Clutter: A Battle in the Class War

The wealthy have the ability to get rid of stuff, because they know what they can do without, and if they accidentally get rid of what they need, they can buy another.

The poor have to keep more stuff around because they don't know yet what they need and if they get rid of what is necessary, they suffer. And people ask them, "Why did you get rid of that? Didn't you know you'd need it?"

When people look at camps of homeless folks and see all the clutter, they don't understand that it is survival gear, not garbage. You try to put all of the possessions you'd absolutely need in one tent-- clothes, cooking/eating gear, communication, entertainment, bedding, paperwork, health supplies, etc (and, dare I say it, books?)-- and tell me that you wouldn't have spillover.

New York Times Opinion article on decluttering.

Connection

 

Okay, I love M.C. Escher. But beside that, this is an excellent illustration of how individuals create each other.

Each of us are independent, separate, but at the same time, we are influencing each other, sometimes in insideous ways. The more we spend time together, the more influence we have, the more influence we feel. Eventually, we cannot tell what is really us, and what has been created by another. And the same goes for those we spend time with. They can't tell what of themselves is really themselves and what is us. Ultimately, especially in community, everyone is everyone created. We are all a part of each other, inseparable. And even if we are apart from our community, we bring that community to anyone and everyone we meet.

For this reason, the middle class needs to spend more time with the homeless. NOT so the homeless would be more like the middle class, although that would certainly be part of what happens. It is because we need to influence each other. We need to not just feel pity for the homeless, but realize that their way of life also makes some positive critiques of our own, just as the middle class can do for them.

But if the homeless never spend time with the middle class, then the two groups will become more disassociated, more fearful of each other, which leads to prejudice, hatred and violence.

Stop Hobophobia!

Get to know a homeless person!
Or if you're homeless, make friends with a middle class person!

If The Housed Were Treated Like The Homeless

I have known about the surveys of the homeless to discover their needs for a while now. People are hired to interview the homeless, and ask them what services they would like the city (or the state) to provide for them. I think the idea is wonderful, for then service providers aren’t just assuming themselves what the homeless need, but they are asking directly those with the needs.

But today, I discovered a new angle on this survey: There are teams of three that go out asking questions: a social worker, a medical provider and… well, some other professional type person, I don’t remember who. And the team of three goes out very early in the morning, so they can make sure to find the homeless folks, and they wake them up to ask them the questions. (It’s always good to wake up the sleep deprived to see what services they need…)

Maybe you aren’t as stunned (read: appalled) as I am about this, but perhaps this Pythonesque skit will give you the sense:

Scene: A small, suburban bedroom. There is a large bed in the middle, with George sleeping on one side and Carol on the other. George is wearing striped pajamas, while Carol is wearing a short nightgown, but both are covered by a comforter. A dresser with a filthy mirror is on one side of the bed, with clothes scattered about the floor. The remains of a hurried dinner rests on the dresser as well as a digital alarm clock. The two are in restful slumber, when suddenly there is a knock on the window, on George’s side of the bed.

Mr. Pierce: (Peering in) Hello? (Opens the window and sticks his head in.) Hello?

George: (Groggy) Huh? What… who?

Mr Pierce proceeds to climb in through the window and then falls. He is a tall, professional-looking man with a brown suit coat and a red tie. He holds a clipboard and a pen.

Carol: (Waking suddenly, then screaming, pulling the bedclothes around her) George, who is this?

Mr Pierce stands up and begins to brush himself off.

George: (Angry for Carol’s sake) Well, there, hey! What do you think you’re doing? Get out of my house!

Mr. Pierce: (Standing formally, with a clipboard, addresses himself to George) Hello, there, sir. Sorry to disturb you at this early hour…

George: (Looking at the clock on the dresser) Oh, my… It’s 4am! Who in the hell do you think you are? What are you doing in my house?

Mr. Pierce: As I said, I AM sorry to disturb you, but I am taking a survey of the neighborhood to discover what kind of services you might need.

George stares for a moment, stunned.

Carol: (Still in a panic) Who are these people, George? Is this your idea of a joke?

George: (Upset, but a bit of a pansy) I still don’t understand what you are doing in my house.

Mr. Pierce: As I said, I’m taking a survey of the neighborhood and just need to ask you a few questions.

George: Why didn’t you just knock on the door?

Mr. Pierce: I’m sure you wouldn’t have answered the door this early, Mr. … excuse me, what is your name?

George: Mr. Thomson. George Thomson.

Mr. Pierce: (Writing on his clipboard) Thomson… George. Fine.

Carol: (Upset, poking George) George, why don’t you get rid of these people!

