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The Stinking Lousewife’s Leg Humpers Can’t Even Volunteer...


GolightlyGrrl

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I've said it before and I'll say it again: If the welfare queen in the Cadillac ever existed, she and her kids were probably sleeping in the car because that was all they had left!

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There's a term "Orange County poor". That's the family who shows up in a BMW to the food bank because they lost everything in the .com collapse or when their business went under. You never can tell by what someone has.

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This!

What scares me about private only hand-outs is that they become a popularity contest and a measure of one's worth, not need. I'm afraid if our country completely dismantled a public safety net, only white, Christian, conservative families (i.e. Kelly Crawford and family) would get help, and if you're a minority, gay, a non-Christian, more liberal, or childless you would end up dying in the streets.

I don't think the Catholic run shelters and soup kitchens would turn anyone away. I doubt that most of the mainstream Protestant denominations would either.

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They won't turn people away for food, but I bet they would if we were dependent on them for money, housing, etc though. Or it would be a proselytization tool. Consider the Rescue Missions, which make people sit through an evangelical Protestant sermon in order to get a meal paid for with government funds.

I interact with various church charities on occasion, and proselytization is always a part of it.

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They won't turn people away for food, but I bet they would if we were dependent on them for money, housing, etc though. Or it would be a proselytization tool. Consider the Rescue Missions, which make people sit through an evangelical Protestant sermon in order to get a meal paid for with government funds.

I interact with various church charities on occasion, and proselytization is always a part of it.

Evangelical is different from mainstream, which is why I made it a point to specify mainstream Protestant denominations. Proselytizing happens, and it does have it's good points. Some people gain some hope when they hear a sermon. I'm all for anything that may bring comfort to a horrible situation.

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I disagree with making people listen to a sermon to get a hot meal. I don't think it comforts them at all. I have volunteered at missions and there are a lot of glazed eyes. Why not feed them and give the sermon afterward? Of course, I am nitpicking, because obviously all of those people feel the religion is worth the meal.

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I used to volunteer at a homeless shelter and they did not let the homeless watch TV. I thought it was kind of problematic.

I get that the last supper is a beautiful painting but let's face it will people stare at it for hours for entertainment? Wouldn't replacing tv with say a few games or some knitting or something make more sense?

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The (secular) downtown shelter here tries to have productive stuff - they are always looking for craft/activity volunteers with the kids in the evening, and also tutoring and homework help - but there are a lot of parents sitting in the lobby or their room, letting the kids watch a movie on some sort of portable thingy, while they do business on the phone (appointments, benefits, job interviews, family stuff, lawyer stuff).

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Oh WOW.

Maybe they you know ate a lot of food not because they were gluttons but because they didn't know where their next meal was coming from?

I volunteered to serve dinner for a PADS (rotating homeless shelter) dinner here in my state and the people who ate there? were HUNGRY. You could TELL. They'd ask for 2nds before their first plate was cleared. And the guy who routinely made the meals (awesome dude whose wife I'm friends with), said that if you don't have meat the patrons would get upset- probably because they'd feel hungry faster so he always did his hardest to get meat and as much protein otherwise into the food so they felt and stayed fuller longer.

Oh goodness, I have stories! My parents actually work for a PADS shelter, after years of volunteering there. My mother's food is well-reguarded -- it's southern style comfort food. mustard greens and meat sort of things. The local methodist church, on the other hand, isn't well liked. They brought meatless food -- and not things like lasagna, until the director told them they had to stop, otherwise the poor were still going hungry.

I hate this thing that goes through some parts of society that says that people on the margins of society can't have any comforts and must be grateful for whatever crap trickles down to them. Poverty is always going to be with us, why do we have to treat them like they can't have any autonomy in their lives? Sorry, it's a ranty topic for me.

