Rene Dena
D. Hernandez
English 475
22 September 2014
Perceptions Toward the Homeless Community: In recent years the homeless community has had an increase in rising numbers. “These people are criminals”, is what the city of Palm Beach stated in a 2009 press conference subjected toward the homeless community. “They savage our trash and pollute our sidewalks, the homeless are an embarrassment for the town” said Arnold Abbott, a Pennsylvania police chief. As you can see, criticism toward homeless can be found nationwide. So is hatred toward homeless understandable? Or is it non-acceptable? It is estimated that in the homeless population there are about 100 million and growing. Modern homelessness started as a result of economic stresses in society and the lack of availability on affordable housing. Now days it seems as if city’s feel the homeless aren’t a prospect and are immersed into their community. With all of this is taken into consideration, what effects and outcomes does this fabricate among the homeless community? When the general public is broken down into the homeless community, I feel as if this community is in desperation of need. Much of this population becomes homeless just due to the fact they may need some help but just because they are homeless, they get denied the assistance due to the myths and stereotypes held against them such as being irresponsible and its their fault that they are in that situation. Many individuals seem to contain and hold some sort of hostility and grudge toward this population, and for this many refuse to assist and pay existence to their needs. Many are oblivious to the causes of homelessness but not the true cause of it. Why wont the homeless obtain some responsibility and change their own life? Although this may be true for some cases, for many it deals with much deeper factors than just that, such as mental illness, lack of family, lack of education and the economy downfalls. Things in which just are out of their control. It’s my belief that many homeless are genuine individuals who just need the possibility to make a difference within them but don’t contain the necessary essentials to do so. If the homeless community were given an opportunity to make a change, a majority would admittedly take a grasp at it.
Whenever this matter is brought about society, numerous reactions are assembled. When it comes to homelessness many feel as if it is a sensitive subject and many would rather prefer to look the other way. Instead of the general public coming together and constructing collaborations to decrease homeless population growth, they instead intend to ignore these inhabitants and create resentments toward them. Because of this, numerous numbers of cities have proposed the subject of homelessness to their city council’s, in attempts to restrict homeless within their community. One famously known case of these attempts occurred in February of 1987. In this instance the city of Los Angles, downtown announced a solution for in which it would “keep our city clean and would reduce the population of homeless inhabitants within the city”. The plan was to crackdown on the homeless in skid Row by having police and firefighters conduct a number of sweeps through the area in which then lead to a majority of homeless getting arrested during the planned sweeps. This has now became a common occasion for many and has been occurring since the very initial begging’s. No one feels the priority to concede the thought on how the homeless are in despite of aid.
In the photograph “like the American way” by Margaret Bourke-White, Kentucky. The great depression of 1937 it represents a portrait in which the homeless community contains a restraining by the government in which they are suppressed to be acknowledged. In other words, the government refuses to take knowledge of the homeless by only revealing the positive mishaps of that time period. In this case the image exhibits an advertisement in which is
