PUTNEY-Thank you for publishing Annie Pisgah Searsburg's thoughtful and informative piece. It is an issue that needs more attention and awareness!
There are opinions and viewpoints about homelessness, poverty, and disability that need to be addressed openly and frankly, especially when many of these are not only inaccurate, but they also continue to give energy to a disempowerment and discrimination.
Of the people who experience homelessness, 99.9% are no different from most of us. They are people trying to navigate the world the best they can through very difficult and challenging circumstances that many of us can't even imagine.
They are trying to hold their families together and hold a job, and they want to have a place to call home. They just want to experience feeling safe - safe from the elements, safe from discrimination, and safe from judgment. They want to feel valued and loved.
Truth be told, so many people are living from paycheck to paycheck, and all it takes is an accident, an illness, a fire, a catastrophic weather event, the loss of a job, or any other unforeseen circumstance to put them in jeopardy and become just another unwelcome statistic.
As someone brilliantly observed, when one points a finger at someone to blame, there are four more pointing right back at them.
Thank you, Annie, for your courage and for sharing your vulnerability by putting a face to this unfortunate aspect of our culture and society.
Andrea Capron
Putney
This letter to the editor was submitted to The Commons.
This piece, published in print in the Voices section or as a column in the news sections, represents the opinion of the writer. In the newspaper and on this website, we strive to ensure that opinions are based on fair expression of established fact. In the spirit of transparency and accountability, The Commons is reviewing and developing more precise policies about editing of opinions and our role and our responsibility and standards in fact-checking our own work and the contributions to the newspaper. In the meantime, we heartily encourage civil and productive responses at voices@commonsnews.org.