"Get a job, you bum!" You say as you pass the stranger on the sidewalk. Why should you give this person your hard earned money? After all those years you spent in school, those sleepless nights spent studying and exhausting your body to he point where you question your own sanity. After this, finally graduating and getting a career for yourself. Even then, the hard work has only begun. You wake up before the sun rises, to go to a job that stresses you out, to support a family you barely even see, only to return home after the sun has set, with only a note to greet you and inform you that your cold dinner is on he counter, wrapped in tin foil. If I did it, anyone can do it. I hated school. I hate reading, math, working in general. I wish I could sit on. My ass all day with someone to feed me and literally hand me money. I didn't come from a rich family. No one handed this to me, I earned it.
Did you ever stop to wonder how they wound up in that situation? Perhaps you yourself had a rough start.
Let's look into the story of Liz Murray, for example. Ordinary girl, born to drug addicted parents. She describes them as loving, even though they would sell their food stamps for drug money. She and her sister resorted to eating toothpaste and ice cubes to quench their hunger. Although this obviously didn't taste like food, it felt good to have something in their stomachs.Her mother contracted HIV from sharing needles while doing heroin, and her father contracted he disease shortly then after. She was couch hopping when she could, but for the most part, had nowhere to stay. Where is a 15 year old child to turn in a situation like this, when "Mommy and Daddy" are supposed to be the ones you turn to for protection, love, guidance, and necessities? Liz, now a Harvard graduate, is doing just fine now. But where would she be if she wasn't able to reach out and receive the necessary resources to get back on her feet?
-I can see a good follow up to this describing what those resources were and how she did get into the position she is at
-this would be a good opportunity to mention the resources/organizations/programs that California offers not just their homeless, but their teen homeless population
-after that kind of follow up paragraph, I can see this being a good place to spend some time painting a picture of California's homeless situation- stats, demographics, etc.
What comes to mind when you see a homeless person? A drug addict? A mentally ill person? Someone who simply doesn't want to do anything with their life? How about someone who is just down on their luck and lost heir job? Someone who is disabled and doesn't have the resources to live a normal life? What about someone like Liz?
-this is a really good transition into a section about negative stereotypes about the homeless. You can break down how negative representations of the homeless lead to these negative stereotypes which you can than connect to your very first paragraph. Why does the man you describe in your first paragraph not want to help out? Because he assumes he is the only one who works hard, late, and has sacrificed and that all those who are homeless have no ambition, work ethic, etc.
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