs with high success rates of over 80%, no tolerance for encampments backed up with alternative housing.
They do not coddle them or enable them, as we are doing and they are saving more lifes and the devastation of families than any other program in North America.
Your comments show just how naive many citizens are! You are entitled to your opinion, but I would suggest you read up more on the issues and not get brainwashed by those that only want to make money off of these people.
Hitler was a fascist, not a socialist. Indeed, many of those who perished under Nazi rule where socialists. It’s a fact I learned in high-school history class. You are simply parroting the talking points of the US right and so I can only imagine where you “read up on the issues.”
Quite correct.
You are correct, he was a fascist with socialistic economic thoughts. You missed the point.
I am definitely not part of the US Right as you state! I back up my statement with something I had read recently:
https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Fascism.html
“…As an economic system, fascism is socialism with a capitalist veneer. The word derives from fasces, the Roman symbol of collectivism and power: a tied bundle of rods with a protruding ax. In its day (the 1920s and 1930s), fascism was seen as the happy medium between boom-and-bust-prone liberal capitalism, with its alleged class conflict, wasteful competition, and profit-oriented egoism, and revolutionary Marxism, with its violent and socially divisive persecution of the bourgeoisie. Fascism substituted the particularity of nationalism and racialism—“blood and soil”—for the internationalism of both classical liberalism and Marxism…”
We are in the here and now and the issues on the street are complex, but simple in the fact that many of these people will not abide by the rules in the shelter or if given accommodation in an apartment and live in the encampments so they do not have to follow any rule or laws, laws that the rest of us have to live by to respect the rights of others and protect all of us.
The point was whether or not Hitler and the Nazis were socialists. While the Nazis were not opposed to government intervention in the economy — as a case in point you may wish to acquaint yourself with the Nazis’ plans for rebuilding Europe’s war-shattered urban system using the theories developed by the German geographer Walter Christaller — but they did not advocate a classless society (far from it, actually), state ownership of the means of production, or the redistribution of wealth, all of which are pillars of socialism.
For an excellent analysis of this question, you may wish to follow the link below. It will take you to an article published in the Washington Post written by Ronald J. Granieri, an Associate Professor of History at the US Army War College.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/02/05/right-needs-stop-falsely-claiming-that-nazis-were-socialists/
Sounds to me like all you want to do is argue with someone!
Find someone else! The topic is encampments and getting the issue dealt with so people are no longer dying on our streets! DAAAAAHHHHHH!
wow – you show yourself to be the perfect fool so very often. can you not take in factual information and at least acknowledge you learnt something new?
this is an entry entirely ignorant of what are hitler and stalin, and what is fascism/totalitarianism and socialism. it is a classic example of the brainwash that has taken place over generations that has with egregious error applied the terms socialism and communism to the likes of the ussr to the current russia, and to china, which in fact are and have been variants of fascism and totalitarianism and now autocracy and oligarchy.