Luis Molina
Amanda Reyes
English 105
The homeless are being harassed in California
It's quite disturbing that people find it appropriate to
discriminate against the homeless. It's bad enough that there are many negative
stereotypes about homeless people like homeless people being drug addicts,
alcoholics, mentally ill, or lazy; but now the government (with the support of the
citizens) are passing laws and bills to make life even harder for the homeless.
According to FBI reports, arresting of the homeless has
increased 77% in California from 2000 to 2012, but arrests for drunkenness
and disorderly conduct has decreased by 16% and 48% for some odd reason.
Why are people more comfortable with drunks and disorderly conduct
than people who unfortunately landed on hard times? A lot of people
stereotype homeless people as the same drunken, drug addicted criminals that
are being arrested. A lot of homeless people can become homeless in different
ways such as they lost their jobs or made poor financial choices.
Advocates have attempted to have a bill passed to protect
the homeless from being arrested for performing every day activities;
back in 2013, advocates proposed a homeless bill of rights to do just that but
the bill eventually died in the Appropriations Committee. It is currently
unknown as to why the bill died. People
may argue that homeless citizens have to help themselves and get jobs but they
can't stop being homeless without a little help, after all, the homeless
are people too.
Whenever people walk past a homeless person sitting on the
sidewalk asking for any spare change, they usually don't even acknowledge
them or claim that they don't have any spare change even though they
probably do. Whenever I give money to the homeless, they are always
so thankful and I can see in their eyes that they're very happy, seeing a
person become so happy because of my good deed makes myself happy. I grew
up being taught by my mother and uncle that giving to the homeless is the right
thing to do and to give whatever I could to the homeless if I had any pocket
change. The average person doesn't know that most homeless
people have had very troubled lives people should at least try to start a
conversation with a homeless person to show that someone cares. After all,
ignoring or neglecting the homeless is a form of harassment since by neglecting
the homeless, people are basically acting as though the homeless aren’t worthy
of their time or sympathy.
Hatred and harassment go hand in hand, so why do people hate the
homeless? As I wrote earlier, there are many negative stereotypes about the
homeless. Many people don’t want to financially support the homeless because
they feel if they give money to the homeless they’ll use it to buy drugs and
alcohol instead of buying necessities. People don’t want to help the homeless
because they believe the stereotype that homeless people are mentally ill and
should not be given support but instead should be sent to a mental institution.
Some people believe that all or most homeless people are too lazy to get jobs
and work so they believe that the homeless don’t deserve their help and should
earn their own money. All of these stereotypes can cause someone to become
prejudice towards the homeless and as a result, they’ll support any legislation
that makes life harder for the homeless.
Talking
to the homeless can brighten up their day. In an interview with a homeless
veteran named John who unfortunately lost his dearly beloved older brother in
the Vietnam war, lost his ability to walk, and became homeless sometime after
the war, John confirms that whenever someone talks to him, it always makes
his day better and puts a smile on his face and it makes him feel like less of
a human when someone ignores him. John stays positive everyday knowing that
someone cares when someone just says a friendly hello. Californians and humans
in general should show that they care for the homeless and less fortunate. The
first step would be to get people to care about the homeless, we need to show
compassion and humanity towards them. The second step would be to
pass a bill that protect the rights of the homeless so the police don't have to
arrest a homeless person sitting or resting on the sidewalk. Then we have
to create programs to assist the homeless to get them a good job so they can
actually afford homes.
https://youtu.be/JdzLLEvxKoY
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