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fuck.
One in four foster kids will end up homeless.
https://nfyi.org/issues/homelessness/
up to 3 out of 10 homeless people are foster kids who aged out.
what the fuck.
I thought it was bad enough knowing about the veteran rights.
some of the studies show higher rates.
The studies. on the homeless children.
If you want more statistical horror, look up foster care to prison pipeline
So when conservatives want to ban abortions they are basically trying to increase the flow in this pipeline to get more prison slave labor
10000% yes. The easiest people to manipulate are the desperate and manipulators love dangling carrots.
What’s worse is that this is easily recognizable but nothing will ever be done about the nutjobs who enjoy watching others suffer at their hand.
There is no reason to believe we don’t live in hell
But “poors” “ruin” “great American cities”
Make me a billionaire. Say now I’m a super selfish billionaire. I’m OK with having to ride my limo through SF, routing around the Tenderloin, to rub shoulders with those Silicon Valley MAGAs at their fundraisers? Why don’t my buddies and I stop the madness, call it Euthanize The Poors if we have to, but with crime down security costs go down too and any reproductively-derived assets (children) must be safer…
Gated communities are cool but sightseeing is part of life. I’m a selfish billionaire but I can’t visit Honduras safely b/c I haven’t fixed global poverty, now I never get to see it. My yacht is good enough for me I guess fine
Billionaires go to Honduras and fuck kids probably. They can go anywhere they want and do whatever they want unless they fuck with someone with more money and power, then they’ll suck that person’s dick.
Multiple angles really.
Biggest one is that a child is both a financial and mental stress on a parent, and our society overwhelming believes that children are primarily the responsibility of the mother. By attacking abortion, they basically saying that every woman is just one sexual assault away from a lifetime of financial, emotional, mental and social duress.
The second reason is class stratification. The financial stresses impact less wealthy families or individuals disproportionately, and less wealthy people cannot afford to travel to areas where reproductive care is legal, nor can they afford the lawyers required to fight the potential criminal cases or just pay their fines. The rich conservatives bankrolling these anti-abortion groups aren’t threatened or beholden to the policy they create.
The third reason is racism. Black women are more likely to seek abortions, partly because they suffer a higher incidence of sexual assault, but also because they have less access to reproductive resources and education. Republicans have dog whistled this in the past by trying to say that abortions are racist because black women have a disporportionate number of abortions, even going so far as to call it a Democrat genocide on African-Americans. This dog whistle shows their true intentions; force financial, mental, and social stress in ways that are “equal” along racial lines, but not “equitable”.
You could say that religion is a 4th reason, but I don’t consider it a real reason, and they cherry-pick their religious convictions anyway. You see those motherfuckers eating shellfish and wearing blended fibers all the time.
Yep, people are only a commodity to be manipulated by the capitalist systems
Well yeah, obviously.
It can’t possibly be because of religion, because all of them would be damned to hell five times a day for several other reasons.
People can easily justify their own sin because they know exactly what motivates them, which is usually some other bullshit they justified to themselves already.
I have witnessed some serious mental gymnastics in my life regarding such things.
I knew a man so religious that he wouldn’t dream of letting a woman live with him if he wasn’t married to her, but he wasn’t really cheating on their two decade long relationship, because they weren’t married.
And boy oh boy, a personal relationship with god affords you all sorts of leeway. Throughout the history of Christianity, what the church had to say was very important. Not anymore. The religion has evolved so that every man is a priest, and Jesus is just wearing shades and riding shotgun wherever they go.
“I’ve never actually read the bi-buhl, but I have a personal relationship with Christ so… and when I have trouble, I just open a random page and read until I find something I relate to. That’s how he guides me, that and the feelings I have in my heart.”
Amazes me.
Not trying to defend their position but young kids given up for adoption at or near birth are overwhelmingly adopted. There are lines and a whole grey market.
It’s kids with shitty parents that get removed after the toddler phase that tend to end up in the system long term.
Also black families are over-policed, and their kids more likely to be put into foster care “National estimates suggest that 53% of Black children will experience CPS contact by age 18, as compared to 28% of White children” “We consider that, at their root, these inequities are the consequence of systemic racism: there is no inherent relationship between race and child maltreatment. Rather, race is a proxy for the societal and institutional privileges and oppressions people experience because of their membership in a racialized group” https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9325927/
Movement for Family Power is a great advocacy organization if you want to get involved https://www.movementforfamilypower.org/
“National estimates suggest that 53% of Black children will experience CPS contact by age 18, as compared to 28% of White children”
Holy shit both of those are so high, and the the difference is also crazy
To be fair the word contact is kinda sus. I had CPS “contact” when I broke my arm in kindergarten.
