Aaaaalriiiiight... I shall be the voice of the cynic on this topic.
On this forum, we are all fairly well educated people who are not afraid to think, work, and struggle. We make decently good decisions, I'd think, but is that the same for the poor?
I have a great aunt who cannot live alone. She cannot manage her money. She's never been able to. She is getting social security right now, and used to live alone. She'd get her check at the beginning of the month and see how much it was, then go out and buy jewelry, clothes, and all manner of luxuries before running out of money halfway through the month and calling her sister (my grandmother) to ask for money for food. The situation resolved itself now, and she lives in a community home where she allows the landlord to collect the social security and provide her with food, cigarettes, and other required items.
We are animals, and are subject to our less admirable qualities. It's easy to look past them and pretend they don't exist. If you're smart, you can buy healthy food and cook it up on the cheap! Bananas cost about $0.35 each. Pasta is cheap. Ingredients for salads are relatively cheap. Carrots, beans, rice - cheap, cheap, cheap!
I visited this site
after I typed up the above paragraph. How awesome am I!
http://cheaphealthygood.blogspot.com/2010/04/10-cheapest-healthiest-foods-money-can.html
I've heard it said before: "They need education! They don't know how to eat healthy! They don't know how to save their money!" ...but let's say you included a simple pamphlet of "Healthy Food - Unhealthy Food" and "Inexpensive Food - Expensive Food" when you gave them their card. What would they do? We're led so often to believe that they would do better if they were given knowledge, but don't we all foresee them glancing at the pamphlet and then tossing it away because they don't want any of that stuff. They, and their children, want candy, chips, soda, fries, and microwave food. Healthy food doesn't taste as good, and in order to get it cheap you have to spend time cooking it. Many don't want fruit - even if it's cheap. They'd rather have some McDonalds.
I'm not so much talking about those poor who are that way temporarily because they lost their job, got into an accident, or are in college. I'm talking about the perpetually poor. Those who never sought to advance in anything nor improve themselves or their situation. I do not expect those in that mindset to make an effort to better their health. They'll continue to do what they're used to: Taking the quick, easy way out and not thinking about it for a moment. When I hear many of the perpetually poor saying "We need more money so we can get healthier food. I can only afford to buy my kids nutty bars and TV dinners because they're cheap. I would eat healthier if I could"... all I see is that homeless man with his dog holding a "Will work for food" sign, collecting what he can get based on others' pity and then trotting off to the gas station to get a 40 of King Cobra.
Granted, there are a lot out there who are trying. I don't want to stereotype, but there are a LOT out there who sit and spin a good story, but never do anything to effectively better themselves.
I have one last personal example that is suddenly coming to mind:
A year ago, one of my friends was telling me how hard it was to get a job. He needed a job because he was going to be kicked out of his house. He'd been living with his girlfriend for a few years, off of her income. They'd broken up. He'd always been trying to get a job, but somehow it just evaded him. The time had come when he HAD to get a job. I advised him to go and apply to everywhere that he could, and to speak to the managers and tell them that he'd be the best damn worker they'd ever hired. He said that he's been trying to reapply, and that maybe he'd actually go into the store in a while - it turns out he was doing it all online. It just amazed me. He'd been applying to the 5% of stores that have online applications - and I'm SURE they get discarded in favor of those who actually go into the store. He found reason after reason to justify how he hadn't actually gone into other stores and talked to managers and manually filled out applications. He's been really busy. He's been depressed. It's strange how he was such a happy guy and fun to be around until he started job searching. Always drinking and partying and having fun, but suddenly it all changed the moment he realized that he needed to sustain it by working himself, and his mood would shift from normal to being a wreck whenever he was supposed to apply himself to it.
I asked him why he didn't go out further and maybe try other places - but he said he could only walk. He said he needed a driver's license but couldn't get to the DMV to take his test. I offered to drop him off there - but he found a way to decline that too.
So it goes, there's always a good story. What actually lies underneath that story though? Are we willing to look at it and honestly see those who do try and those who don't? And are we willing to say to those that don't try "Alright, we are not going to try to help you anymore. You need to do this on your own" and let them sink or swim? The story is so much easier to believe... it feels so much better... And how many of them are just stories, compared to the realities of struggle? Quite a few are stories, I'd imagine.
To quote Machiavelli - "Men judge generally more by the eye than by the hand, for everyone can see and few can feel. Every one sees what you appear to be, few really know what you are."
Mind you - I am not an elitist. I'm giving a different perspective, one that I see quite often. I am a cross, fickle person... but I know it. I am honest with myself, and I desire honesty from others. It's not a less-than-perfect reality that offends me, it's anything aside from reality attempting to be played off as it.