George: See here. Why don’t you just come back during the day, not at this ungodly hour?

Mr. Pierce: Mr. Thomson, surely you understand our position. Do you not work during the day?

George: Well, of course.

Mr. Pierce: Well, then, we couldn’t really come during the day, could we?

George: (Pacified) Oh, I suppose not.

Carol: Well, then, why couldn’t they come see you at work?

George: Yes, why couldn’t you see me at work?

Mr. Pierce: Then we wouldn’t be sure you lived here.

George: Oh, I see. But it IS rather inconvenient…

Mr. Pierce: I appreciate your position, Mr. Thomson, but you see, it’s the only way.

George: (Pacified again) Well, if nothing could be done about it…

Carol: Yes, something could be done about it, you could throw them out!

Mr. Pierce: Are you disturbed, ma’am?

Carol: Yes, I am.

Mr. Pierce: Of course, you don’t have to participate in the survey. You may leave, if you like.

Carol: Leave! I can’t leave! I’m not even dressed!

Mr. Pierce: I would be happy to avert my eyes…

Carol: Get out!

Mr. Pierce: Just as soon as I finish the survey. Now then… (looking at clipboard) Mr. Thomson, how old are you?

George: 35.

Mr. Pierce: (Writing on clip board) Fine. And what is your ID number?

George: 491…

Carol: Don’t you think that’s a bit personal?

Mr. Pierce: It is just a basic question, ma’am. Sir?

George: 491, 327, 45, 49

Mr. Pierce: And could I see your ID, please?

George: Actually, I lost it last week.

Mr. Pierce: Oh, did you? That’s fine. We can help you with that. (Calls out the window) Officer MacDonnal? Could you please come in? (A police officer in full uniform climbs in. He wears dark glasses, speaks in a “Sgt. Friday” voice, and has a pair of handcuffs at his hip.) This is Officer MacDonnal and he’ll help you with your ID issue.

Officer: (Takes out notebook) Sir, ma’am. I just have a few questions to ask you.

Carol: And who let you in? What right do you have? Who said you could come into our bedroom?

Officer: Well, Mr. Pierce did, ma’am.

Carol: And who let Mr. Pierce in?

Officer: It’s all official business, ma’am. We are just here to help.

Carol: What kind of officials are you?

Mr. Pierce: This is all according to city policy, ma’am. Now, while Officer MacDonnel assists Mr. Thomson with the forms, would it be alright if I asked you some questions?

Carol: Why not? Might as well. Not going to get any sleep anyway.

Mr. Pierce: Fine, then. (He flips a page on his clipboard) Could I have your name, then, please?

Carol: Carol Drew.

Mr. Pierce: And your last name is spelled?

Carol: D-R-E-W.

Mr. Pierce: And are you a Miss or a Mrs?

Carol: A Miss.

Mr. Pierce: (Looking up from his clipboard, with eyebrow raised) So you are not married to Mr. Thomson, then?

Carol: (Voice raising) No. And what business is it of yours?

Mr. Pierce: I’m not judging, ma’am, just saying. But this kind of situation might require a health professional. You wouldn’t mind having a doctor ask you a few questions, do you?

Carol: I suppose not. It would be better if the doctor came over at the daytime, however.

Mr. Pierce: No need. (Calling out the window) Dr. Zook, could you please come in? (A woman in a white doctor’s coat with a stethoscope hanging out of the pocket climbs in through the window) Dr. Zook, it seems that we have an issue here.

Dr. Zook: (Looking at Carol) What seems to be the problem?

Carol: There’s no problem! Except I am having trouble sleeping!

Mr. Pierce: Well, you see, Mr. Thomson and Miss Drew…

Dr. Zook: (Nodding) Ah, I see. (Pulls out a clipboard) Miss Drew, if I could ask you a few questions…

Carol: (Flustered) I don’t think so…

Dr. Zook: Please, it will only take a few moments.

Carol: I suppose.

Dr. Zook: First of all, please tell me if you have ever experienced the following: Herpes?

Carol: Which kind? I mean, sometimes I have cold sores…

Dr. Zook: Mm hmm. (writing on clipboard) Positive. What about genital herpes?

Carol: I don’t think so…

Dr. Zook: Have you ever been tested for it?

Carol: No…

Dr. Zook: Well, we can work on that later. What about gonorrhea?

Carol: No.

Dr. Zook: (Looking at the clipboard) Ever been tested for it?

Carol: No.

Dr. Zook: Unknown. Have you ever been raped?

Carol: No!

Dr. Zook: Fine. What about date rape?

Carol: What do you mean?