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I just reread my last post and I want to make it clear: BECAUSE the shelter can't provide enough safe, productive stuff for the kids to do, the parents use the resources they have, mostly TV, to be able to get shit done. Important shit they have to do because you have to jump through a million hoops to get benefits, to stay in your terms of release, to get legal protection from violence and fraud, etc. Because even two-parent families, if they are trying to get/keep jobs and deal with our supposed safety net program, cannot also watch their children constantly - and without a private, safe place to be, that's exactly what they have to do. Constant vigilance.

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Oh goodness, I have stories! My parents actually work for a PADS shelter, after years of volunteering there. My mother's food is well-reguarded -- it's southern style comfort food. mustard greens and meat sort of things. The local methodist church, on the other hand, isn't well liked. They brought meatless food -- and not things like lasagna, until the director told them they had to stop, otherwise the poor were still going hungry.

I hate this thing that goes through some parts of society that says that people on the margins of society can't have any comforts and must be grateful for whatever crap trickles down to them. Poverty is always going to be with us, why do we have to treat them like they can't have any autonomy in their lives? Sorry, it's a ranty topic for me.

Oh yeah. And I could tell too, that the food... the guys who cooked it made an effort to make it really good. Even though they were serving it for like 100+ people. Made sure there were a LOT of different "courses". There was salad, bread, meatloaf, mashed potatoes, veggies, and more that i'm forgetting. I wanted to volunteer again, but the day I did it, i was like 36 weeks pregnant and life got away from me after that!

My dad worked for a charter school in Chicago, and was appalled at what they considered a "balanced meal" for the kids who didn't have money that the state was giving the school. He fought and fought and fought and fought for them to change it. Eventually he got so disillusioned he went back to the parochial system because every step he took there to do some good for disadvantaged/underprivledged kids was being met with complete and utter resistance.

I think that the folks who have no homes deserve ALL the little luxuries they have. Its pretty much all they have.

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I used to volunteer at a homeless shelter and they did not let the homeless watch TV. I thought it was kind of problematic.

I get that the last supper is a beautiful painting but let's face it will people stare at it for hours for entertainment? Wouldn't replacing tv with say a few games or some knitting or something make more sense?

Guess it depends on the shelter...

I worked for a transitional housing program several years ago that was for homeless women with children. All the women had their own apartments which were equipped for cable access.

The affiliated shelters which referred many of the clients to this program also allowed for cable access (if clients were assigned their own individual room).

Both places had rules that maintained that residents should either be out working or looking for a job during the day. So, they weren't allowed to sit around and watch daytime TV, but they could certainly watch to their heart's content once they returned home for the evening.

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Oh wow. This is relevant to my interests.

I went to declare myself homeless yesterday. There was a telly you could watch while you waited. I do not think a painting would have been particularly consoling.

No one was fat as I remember but they could have been and they still had lost their home. It's wrong to be fat and homeless? Most of them were desperate, twitchy, and dealing with authority, which they were not fond of doing. I would rather they were fat and happy in their own homes instead.

(I didn't think many of them got much healthy food to eat.)

I am not going to end up a rough sleeper but I will be couch surfing or in homeless accommodation unless things look up soon. It is not pleasant to be wobbling on the edge of an abyss or, far worse, to have outright fallen in. Have they any conception of that, and what it might have done to the ladies served?

I also thought the Lousewife's comment was stupid (no surprise there). Lousewife, mentally ill doesn't mean "only fitted for the most menial tasks". Untreated mental illness might mean a worker bursting into tears at the stack of plates, hearing voices muttering to her, knocking them all over and losing it, or quietly doing the job, going to bed and slitting her wrists. Or it could mean nothing and she washes the dishes. It is NOT PREDICTABLE and it is not the same as "learning difficulties".

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Oh wow. This is relevant to my interests.

I went to declare myself homeless yesterday. There was a telly you could watch while you waited. I do not think a painting would have been particularly consoling.

No one was fat as I remember but they could have been and they still had lost their home. It's wrong to be fat and homeless? Most of them were desperate, twitchy, and dealing with authority, which they were not fond of doing. I would rather they were fat and happy in their own homes instead.

(I didn't think many of them got much healthy food to eat.)

