Wednesday, September 26, 2018

No matter how you slice it

A debate took place on the pages of Facebook (page after page after page) about a homeless man in our town who has taken up residence under the city-owned water tower, on the parking lot of the new CVS, and other outdoor sites.

Our councilman took the appropriate steps of contacting the proper county agencies to seek help for the man, and he remains obdurately opposed to moving to a shelter or receiving any sort of help from the government. Fine.

And the conversation moved on to anecdotes from people who regularly stop by his makeshift encampment and give him clothing, blankets, food and I don't know what-all else. This makes them feel better about the situation, but when you think about it (or when I do), it seems to be just a way to perpetuate a situation which should not be perpetuated. Living on public (or someone else's private) land is not the normal course, and I think it's like seeing someone pounding their head with a wooden mallet and giving them a new mallet. 

Image result for the middle abc
I recommend watching "The Middle" reruns all day
I'm not against charity by any means but it should be useful for the recipient.

But that's not even my point today. Some of the people chatting about the dude said that he approached their cars on the parking lot and screamed curses at them and their children, which must be awfully hard to explain to the kids. But another woman wrote to say that she thought children should be exposed to this as a "slice of life."

This led me to think of some of the things I have seen done and said by residents of that demimonde, and, frankly, I don't think children need to be exposed to such horrors. Plenty of people enjoy that "Deuces" show on HBO, and I'm not sure I'd want a child to watch the glorification of prostitution and strip bars on Sunday night before heading off to school Monday morning.

Not all slices of life ought to be served up on fine china plates with the good silverware, is all I'm saying. And I'm also saying that if you really want to help a destitute man who's living in the woods or something, help him get ready to go get a job and get his life back on track. Handing him a sandwich today does nothing to prepare him for tomorrow.

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