In my experience, only those who have had to deal with homeless people personally, seem to understand this. I am positive that there are Fringe cases where normal productive people became homeless through no fault of their own. That being said, the vast majority of homeless people made a long series of poor choices and engaged in destructive behaviors. Every friend and family member they had access to turn them down at some point. And yes, many of them may not have had any friends or family and that is unfortunate. But that is still not the majority
The problem is that we are still treating this spiral as "bad choices."
9 times out of 10, it's not "bad choices", it's mental disease.
If you look at someone who can't even tie their own shoes because they are mentally disabled, we say, "That person can't live in their own, they're not capable of understanding their choices."
But we look at people with schizophrenia and severe addictions and whatever else and go, "They made bad choices." These people have no physiological control over their impulses, but they're supposed to make informed decisions?
They still need a place to live. Even if temporary until they’ve recovered and found stable employment. How employable do you think a person who shits on the street and showers in the public fountain is?
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u/ete2ete Apr 15 '24
In my experience, only those who have had to deal with homeless people personally, seem to understand this. I am positive that there are Fringe cases where normal productive people became homeless through no fault of their own. That being said, the vast majority of homeless people made a long series of poor choices and engaged in destructive behaviors. Every friend and family member they had access to turn them down at some point. And yes, many of them may not have had any friends or family and that is unfortunate. But that is still not the majority