I was pushed off the play ground by another kid while at school. My parents were both at work. I had a lot of bruises they also didn’t like. I remember getting questioned about it at the hospital for what felt like forever. They kept pointing out scrapes and bruises and asking how that happened. I had no clue and kept saying from playing.
That sounds like the bare minimum to qualify as contact.
Those contacts can be compared to a broken taillight or stop and frisk—it’s an opportunity to probe deeper and find anything at all to justify further surveillance and actions taken against families who are often impoverished and the hard life that creates.
Also impacts Native Americans. ICWA was put in place to basically stop DHS from kidnapping native kids. (The Right has been waging a war against ICWA for a while too - they tend to be against any form of oversight in child welfare/adoption. They want kids to go to “quiverful” white families)
there is no inherent relationship between race and child maltreatment
The pipeline is systemic racism -> poverty -> child maltreatment.
While this is accurate, most people have a better chance of actually understanding it when you use the full quote.
We live in a world where people have to be convinced to care for and sympathize with those around them.
Empathy is a skill.
That’s a great point. Wish more people would practice it.
💯
The reality if you’re working class in America; we’re all one really bad day and a few less people caring about us from being homeless.
In addition to the appalling foster care kid stats for homeless, around 13% of homeless are veterans (obviously some qualify as both). Funny how support for the military dries up once they get discharged.
Then we have the complete lack of any kind of assistance for the mentally ill.
We shouldn’t even pretend that we are civilized. We treat our fellow humans so barbarically.
I’ve been a homeless teen, thankfully it was over a decade now though.
Shit sucked. I get angry when I hear people make excuses about how homeless people are just lazy or trying to rip you off somehow. Like stfu you have no idea what it’s like!
my view of homeless people changed forever when I learned that more than half of them were foster kids who aged out of the system and were left with no family or resources.
Jesus, that’s dark.
Sure, it may sound bad when children become homeless. But have you ever thought about how much money it saves? Just think of all the good things we can afford with all that money!
Like anti-homeless park benches. Or those little speakers that emit ultra-high-pitched sounds so that young people don’t … enjoy … existing somewhere or something, idk.
And just because I’m unable to actually satirize reality at the moment, yes, /s
Yep… there’s also a massive overlap with vulnerable groups like LGBT and disabled
LGBT
X to doubt
You doubt that people put their kids on the street when they come out as gay? Lol.
I don’t doubt that, I just forgot that lemmy is like 80% american and you guys don’t have any social security over there lmao.
Don’t ‘you guys’ me, I’m not from there either, lol. But yeah, good thing to keep in mind on here.
FYi readers, I don’t know the actual statistics on foster children who grow out of the system and how prevalent that is in the homeless population, but from what I know at least, particularly in my own time homeless, is that most homeless people are actually small families who live in their car or in someone’s garage.
I think we need to do a lot better to show what poverty really looks like in the USA, because we picture the media-spun image of America that we have a huge middle-class in nice suburban homes, and then there’s the “the poors” who are like, generic homeless dudes who are grizzled old bums warming their fingerless-gloved hands over a burning metal drum down in skid-row.
The reality of the distribution is the “middle class” in America is much, much smaller and more poor than most people realize. Most people who seem to “have it all” are in immense debt, and the larger percentage of families in the US are working poor, people who live in shared homes and apartments with too many other people, people who live in their car and go to work and school every day, people who live in motels and abandoned homes or who “Stay after work” to take advantage of the company showers before sleeping under the desk. These are not jokes or tropes or memes, this is really how many, many Americans live… in the wealthiest country in the world.
There are an incredible number of people with gym memberships for access to the showers.
Besides every van lifer on YouTube.
I’m pretty sure the whole “van life” trend started with homeless people documenting their humble lives in their vehicles, and the weird romance of having no responsibilities that attracts every child who had dreams of running away and riding boxcars across the country.
Now every “van lifer” is some white college kid with perfect teeth living on their parents’ dime while saying all you need for a happier life is this $90,000 RV that you can just drive up and down the coast getting high by beach bonfires every night.