I am not going to end up a rough sleeper but I will be couch surfing or in homeless accommodation unless things look up soon. It is not pleasant to be wobbling on the edge of an abyss or, far worse, to have outright fallen in. Have they any conception of that, and what it might have done to the ladies served?

I also thought the Lousewife's comment was stupid (no surprise there). Lousewife, mentally ill doesn't mean "only fitted for the most menial tasks". Untreated mental illness might mean a worker bursting into tears at the stack of plates, hearing voices muttering to her, knocking them all over and losing it, or quietly doing the job, going to bed and slitting her wrists. Or it could mean nothing and she washes the dishes. It is NOT PREDICTABLE and it is not the same as "learning difficulties".

*sympathetic arm pats* I hope things work out for you soon.

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As for obesity - is there a functioning brain cell in her head that could possibly understand that people living in poverty tend to eat cheap carbs because they are, well, cheap? That most people living in that sort of poverty don't have the luxury of knowing that they will have a consistent source of fresh fruits and veggies and lean protein and some whole grains? It's not gluttony - it's an attempt at survival.

Another WTF to the suggestion of replacing the TV playing American Idol with picture of the Last Supper. Is she watching the same American Idol that I do? Because I dont' recall anything remotely violent or offensive - it's a show where people sing. Period. It's possibly the least offensive show out there. If someone is struggling and a bit of TV helps to distract them and maybe keep the shelter a bit more calm, great.

I was also wondering what is wrong with the entire social structure in the affluent suburb that some women could be working hard and still require a shelter in order to house themselves. Apparently, that's not what bothers this reader.

I'm just going to quote this because most of what I'd type is the same thing. Really, WTF. The cheap foods are the high fat, high carb, high sodium foods that are pure crap. The weeks when money is tight for us, we have to eat a lot of the same foods, and it SUCKS. I feel for the people who have to eat it all the time just to have food.

American Idol. No, she wants them to be forced to pray before getting a few morsels of food then to listen to a sermon while they eat it and are judged.

I think she thinks the working homeless are just lazy. What's interesting though is she looked up on the women with iPhones who were talking about the bible. But those who were working and homeless...shame on them if no bible-talk is heard.

I want to know what shelter she volunteered at that didn't allow the homeless to help out. Also, at the shelters near me, you have to pass background checks and pay up front for them. A lot of homeless people can't afford that. If she thinks it's so luxurious to be served food (didn't Jesus say something about serving those in need?), how about she trade places with them, give up her home and security and worry instead about where she'll lay her head down each night. Sure, some homeless are lazy, but MOST of them would do ANYTHING to have a job and a way to afford a home or even to pay rent on a regular bed for the dignity that comes with paying one's own way through life. The vast majority of homeless aren't homeless because of anything they've done wrong. Our society is so fucked up with a minimum wage that doesn't pay for cheap rent in most American cities that out politicians think is a fair minimum wage, with taxes on the middle class and poor being raised while takes to the goddamned millionaires and billionaires is lowered and corporations pay nothing at all...

I need to stop before I get REALLY mad.

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It likely never occurred to her that obesity doesn't just occur from over-eating or from eating the wrong kinds of foods. Hypothyroid can cause obesity, for example. Some medications can also make weight-loss difficult. Add this to the fact that, as you've all said, it's likely they have no idea from where or when their next meal will come, and you can't blame them for stuffing their faces. The 'Thinking' Housewife and her 'grateful reader' are just a couple of privileged, self-important assholes who only believe they know about real life.

((( JFC )))

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I think most of what she wrote is a huge lie.

And so what if they projected some Apprentice or whatever onto the wall. What's so terrible about these homeless women having a diversion for an hour or two? And they sat around discussing their favorite iPad apps? I'm sure just by posting this, someone who believes that anecdata = evidence will respond to correct me and tell me that homeless people typically have iPads, but I don't believe it.

