Here are three questions from the Challenge Community Forum that address our perceptions of our city’s marginalized.
In what way will this experience change your attitude about poverty?
What things do you no longer assume about people living / struggling with poverty?
Was it difficult to understand that people on low income benefits have to use the Food Bank / Salvation Army / The Bridge until you experienced it for yourselves?
September 30, 2011 at 2:43 pm
What persists as a key mystifier for me is the near absence in this forum of the voices of those with the lived experience of poverty. Those folks need to be at the heart of the dialogue yet continue to have low participation and as such remain limited in their influence of the dialogue. I struggle to understand the cause of this disparity – the discrepancy between public awareness/open discourse and a shift in social power and influence i.e. social inclusion and the voices of low income people. Poverty is not defined narrowly as merely financial deprevation – though lack of income is central, poverty elimination (yes, I use the term ‘elimination’ NOT ‘reduction’) for me includes a better understanding of my own discriminatory and exclusionary practices which stand in the way of including the voice of first hand experience.
“…No one knows it all; no one is ignorant of everything. We all know something; we are all ignorant of something. Without humility, one can hardly listen with respect to those one judges to be too far below one’s own level of competence. But the humility that enables one to listen even to those considered less competent should not be an act of condescension or resemble the behavior of those fulfilling a vow…” Paulo Freire.
October 1, 2011 at 8:37 pm
Dear John, Thanks for your insight. I think that you get that the “voices” that we most need to hear from are those dealing with the challenges of poverty everyday.
Personally, I find it somewhat insulting that the majority of the posts are not from the experts who live in poverty everyday, with no options to “cheat” “quit” or “bail.”
The question is WHY don’t more people speak out or come forward? Is it a question of accessibility or self-preservation?
For me the answer is that I risk further hardship and condemnation for doing so. During this challenge I realized that I am not even comfortable using my own name. That was a painful awareness, that I have been so condemned that I am nolonger comfortable to be who I am.
Too often, society sees me as nobody.
October 2, 2011 at 8:13 am
Thanks for the reply…ouch!
Clearly the pitchforks are readily at hand and the lynch mobs are standing guard out there to defend our shining city. I’m embarrassed to live in a small friendly good hearted prairie city where people like you – on top of the depravation – feel shamed into hiding and are made to feel as though you have nothing to contribute and feel excluded. Wow, we’ve got a lot of work to do here.
But know this, its not your fault, you have done nothing wrong and you have nothing to be ashamed of.
October 2, 2011 at 12:17 pm
Thanks John. It is not your fault anymore than mine. Those responsible are much more concerned about their welfare and reputation than mine.
Believe it or not, I am not trying to attack those with hearts and souls and compassion. There are just far too many who objectify decent human beings in order to justify the mistreatment and abuse that they endure at the hands of others.
Maybe that is why so many of us feel this way, unwelcome, unimportant and with little “value.”