From “Steering city’s homeless focus from sin to sickness,” by Teresa Gowan, at SFPublicPress.com 1/4/11:
For many poor San Franciscans, the extraordinary strain of trying to maintain housing was compounded by an absence of strong social ties. As a great destination for cultural, economic and political migrants, more than half of the city’s population were born elsewhere and had no local family members to help them.
San Francisco represents a particularly important case of the criminalization of homelessness. Even in liberal San Francisco, the social construction of homelessness as bad behavior became powerful enough to propel large-scale police campaigns against nuisance offenses, repeated attempts to abolish general assistance, and numerous other programs aimed at pushing the “visible poor” back into invisibility.
This essay describes a fundamental flaw in dealing with the homeless – homeless people are too often discussed and treated as abstracts, problems along the line of city potholes, litter, and outbreaks of the flu. It’s a mindset that remains in place whether or not the policy makers view the homeless with hostility or pity. In the mind of most politicians, the homeless
cannot, must not be viewed as victims of failures in our system -- except in terms of the system’s failure to control them.
Back during the Reagan years I watched the evolution of this mindset. First, there were the denials from the right that cuts in the social safety net were going to result in an increase in a rate of homelessness that was already rising. I distinctly remember being told by enthused Reagan fans that, once the cuts were made, all those lazy bums who were enjoying government largess would pull up their socks and get jobs. Why, it would be the best thing for them! Wait and see!
Instead, homelessness became even more undeniably visible, and the face of homelessness changed from that of single men – often alcoholics -- to women, children, sometimes even entire families who were simply poor. This did not, of course, result in any reassessment of the changes in society that had led to this epidemic. The question asked was not, “what’s wrong with our society,” but “what’s wrong with
them?"
And yes frequently there was and is “something wrong” with a person who is homeless. Addiction and mental illness can drive someone onto the streets. So can physical illness and sheer poverty. And if someone were not addicted or mentally or physically ill before they started living rough, I suspect they can very well end up that way after a few months on the streets.
It’s been thirty years now, and the visible homelessness that shocked many Americans in the ‘80s is now pretty much taken for granted. The Reagan revolution successfully and significantly lowered the bar that steeply for American expectations.
How much lower can it go? Well, consider the current crop of Republicans and their reactions to Americans facing anything from disabling winter storms to life threatening illnesses. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has blithely disclaimed responsibility for New Jersey citizens who found themselves snowbound in the wake of the last storm while he was vacationing in Florida. He’s pointing the finger at mayors who were forced to divert snow-plows to clear vitally needed state roads. Arizona governor Jan Brewer has deliberately cut state Medicaid to the point where sick Arizonans needing transplants simply cannot get them. When asked about it, she's chuckled and referred to the life-saving transplants as "optional."
She knows, and the Republican hierarchy knows that people who could be saved will die because of this laissez-faire, Social Darwinist approach to governance. And that’s okay with them. They’re counting on us getting used to it.
Why not, considering what we’ve been willing to throw away over the past three decades?
Crossposted from “
Thoughtcrimes
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