Reaction to: “Homeless in a Pandemic-Stricken Chicago,” by Sarah Gelbard. “Chicago Reader,” January 14, 2022.
Ignoring the Topic at Hand
Perhaps this article is for spoiled rich people to read. But then, I guess what’s spoiled or rich is up to the perspective of the person interested in what’s going on here.
Like all Reader articles always, this one is mostly about the chronic homeless out there with the usual explanations and details of the world of persons without a roof. The articles focus on the gritty, on the rats, on the bugs, and on the addictions common among some—but of course not all—of the homeless in Chicago.
A couple times a year, the Reader shares the same sort of information because, well, it is time to talk about those crazy homeless folks again. Although there are thousands and thousands of homeless in this city, the Reader only tells us about persons with disabilities, evil landlords, drug issues, little hope, and of course little access to solutions.
What the reader is missing is that it is difficult to be homeless, many people know this, and the focus of their articles could be on solutions.
They never focus on solutions.
And they never realize (or will tell rich spoiled readers) that there are all kinds of homeless people. There is the divorced guy who is making the house payment for his three daughters and ex-wife so they have a place to live. There is not enough money for him to have an apartment. There is the young couple saving for a decent apartment and not able to afford it until the car is paid off this July. There is the young guy whose company just closed and he doesn’t know how to get unemployment payments… or a place to live, not knowing anybody in town. There is the immigrant—a professional—who cannot get a good connection with a new family after something happened with the original sponsors, there is the old man who sold everything and came here from Alabama, and there is the college student who still cannot find a job three years after getting his degree at UIC.
In short, there are thousands and thousands of homeless persons—all ages, colors, nationalities, backgrounds, income levels, neighborhoods, communities, and orientations.
There are senior citizens who do not qualify for xyz. There are teens who ran away from home so their parents would not harm them—or their dad would not rape them.
So no, the Reader folks do not focus on what you might expect—in this article or others.
But they could focus on solutions! The Reader is a powerful publication with a big readership. They could convene meetings. They could interview the mayor and many different persons in her office, experts who work for HUD and Heartland Alliance, and Rush, and… They could offer their assistance getting the word out about special new programs for the homeless. They could help by providing staff to go out and work with the homeless…find out who is coming to help them on a regular basis…find out what the homeless actually need. What kind of food? Personal items? Clothing?
What rich spoiled people think the homeless need is not in reality what is sought (“The Kinds of Items Homeless Persons Really Need,” July 20, 2020, Second City Teachers: Homeless Needs).
What the Reader and their collaborators could focus on is all of the programs offered that actually work. They could focus on urging the mayor to consolidate resources and data into a more centralized system. They could focus on the huge lack of coordination among service providers and the huge need to bring providers together to get homeless persons into housing.
There are many different housing solution models. There are many different agencies, offices, hospitals, and churches involved in helping.
In almost all cases, it is the homeless persons themselves who must navigate all the different protocols and rules to find their needed items.
What is the Reader doing to help the homeless with their needs? With getting the homeless into immediate short-term housing? This is a priority to the mayor, by the way, and she has a special program that is out there happening somewhere.
Are they helping the homeless get into longer-term supported housing? There are many ways to do this, all kinds of vacant housing in and near the city, several schools of social work in Chicago that could help, many hospitals and clinics and well the list goes on forever.
What is important to understand is that some homeless people do not want to live indoors, some do not want to work, and some do not want furniture, bills, troubles, or hassles. However, that group is a small percentage of the homeless population in Chicago. And that is important to understand, also.
By the way, it is not 3,000 or 4,000 people in the city living with no roof. It is tens of thousands. In fact, the number is greatly higher statewide. That is reality.
There are over 52,000 homeless children in Illinois. That is reality. I know about this figure because I wrote about it (“There are 52,000 Plus Homeless Children in Illinois:
Some Solutions for CPS Students,” October 14, 2020, Second City Teachers: Search results for 52,000).
Rather than showing a bunch of pictures of sleeping bags and desperate people, why not show some photos of people helping, the mayor overseeing the coordination of a real solution to the “homeless problem?”
The article in the Reader is supposed to be about the pandemic making it more difficult to survive as a homeless person in this city. Or at least that is what I hope the article is supposed to be about.
Notice the Reader never runs stories about how some aldermen encouraged police officers to harass the homeless by driving around during the first lockdown with these announcements blaring: “Go home, people. People, go home.” There were rumors of the city planning to arrest anyone walking down the street, forcing homeless people to go to shelters (a death sentence because the shelters were full of COVID-19 infected residents and employees) and not allowing non-violent criminals out of jail because the mayor was afraid they would be released “into a void.”
What did the mayor think the homeless were living in?
The pandemic has been deadly and distressing and dangerous for homeless people not just because of the nature of the illness. Instead, it is the city just as much—and more—responsible for destroying lives of the homeless.
We may never know how many homeless people died because of the virus or disappeared or were disappeared by the “powers that be” in Chicago.
The Reader missed a real opportunity to show the very wide range of homeless people in the city and explain how—no matter what kind of homeless persons are being discussed—they had a much tougher go of it because of the pandemic and the city’s rules and lack of interest in its citizens.
In a few months, it will be time to drag out the photos of the sleeping bags and give examples of the chronic homeless and the hardcore homeless and the people who try to help them. Including all the examples of tents, rats, viaducts, smells, and hopelessness just perpetuates the ignorance of homeless persons embraced by the average citizens (basically rich spoiled Chicagoans who read publications like the Reader).
People with working microwaves, doors that lock, cabinets to keep their wallets in. Refrigerators to keep leftovers in plus warm beds. Some even have that weird combination consisting of hot water and deodorant soap.
The rich look with disgust and pity at all those photos of tents and shake their heads.
“What are you reading, Ron?” asks Shelly.
“Oh, I’m reading about those silly homeless people who like to go camping. Who knows what they want? So sad.”
Spoiled and rich. The article helps keep them in the dark.