I don't think she made it up. My theory on the iPad thing is that some of the "homeless" (?) people she was serving did in fact have iPads. This pissed off Lousewife, but instead of saying something like "What were they doing with iPads?! Why didn't they sell their iPads and get food" or whatever, she decided to be passive-aggressive about it and just "mention" that they were using iPads. After all, she wouldn't want to grouse too much, because after all the women were talking about the Bible. (they were the ones with "an inkling of beauty and truth in them," after all.) But I'm sure it's one of Lousewife's lingering resentments about the experience.

I feel really sorry for people who have iPads who eat at the homeless shelter--maybe even sorrier than for people *without* iPads who eat at the homeless shelter. The former situation just shows that they have no sense of money, will likely never be able to budget or save well enough to pull themselves up out of poverty, and would trade their dignity (=the ability to pay for meals outside the homeless shelter) for a new gadget. Which most likely was bought on credit and then defaulted on. My point is just that the iPads are (probably) evidence of a very sad situation.

ETA: It's also barely possible that the women worked at one of the many big companies that are giving iPads to all their employees these days.

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Oh no, you didn't, chiccy.

You know what? Selling a used iPad will not provide you with meals. It is a fixed amount of money which will get eaten up by other debts fast. It is not a constant source of income.

You know something else? I called in to work today explaining I was going to be off because I needed to find somewhere to live. Tell me what I should lose to pull me out of poverty. My smartphone, because povvos shouldn't have phones? If I get a crappy one and visibly cringe and bow while I am using it, will that work?

I have no home, and I am absolutely terrified by what may happen to me. This is a horror story that no amount of iPads will fix. I have a low paid job and a person I want to live with who can't pay the rent. I have no fucking clue where we will end up. That is scary as shit.

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Fuck this woman.

If it wasn't for my family, I would be homeless right now. I had a decent job as a retail manager until I got diagnosed with an illness last year that's affected me physically and mentally, permanently. I am now unable to work. Let me tell you, medical bills wipe out your savings REAL FAST. I've sold a lot of my things, but kept a lot as well. I have a nice computer, thanks to a birthday gift from my dad last year. I kept my favorite guitars, headphones, and all my vinyl records/music collectibles. I have a passion for crochet and use a portion of my government money for yarn, not only for crocheting functional clothing and household items for myself/my family, but I really like to make hats, blankets, scarfs scarves and things for charity.

Why? Because life wouldn't be worth fighting for without these things. I'm 30 this year and I've been a musician and enthusiast since I was a small child. It's who I am. I crochet because I enjoy it and it's one of the few things I have left that actually makes me feel like a productive human being. It's also incredibly meditative. Anything that helps me forget for one minute how fucking shitty I feel, I do it.

That's also why I read so much hilarious snark. :)

ANYONE deserves to have some creature comforts that allow them to escape, if only for a while. So yeah, fuck this lady. I'd love to see her go just one day in someone else's shoes.

JesusFightClub, I am sorry for your situation and I really hope things start looking up for you soon.

ETA: Scarves. I make scarves. Smuggar scarfs tacos.

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I forwarded the SL's blog entry to a friend who spent time in shelters while an adolescent (father was alcoholic and abusive; mother got out, taking the kid with her). He says this was exactly the reason they avoided shelters until they were able to find a non-denominational one. And by 'avoiding shelters' he means 'sleeping on park benches'.

From our IRC chat:

me: You got yourself out [of poverty and that kind of vicious cycle]

him: I know but I can still feel their eyes

me: ...whose eyes

him: of people just like her

him: it was like being silently accused of a crime

I'm not in the US anymore so I can't help on the ground, but if anyone could link to places I could donate to, I'd be grateful. Or PM me.

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Oh wow. This is relevant to my interests.

I went to declare myself homeless yesterday. There was a telly you could watch while you waited. I do not think a painting would have been particularly consoling.

No one was fat as I remember but they could have been and they still had lost their home. It's wrong to be fat and homeless? Most of them were desperate, twitchy, and dealing with authority, which they were not fond of doing. I would rather they were fat and happy in their own homes instead.