When I see things like this it makes me so proud of my parents. They are the few people I know who do foster care because they care. They have actual love for every kid that ever walked through their doors. They have had so far 3 kids that moved back home at one point or another and for all 3 of them the only question They ever asked was “how soon do you want to move in?”
At the same time stuff like this hurts me because I always thought unconditional love was the standard growing up. The knowledge that most people didn’t / don’t have that is so sad.
Anyway on a side note I am going to call my folks and tell them how great they are.
I’m grateful for my parents as well.
Even worse a ward of the state loses ALL benifits permanently if they are convicted of any offense, guess how motivated social workers are to find an excuse? For anyone that’s never been through these systems when you spend a lot of time with a social worker, I’ve never been more clearly threatened more credibily by anyone my entire life. I told one that I needed help with child care and they said ‘‘you don’t want to tell ME that, if you’re having such a hard time watching your kids, maybe you need them removed by CPS, I can have an office over there before you get home if you’d like, or can you manage without talking to be about it?’’ Imagine being 18, right out of foster care, trying to get enployment or training through health and human services, and they know all they have to do is get you on any technicality and case closed. I know they’d get you a job with a van picking you up, and let police have a look at your ID and run it to find any lapse. Had a cop pull over a van with 8 people, never even talked to the driver, just demanded everyone in the van give over ID and, clearly targeting, went right for one guy and ‘‘found out’’ he had failed to report the job we all started that day to his case worker who set up the job assignment, and got him charged right there. The business we were hired by was furious, because apparently they’ve lost vital numbers of workers this way, and the social workers did this fairly regularly, also the amount of times they send you paperwork that gets to you on the 9th, and had to be turned in by the 8th was VERY precise and consistant. The welfare state isn’t about helping anyone, it’s about reducing the burden on the tax prayer by any means necessary. They do not care about getting you kicked out permanently. They want your case closed.
It’s because those orgs have been captured by their enemies, people that don’t want to help. They blame the people that need the services as being leeches, but they are the ones getting paid to fail at their jobs. They don’t want to see it succeed, they want it to fail so they can say how bad the system is.
Sounds psychotic, which is also what I come to expect.
When you have decades of Republicans putting poison pills into every law and passing bills that create as much disfunction as possible this is the end result.
Liberals are also to blame for gaslighting and selling workers out to the capital class for 50+ years. The last Democrat President that actually fought for the proletariat was FDR with his New Deal programs.
Yes, liberals were less evil than Republicans, but when Obama tried to give us universal healthcare they stabbed him in the back and when Bernie set multiple grassroot funding records, they conspired against him and stabbed the entire nation in the back. So if we factor in the opportunities for real leftist leadership that liberals stole from us than that opportunity cost is nearly as damaging as what Republicans are doing.
nearly as damaging
really? More BS false equivalence. The liberals where never in control enough to make any of that happen. They may not be perfect by any means but to say they’re “nearly as damaging” as the right is just ridiculous.
Convenient that when the GOP has a razor thin edge they get everything they want with almost no issue, but when DNC has a super majority they can barely get watered down health insurance reform.
That’s the difference between ethical governing and the unethical abuse of power.
If you want liberals to “get everything they want”, and ignore democracy, they’d have to do it unethically.
Wouldn’t it be better if everyone played by the rules, and governed like they are actually working in the best interests of voters?
The real problem is most of the DNC don’t want the things they say they do to get elected. They get the same conservative money the GOP does to be sure those things don’t happen.
Then let’s apply the same reasoning we did in November. Some unethical abuse of power is going to happen. Wouldn’t you rather it be less?
It’s a lot easier to get things done when you get to cheat while the other side has to play by the rules.
In the past the Democrats did good things for regular people.
Today’s Democrat party is incapable of doing good things for regular people. Literally no better than Republicans these days tho.
There’s no false equivalence in comparing two arms of the same Duopoly.
Literally no better than Republicans?
You’re either a troll or completely brainrotted
Yea… dems aren’t great and I’d love to see a new party. But, I do not understand people saying “the party that is bad at governing is basically as bad as the party taking over the nation through brute force.” Insane logic.
So when do the Dems step up and do something to fight back instead of shrugging while voting for fascism?
All Dems are voting for fascism?
The votes wouldn’t be passing if they didn’t vote for it.
So if I looked up how Republicans and Democrats vote, they’d be the same? The Democratic voting history would be literally no better?