Dr. Zook: I mean, has ANYONE (she glances at George still speaking to Officer) ever put you in a position where you felt you were sexually compromised?

Carol: I… I don’t think so.

Dr. Zook: Let’s be careful about this, now. Are you sure? I mean, for instance, has Mr. Thomson ever asked you to do something sexually you weren’t comfortable with?

Carol: Well, like what?

Dr. Zook: Anything.

Carol: Well, he brought out this book tonight and wanted me to try these positions and I wasn’t comfortable….

Dr. Zook: Did you tell him you were uncomfortable?

Carol: Well, yes, but…

Dr. Zook: And did he make you perform anyway?

Carol: Well, he didn’t MAKE me…

Dr. Zook: Did you feel coerced?

Carol: Perhaps a bit manipulated…

Dr. Zook
Officer: (together) I think we have a problem.

Mr. Pierce: Officer MacDonnal, you first, please.

Officer: We just discovered that Mr. Thomson is living in this dwelling under false pretenses.

George: That’s not true! I told you, I am staying here while my Uncle is at the coast. He invited me to stay here.

Officer: So this isn’t your house?

George: Right, I told you that. But I have permission.

Officer: I’m not sure about that. I just called your “uncle” and we couldn’t get an answer.

George: Of course not—it’s 4 in the morning!

Officer: That is no excuse under the law. The fact is: you are in a house that doesn’t belong to you. Let me ask you, do you have any place to live?

George: I moved out of my apartment in Maryland. I have moved into town just last week. My uncle is giving me a hand until I settle in.

Officer: So you are a homeless transient, eh? I’m afraid you’re going to have to leave immediately.

George: What do you mean? All my stuff is here!

Officer: What stuff is that?

George: Well, the dresser, the bed… all the furniture in the house.

Officer: Uh huh. Okay, just a second. (Calls out the window) Joe! Yeah, go ahead and get the dump truck over here. We’ll have to trash the whole place.

Joe: (Outside the window) Right away!

Officer: Mr. Thomson, I’m afraid you will have to vacate the premises…

Dr. Zook: Um, officer. I’m afraid there’s another issue…. (Dr. Zook goes over and whispers in the officer’s ear).

Officer: (Facial expression becomes angry and eyes grow large) Is that right? (He walks over to George and throws him against the dresser, knees him in the kidneys, and spins him around. He pulls off the handcuffs off of his hip and cuffs George) You have the right to remain silent, you…

George: (Voice groaning a bit from the pain) Wait! What am I being arrested for?

Officer: Sexual assault 3.

George: Carol, what did you tell them?

Carol: (To Mr. Pierce) Of course, I don’t live here. He seemed so nice at first. I actually live with my parents on the other side of town.

Mr. Pierce: You need to take care who your friends are in the future. Could I arrange a ride for you back to your parents?

Carol: Oh, that would be wonderful.

Mr. Pierce: Here, let me get you a coat to cover you. (He goes to the closet and takes out one of George’s coats and wraps it around Carol) There you are.

Carol: Thank you. I don’t even know what I saw in him really…

Dr. Zook: I was thinking that we could give you a pelvic exam right here in the living room. I have a rape kit right here…

(Dr. Zook leads Carol out of the room)

Officer: Come with me, Thomson. I’ve got a lot of paperwork to fill out now because of you…

George and officer walk out of the room.

Mr. Pierce: (Writing in notebook, reading his text) We found Mr. Thomson city-sponsored housing and Miss Drew received rape counseling and a physical exam. (Looks up from his clipboard) Hmm. I didn’t arrange for Miss Drew to get tested for her sleep disorder. Ah, well, we can’t help everything…

How To End Poverty 3

 

Okay, let’s get serious about this. How DO we deal with poverty?

First of all, we need to understand what poverty is. There are two main categories of poverty, which greatly overlap. There is the poverty that is being physically destitute. This is the common kind of poverty we think of: people who are hungry, who have no where to live, who have no warmth, who have no safe drinking water, who are wracked by disease. Those who are destroyed because of their lack of physical needs.

The second is like the first: social poverty. This is a state of separation, of rejection, of outcastness. These are the poor who the mainstream culture of one’s society rejects, for one reason or another. Usually, however, they are rejected because they do not accept some major, unwritten law of the mainstream culture. They are too loud or too quiet. They don’t participate fully in the mainstream’s economic system. They don’t look like or dress like the mainstream. They have different cultural presuppositions.

This second class of the poor soon become the first class. They become destitute due to their social standing. And the mainstream feels good about these poor because, “They deserved it. If only they would…” (fill in cultural prejudice here) “… then they could live better.” So the mainstream convinces themselves that the poor are worthy to be poor and they deserve their benefits and judgments.

