I can't agree with Topher's "Homeless by Choice" statements. That would be akin to saying there are "Battered Women by Choice" because they don't make efforts to leave their batterer, or there are "Drug Addicts by Choice" because they can always quit. I've known enough houseless people to know that many, if not most, of those who claim to prefer living as they do believe they have no other viable options. Many, many of them have tried taking advantage of the miserably inadequate services that are offered to them and have seen nothing but failure after failure, as much because of the "system" as because of their own failures. They simply end up giving up on themselves but, because they don't want others to see their "failures", they often justify their situation by claiming they want to live the way they do. The houseless suffer greatly, whether they openly express it or not.
If there is a minority of houseless people who have really chosen to be so, it is such a small minority that it isn't even worth mentioning as an issue. To point out the "Homeless by Choice" only feeds into the ignorant misconceptions far to many have about the houseless.
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I can't agree with Topher's "Homeless by Choice" statements. That would be akin to saying there are "Battered Women by Choice" because they don't make efforts to leave their batterer, or there are "Drug Addicts by Choice" because they can always quit. I've known enough houseless people to know that many, if not most, of those who claim to prefer living as they do believe they have no other viable options. Many, many of them have tried taking advantage of the miserably inadequate services that are offered to them and have seen nothing but failure after failure, as much because of the "system" as because of their own failures. They simply end up giving up on themselves but, because they don't want others to see their "failures", they often justify their situation by claiming they want to live the way they do. The houseless suffer greatly, whether they openly express it or not.
If there is a minority of houseless people who have really chosen to be so, it is such a small minority that it isn't even worth mentioning as an issue. To point out the "Homeless by Choice" only feeds into the ignorant misconceptions far to many have about the houseless.
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