This right here is my biggest fear for my daughter.
She’s lazy. She’s unfocused. She’s isolated.
She is one of the greatest artists I have ever encountered in my life. Bad shit seems to come with that. I am afraid that the world will never know it because she isolates almost completely.
Her mother died from breast cancer when she was 13. I have been so unkind to my body and I’m afraid I won’t be here long enough to help her the way she might end up needing it.
She has her step dad who has remained a big part of her life since her mom passed away. He’s a great man and she and her mother were very lucky that he’s the one she found. She can’t get along with any of her mom’s family. I believe that my wife would always look out for her, but I wish they’d get closer. Her mom made that hard by saying only days before she died, “If you replace me with that woman I will spend eternity rolling in my grave.”
I have survived in this world because of my mother and my uncle. Without them I would have been homeless over and over again. I wish she would get closer with her mom’s family. I can’t make her stay with them though. Her aunt takes her to school if she misses the bus, so maybe she’ll look out for her.
It keeps me awake at night more than anything else.
Has ADHD ever been ruled out? Cause being treated, this immensely increases the chances of a healthy and successfull adulthood…
We’ve been trying to get a diagnosis for a few years. Everyone seems to agree she has it, but they’re scared to medicate her because of my issues with addiction I guess.
We’re pushing the issue next week actually.
A someone who became middle aged with it (ADHD), not knowing what it really was or how it was affecting me, it is worth the effort.
They didn’t really prepare me for how much being medicated would change my life. Not that it cures everything, but I had to deal with a profound sense of loss for a few weeks after getting setup.
I found it really hard when I started to remember all of the missed opportunities and experiences that this condition had taken from me over the years. If ADHD is the cause or a factor, she will thank you later.
I wish my parents had got me help. The poor things couldn’t help themselves though.
I waited too late with my daughter really, but we had a lot going on for a long time. Her mom lost her mind and totally threw everything in the wind and then got diagnosed with cancer and suffered horribly before dying.
I’m hoping I can get her turned around now.
My doctor won’t treat me (I definitely have adhd)because I’ve been on suboxone for a decade and they’re afraid I’ll abuse it I guess. I could go somewhere else but starting over on this is a nightmare. He says if I tested positive he’d have to put me in rehab.
When I began I had to dose in front of a doctor every morning. That went on for several months, then I went once a week. That went on for several more months, then once every two. Several more months of that and finally once a month.
On top of that, I had to go to group three times a week and one group with an actual psychologist once a month.
I’d love to be able to use my brain. It has taken me over an hour to type this comment haha. I keep forgetting and then coming back by accident when I look at my phone.
I’m sorry you are going through that.
I didn’t think the meds for adhd were addictive to people who have it?
My limited understanding is that whereas they would make a non-divergent person “high”, they make me more calm, collected and able to sort my thoughts. Just like Caffine and sugar often makes me sleepy. It’s kinda opposite.
My Dr. Told me that if I had ADHD, I would know pretty quickly when I took my first, very small, dose because if I didn’t have the condition, I would feel like I suddenly had too much energy, or like my body was vibrating.
The only thing I noticed first was that I could recall what I had to do later that day, which would not be the case otherwise.
It’s still a worry in the world of recovery.
I know this about myself for sure. I used to do coke once a year. I’d buy a weekend supply and have a ball. Can’t do that today because of fentanyl.
Anyway. I was the only person in my group that could do a bunch of coke and sleep like a baby. I’d sit up and play shooters with more focus than I’d ever had and then I’d go to bed and get up and do it again the next day.
Probably related.
That certainly sounds like it. There is basically just a big ole list of indicators of having it and if you tick enough boxes, then welcome aboard.
On the bright side. I’ve also noticed that other neuro-divergent people seem to be my favourite to hang around with. Something about being halfway through describing a thought and the other person already gets it makes me happy.
No one should judge homeless people. It’s easy to judge being in a privileged position, but without having experienced bad shit yourself you should just shut the fuck up. Maybe help the less privileged, otherwise you will be judged by my.
I don’t think people judge them specifically, around me are a lot of scammers, making it very difficult to know who needs “help”
Yeah, there’s that too. A decade or more ago, our local paper ran an expose on the scammers, but they kept it reasonably constructive, giving equal space to strategies for identifying those in actual need.
