Homeless people are not cockroaches or vermin – they are human and have rights

You can start by trying to question your own bias about the poor being lazy.

Ugh.

Know what i tired of? False dichotomies where people on each side defending people that supports their idealogy acting as if all the members in a particular group that aids in them in making their case are somehow all this or all that.

Syrian refugees? Xenophobes, reactionaries and nationalists are willing to paint the entire lot as incompatible with western society. While liberals are ready to defend each and every one of them as precious, well intending snowflakes. ALl of a sudden the right cares about rape culture, now that's it's advantageous, and the left is all of a sudden blind to rape in the fear of being "racist".

what you're doing is the same shit. There are lazy people. A lot of lazy poor people. There’s a lot of people not lazy too. There's lazy people who are victims of the system, there's hard working people that are victims of the system. There's lazy people who benefit from the system due to their race or inherited wealth. There's hardworking people who inherited wealth.

Brushing with broad strokes... is dishonest and lazy, and you know it.

I've worked every shit job you can imagine. I've worked kitchens in restaurants, i've worked retail jobs, i've worked in salon supply stores, computer retail, i've painted houses, i've worked at car washes, i've worked construction. I've worked grocery stores and toy stores. I've cut trees. I've worked at pharmacies and a long the way i've met some of the hardest working people and i've met some of the laziest. Construction and cutting trees? I've met guys that would work most gym nuts into the ground.

But i've been on the flip side of that. I've worked part time at pharmacies, where in 2 weeks the manager is BEGGING me to be a full time assistant manager b/c of all the lazy, grimy bums (bad area) that worked there who wouldn't life a fucking finger to so much as front and face the products on shelves when there hadn't been a customer for hours.

People are just fucking people. Over-generalizing is cheap. And honestly - i've had more luck in my life convincing conservatives, at least during the sake of discussion, that supporting systematic changes to benefit larger groups of disadvantaged, than i have convincing liberals that a little personal responsibility has the potential to go a long way. It's like blaming the government and capital, however much merit those complaints have - has turned into a fucking religious that is used to avoid and side-step any personal responsibility discussion.

Second, you can work toward a government that recognizes the way the world has shifted. We are not going to keep jobs and corporations in the United States by lowering taxes. Eventually, business will go to the lowest capital bidder. (Much of it already has.)

I've advocated, in several posts already - that i'm for expanding and growing most social services in a massive way. You cast your vote, you devote what time you have to what cause - but at the end of the day, that is not going to fix your conditions in any immediate sense. Voting for Bernie Sanders or Jill Stein (people who i like, and will vote for..bernie that is) isn't the end all be all. If you don't take care of you, the system will eat you up before any of your activism ever helps you. It's really that simple.

/r/TrueReddit Thread Parent Link - theguardian.com