10 Things You Need to Know to Live on the Streets

[Better Believe It]

10 Things You Need to Know to Live on the Streets
How to make the best of a traumatic transition: Learn the best bathroom options and soup kitchen schedules, carry a blanket and more.
By Walter Mosley and Rae Gomes, The Nation
July 28, 2009

For millions of Americans, the housing crisis began well before last year's front-page collapse. Bigotry and criminalization by an unjust system of policing and incarceration, combined with economic privation, have kept even the meager privilege of a subprime mortgage or slumlord lease out of reach for many. As the crisis unfolds, the number of homeless will grow.

Picture the Homeless, a social justice organization founded and led by homeless people in New York City, has joined The Nation to come up with a list of things you need to know to live on the street--and ways we can all build movements to challenge the stigma of homelessness and put forward an alternative vision of community.

Read the 10 points at:

http://www.alternet.org/workplace/141567/10_things_you_need_to_know_to_live_on_the_streets_/

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. Nothing about a knife.

Therefore it doesn't reflect my real world observations.

[John Q. Citizen]

3. Did you need a knife when you were homeless?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

4. Funny.

:D

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

5. If you want to know my observations, I'll tell ya.

If not, I'll let your humor stand.

[John Q. Citizen]

6. Please share your observations

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

9. The next step outside jail.

Whether coming or going.

Survival.

Abandoned buildings. Fellowship and distrust.

Facilitators and enemies.

Between family and abandonment.

And the next rung...work.

And the next rung...a home.

And the next rung...respect.



Note: Visiting a friend whom I couldn't afford to help but couldn't afford to cut loose. It's such a perjorative that I have to explain that it's not about me but about my friend. Golly, what will people think!?! It's a shit deal.

[pitohui]

8. i would appreciate hearing your story, rummy

it's my opinion also that this article is a little bit silly

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

10. See #9, first.

I was a lucky midddle class motherfucker.

Problems...........dissolved.

The rest of the people in my life weren't so lucky.



I was just taking exception to the "To Do" list for the homeless. It's ridiculous. It can't be sanitized. It can't be a 10-step program. It's as close to a jungle as one can come without being in a fingers-on-throat act of survival. It can't be mitigated in how fucked it is.

[pitohui]

12. thanks, i see that now

i agree w you, the article may be well meaning but it's just silly

[cutlassmama]

2. Good info. for a lot to have. Thanks n/t

[pitohui]

7. this is pretty useless advice on based on my personal experience

they don't seem to know whether they are aiming their advice at the high functioning homeless person, who will mostly be couch surfing friends and family member's basements or camping out in parks, college campuses, etc. where they can blend in with the public rather than shelters, or the more dysfunctional homeless (those who have already pissed off everyone they know who will get them a place to stay for a night or two) -- the dysfunctional beggars already know all the soup kitchens and where they can hustle you w. a stupid-ass "funny" sign w.out getting arrested -- the higher functioning "hidden" homeless who are going from couch to couch don't need advice on finding a freaking toilet

advice like "let go of your pride but hold onto your dignity" is just nonsense words

a clean, sane person who can pose as a backpacker and live in a tent will be able to survive as a homeless person and NOT be sleep deprived a lot more easily than a person who is struggling with mental illness living out of a shopping cart...there are all kinds of homeless...but the first piece of advice i ALWAYS give is be clean and don't smell, that's the key to everything else (being admitted to a park to camp for a couple of weeks instead of being chased off, for example, being allowed to use the library or to slip into a bathroom at a fast food place, for others)

hell i slept in a public bldg at a university when i was younger on several occasions and never got caught for sure altho people suspected, a friend actually slept on a university campus for months before they caught onto him and gave him a trespass ticket, being neat and clean and well-spoken goes a long way

unfortunately, being neat, clean, well-spoken is not always under our control, especially when the person is not bathing and is ranting because of a mental illness

so this advice is i think not as useful as it might appear???

[BlooInBloo]

11. Would rather see "10 Things You Need To Know To AVOID Living On The Streets".

[ret5hd]

13. First: Get a million dollars.

[XemaSab]

14. Second: Get a Rolls and a driver