For my teens, I kept it simple
- someone actively soliciting you in a high traffic area is likely a scammer
- someone sitting quietly, trying to “shrink” away from attention, whether they have their hand out or not, is more likely in need
That shouldn’t be a reason to ensure more money to go to the ultra rich while making the lives of the poor even more miserable.
But you can’t tell if they really need help. Look up the fake violin beggars. It’s very similar, panhandle all day, then go home.
What does that have to do with ultra rich?
Who said we’re making their lives more miserable?
The western world is heading towards the right, destroying social structures in governments. Increasing taxes for the poor, grocery costs, rent and house prices, stripping health care and education systems. While at the same time we ensure the ultra rich get more power and money and can continue not paying any taxes.
But your argument is also wrong. Just because you can’t tell who really needs help you don’t help anyone? Just because a car can have an accident you don’t drive at all? Do you think the street violin players are rich? In my city there’s an east European gang dropping off beggers at certain spots, forcing them to beg. It’s very clear who’s part of this organization and who’s a local homeless person. I always give our local homeless money or food. I volunteer at a venue where the homeless can get free coffee or tea and twice a week a free meal. I vote left, I live in a left city and I speak out for social structures and against nazis. Friends who are struggling financially I financially support, like my past holiday to Cambodia, 2 of my friends and I payed for the entire holiday of one of our friend so he could join us. Every bit helps, even the smaller ones.
I’m struggling in life as well, just not financially (PTSD). I get support from friends and the government. It helps me to live from day to day. There are people judging me, telling me “just have a different mindset”. These are people who never had a struggle in their life. They are completely lost when they ever hit an obstacle in life, but until then they don’t care about others who struggle and they judge them for “not making different choices” etc. “Why don’t you get a job and buy a house”, while this homeless person lives in a constant psychosis and can’t do anything else then play air guitar on the streets. Or because this guy won boxing championships back in the days which got him extreme brain damage, ending his career and putting him on the streets drowning him in alcohol and drugs. These are our most famous homeless persons, who have died in the past 3 years. But everyone has their own story and reasons for why they ended up in the fucked up position no one wants to be in. Even the beggers who are forced to work for this criminal organization. I feel sorry for them, I just don’t know how to help them because everything goes to the criminals who control them and keep their passports.
Just because you can’t tell who really needs help you don’t help anyone?
Please direct me to where I said this.
So people should give up their money to anyone who asks? I’m far from rich, I work hard for the little I have. I’m not giving it away just because someone asks. Charity begins at home. Of course I’d like to help more, there are a lot of things I wish were different, but I’m not compromising my life, financial safety, risking it for a stranger who I know nothing about. I’ve got people that depend and rely on me.
I’ve bought food for those that needed it, walked him right to the counter of a local taco place and let him order whatever he wanted. I’ve given away a duffle bag full of shit I just bought, specifically for a guy standing outside CVS in cold weather. I give away tools and equipment to neighbors that could make their life a little easier, but handing over cash to someone you don’t know that could be a scam? Why not just send your money to Indian call centers?
I’m gonna need a source on that second claim cause it doesn’t sound right
I think the second guy had it backwards.
Wikipedia (If you don’t like it, use it’s sources):
Nearly half of foster children in the US become homeless when they reach the age of 18
That’s still really bad though
That’s honestly worse.
Backwards as in “less than half” vs “more than half”.
Yeah that’s just the telephone chain effect (or whatever they call it).
1: Source says 45%
2: Guy reads source and says “nearly half”
3: Chap listens to Guy and says “half”
4: Dude listens to Chap and says “more than half”
5: Uni-Grad hears Dude and says “a significant amount of”
6: Media hears Uni-Grad and says “almost all”Backwards as in half of foster kids, not half of homeless people.
Ahh right. I didn’t notice that part.
Guess I should have read the image as carefully as your text.
between 2 and 3 there is a step that goes from “nearly half” to “roughly half” and that is what makes that jump easier you would also likely see that between 3 and 4.
however 2-4 are not needed because 45% is by most metrics a “significant amount”
Two time boomeranging failson here.
I tried Lord how I tried. I fell flat on my face trying to make it on my own. Actually did wind up homeless for a stint. If I didn’t have the option to crawl back home to lick my wounds, I’m not sure I would have made it.
That happens. I dated someone who worked in a group home for foster kids and they try to set a kid up with some place to live, like an AFC home after they turn 18, but sometimes they don’t have any options and get dropped off at a homeless shelter.
