"Get a job!" Sound familiar? Often said to street beggars, especially when they are apparently able-bodied young males. We have plenty here in Vancouver. The ones with cardboard signs asking for donations for beer and pot. The kind of panhandlers we love to hate. Our beggars are often of this category, unlike Mexico where they tend to be severely disabled, or grandmothers, or single mothers with children, or children. The very poor able bodied males who are not able to get by on low paying employment often turn to crime or they immigrate to the US and Canada, El Norte, which is my guess why they are not that often seen in Mexico City. I would also imagine they don't garner as much compassion.
I have no time for those who judge others by their appearance, even though I do it all the time. Once about nine years ago in the shopping district of an affluent neighbourhood I noticed a well dressed middle age man harassing a homeless fellow begging on the sidewalk. "Why don't you get a job?" he asked him over and over as though he couldn't think of something intelligent to say. I wondered about intervening but instead stood still and stared at the aggressor. He could not handle my glare and quickly left. I smiled at the homeless man then went on my way.
A Christian pastor of an independent church I have the pleasure of knowing once mentioned to me that a lot of people on welfare don't want to work. I asked him how he knows this for sure. Have you talked to any of them? Do you know any of them? Have they told you their story? No? Then how can you be sure?
I should note here that this pastor soon ended our friendship accusing me of shooting him down whenever he wanted to express an opinion. Fair enough.
I don't doubt for a minute that there are people who don't want to work. When you have few or no skills and have lived with rejection and abuse all your life it is not exactly a smorgasbord of opportunity awaiting you in the job market. Many actually do want to work but it is very difficult to connect skills with decent remunerative employment. My guess is that so many of the so-called employable young men (and women) seen sprawled on the pavement aren't even work ready. They have no fixed address, often suffer from addictions, lack social skills, their hygiene is poor, their clothes ready to fall off their back, and many suffer from depression, anxiety, PTSD and Fetal Alcohol Spectrum disorder, among other mental health issues. Many people who live with mental illness present as being quite well. Yet, on first sight, they are judged as able bodied but intentionally lazy and useless and their vicious cycles of destructive behaviour simply confirm and entrench the harsh judgment that is society's gift to them. Then there are those who do work but can't earn enough to keep a roof over their head. Or they've been denied or kicked off of welfare because they are considered employable but unwilling to work. Their new career? Street begging. Or selling drugs. Or selling their bodies. Or crime. Sometimes suicide.
When I was on welfare for three and a half years and suffering from undiagnosed PTSD I wanted to work. I could find nothing sustainable. I ended up in short term positions and given my mental health situation I was not able to work according to expectations. Intense job searches were fruitless and useless because I simply wasn't what employers seemed to be looking for.
I began to feel better. I convinced welfare, following a major meltdown with a bullying financial aid worker to leave me alone and change my status. They left me alone, letting me collect my meagre cheque every month while I began to prepare myself for my new profession. I spent almost a year doing volunteer work with the homeless, then found employment in a homeless shelter. Not a good fit, and I was up against some very nasty and bullying coworkers but I lasted more than a year and picked up invaluable skills.
I have been a mental health peer support worker for eleven years. It is not exactly a dream job and the pay is terrible but I have done well, enjoy the work, my clients and my coworkers. Thanks to the blessing of BC Housing I pay incredibly low rent, have a savings account, and money to spare for travel.
None of what has happened for me could have occurred without help and support from others and help from God. No one really pulls themselves up by their own bootstraps. Especially when they don't own a pair of boots. We don't rise alone. We do this together and we support one another. The success of one is the success of many.
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