Another result of this cycle is fear. When one culture separates from another, then they tend to fear each other. The mainstream begins to see the outcast as the root of many of the evils of their society and the outcast sees in the face of every mainstream person the last mainstream person who abused them. This fear becomes prejudice and that prejudice becomes a cycle of mutual destruction.

How do we end this cycle?

First of all, the mainstream culture needs to associate with the outcast culture. If this happens, then the mainstream culture will realize, over time, that the outcast culture aren’t so bad after all. Perhaps they act differently, and hold some different opinions, but that doesn’t make them bad people. That even if they may not be as “good” as those of their own culture, then at least they shouldn’t be feared. Once we get past the fear, then we can perhaps get to the point where representatives of the two cultures could actually assist each other and support each other.

The difficulty is, how to get the two sides to overcome their fear? They need two things: 1. A neutral ground where they both feel safe to meet. And 2. A mediator that understands the cultural presuppositions of both sides and is willing to teach both sides about the social needs of the other without putting down either side.

If we end cultural superiority, then we will end most poverty. If the mainstream and the ruling elite understand the life and worldview of the poor outcast, then we are ready to welcome each person as they are.

How To End Poverty 2

 

I suppose I could have come up with ideas that would be a little less cruel to those in power, but I am tired of the rich elite ruling the world without any idea of what it means to be poor, or what their laws imply to those who have no resources. I am tired of this world where those in North America are so far removed from the poor that they dehumanize their own poor and distantly allow the poor of the world be killed, enslaved, have what little they have taken from them, all for the sake of that distant elite. I am sick of politicians rallying behind finance corporations to save the jobs of financiers, while allowing the needy be starved out due to forced debt and petty charges targeted against them.

I know God is angry at this too. He is saying now to the politicians and bankers and the wealthy elite of the world:
"How long will you judge unjustly
And show favor to the wicked?
Vindicate the needy and fatherless;
Give justice to the lowly and poor.
Rescue the weak and needy
Deliver them from the hand of the wicked.
They do not know nor do they understand;
They walk about in darkness.
All the foundations of the earth are shaken.”

Then He turns to them, in their smugness, and screams in their face:
“You had thought yourselves to be gods
And all of you to be sons of the Most High
But you will all die like mortals
And fall like any prince."

If we are honest about the world and the calamities that fall upon the poor and destitute, then we can but answer,
Arise, O God, bring justice to the earth!
Bring justice to the homeless who have been kicked out of their camps.
Bring justice to the AIDS sufferers who have been degraded by their own people
Bring justice to war victims, whose lives have been destroyed because of ideologies of distant rulers
Bring justice to the mentally ill, who are imprisoned in hospitals because they do not act “normal”
Bring justice to the elderly, who are commanded by their children to do that which they do not want to do
Bring justice to the falsely accused, who languish apart from their family and friends.
Bring justice to those beaten and lit on fire, just because they are too helpless to fight back.
Bring justice to the poor of the nations in such debt because of the greed of their politicians.

Yet, O God, have mercy on us who have failed the poor. Fill us with the compassion we lack.

How To End Poverty 1

 

Today is Blog Action day and so we are all writing about poverty, in the hopes that it might be ended. I think this is a wonderful idea and I really support it.
However, I must say, that this morning I am feeling particularly cynical and upset. So in approaching the idea of how to end poverty, these are the ideas I came up with first:

1. Every politician, judge, lawyer, clergy, CEO, bank manager and doctor, before taking on their profession, must live with the destitute poor—the homeless, a hospital for the mentally ill, a village in Africa, Darfur, etc— for a month before taking office.

2. Create a drug that increases the effect of mirror-neurons, thus causing a super-empathetic reaction, and then put it in the drinking water.

3. Force the top two percent of wealthy people in the world to live among colonies of the sickest in the world—colonies of lepers, of AIDS sufferers, of malaria patients.

4. As a result of any lawmaker who writes or supports a law which harms the poor—for every act of war, for every unfair tariff, for every legislation aimed against the homeless—they are instantly killed by God or by an assassin’s bullet, without trial, without recourse.

Crossing Borders

Everyone in the West should live in a third world country for at least six months on the hospitality of a third world family.

Everyone who is rich should learn to live and give like the poor.

Every judge and politician should live on the street or in a shack for a month before taking their position.

Every pastor should live on food stamps for three months, without the opporunity to make any large purchase-- including books!

If leaders live as the poor, then we can better understand how our decisions effect the poor.