(I didn't think many of them got much healthy food to eat.)

I am not going to end up a rough sleeper but I will be couch surfing or in homeless accommodation unless things look up soon. It is not pleasant to be wobbling on the edge of an abyss or, far worse, to have outright fallen in. Have they any conception of that, and what it might have done to the ladies served?

I also thought the Lousewife's comment was stupid (no surprise there). Lousewife, mentally ill doesn't mean "only fitted for the most menial tasks". Untreated mental illness might mean a worker bursting into tears at the stack of plates, hearing voices muttering to her, knocking them all over and losing it, or quietly doing the job, going to bed and slitting her wrists. Or it could mean nothing and she washes the dishes. It is NOT PREDICTABLE and it is not the same as "learning difficulties".

I am so sorry. Is there anything I can do to help?

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Fuck this woman.

If it wasn't for my family, I would be homeless right now. I had a decent job as a retail manager until I got diagnosed with an illness last year that's affected me physically and mentally, permanently. I am now unable to work. Let me tell you, medical bills wipe out your savings REAL FAST. I've sold a lot of my things, but kept a lot as well. I have a nice computer, thanks to a birthday gift from my dad last year. I kept my favorite guitars, headphones, and all my vinyl records/music collectibles. I have a passion for crochet and use a portion of my government money for yarn, not only for crocheting functional clothing and household items for myself/my family, but I really like to make hats, blankets, scarfs scarves and things for charity.

Why? Because life wouldn't be worth fighting for without these things. I'm 30 this year and I've been a musician and enthusiast since I was a small child. It's who I am. I crochet because I enjoy it and it's one of the few things I have left that actually makes me feel like a productive human being. It's also incredibly meditative. Anything that helps me forget for one minute how fucking shitty I feel, I do it.

That's also why I read so much hilarious snark. :)

ANYONE deserves to have some creature comforts that allow them to escape, if only for a while. So yeah, fuck this lady. I'd love to see her go just one day in someone else's shoes.

JesusFightClub, I am sorry for your situation and I really hope things start looking up for you soon.

ETA: Scarves. I make scarves. Smuggar scarfs tacos.

You don't have to give your reasons for why you have some things. It's no one's business.

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I know. I explain myself too much, it's an annoying habit I need to get out of. I just get so damn mad at these people that have no concept of anyone else's lives and hardships and think if you're homeless/sick/poor/ etc. that you should be in a fucking cardboard box with holey clothes and better damn be grateful that some righteous bitch looked down upon you and judged you while feeding you some hamburger helper.

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I don't think she made it up. My theory on the iPad thing is that some of the "homeless" (?) people she was serving did in fact have iPads. This pissed off Lousewife, but instead of saying something like "What were they doing with iPads?! Why didn't they sell their iPads and get food" or whatever, she decided to be passive-aggressive about it and just "mention" that they were using iPads. After all, she wouldn't want to grouse too much, because after all the women were talking about the Bible. (they were the ones with "an inkling of beauty and truth in them," after all.) But I'm sure it's one of Lousewife's lingering resentments about the experience.

I feel really sorry for people who have iPads who eat at the homeless shelter--maybe even sorrier than for people *without* iPads who eat at the homeless shelter. The former situation just shows that they have no sense of money, will likely never be able to budget or save well enough to pull themselves up out of poverty, and would trade their dignity (=the ability to pay for meals outside the homeless shelter) for a new gadget. Which most likely was bought on credit and then defaulted on. My point is just that the iPads are (probably) evidence of a very sad situation.

ETA: It's also barely possible that the women worked at one of the many big companies that are giving iPads to all their employees these days.

Job loss, sickness, divorce, or change in situation can put anyone into homelessness. It has nothing to do with not budgeting money well. There are people who have been out of work for a year and they wiped out their bank accounts. There are people who do work but no longer have someone helping them pay the bills-their spouse, significant other, roommate. It does not take long to wipe out a bank account, and it doesn't matter what the person had before they became homeless. Homelessness does not discriminate.

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