Those aren't humanitarians, those are enforcers for the bourgeoisie who don't want to have to look at poor black people every day.
One of our strategies is outreach, the kind described in this article. The reason we do aggressive outreach is because many of the homeless have been burnt by their past shelter experience so they are resistant to any offers of housing. Obviously, we cant force them to accept housing. But we go to the homeless, day in and day out, and offer them help and its done in the most benign way.
We do target other areas of Manhattan and Brooklyn. There are teams dedicated to each neighborhood and one by one, we hope to house the homeless.
If you are curious, you can learn more at http://www.commonground.org
Myself and many others like me are thankful for the work you are doing. Keep it up!
But I think the point is valid: a lot of work to help "the homeless" is ultimately motivated more by removing eyesores and eliminating guilt-trips than actually helping people. Out of sight, out of mind.
And yes, I know it's human nature, but that doesn't make it right.
The city government, city council, and general people are more interested in removing eye-sores and guilt trips. But by and large the aid workers are genuine - heck, they are the only people who seem to perceive the homeless as people.
So the question is, who are these aid workers working for - if they represent the city directly, then yeah, I'd be inclined to call shenanigans. If they represent an apolitical aid organization though, I'd be hesitant to make that accusation.
Part of the complexity of the situation is that a lot of the homeless have severe mental illnesses, and many are dangers to themselves because of it. This is why I don't immediately jump to the "enforcer" conclusion - it may very well be that the social workers are trying to get him to a place where his mental illness may be treated.
Personally I'm against efforts by cities to simply get the homeless out of sight - I think most people in society sorely need a daily reminder of just how lucky they are, and how much they are not doing to lift up those around them. Let the ugliness and ills of the city shine openly, it's the only way we will ever be compelled to fix them.
I guess it was just the tone of the article, how they were focusing so much on Times Square, with nary a mention of homelessness in other parts of the city. One contented homeless guy isn't a bad thing - good job. Check on him every few weeks, and move on to people who really do need help. And who might not be in such a prominent location.
christian missionaries are completely well intentioned, but its still proselytization as is this...
would you like jesus in your life? no? what about now?
Vis-a-vis your OT remarks:
Man A (to Suicidal man on a ledge): Would you like to come down now?
Man B: No
Man A: What about now?
...
A: Don't jump!! Come down! We want to help you! B: No thanks I actually live up here, and wasn't planning on jumping... A: ....Don't jump!! Come down! We want to help you!
At one point does it become clear the guy isn't actually going to jump? 10 years? 15? 50?
my jab at christian missionaries was a metaphor that i guess just makes sense to me, but basically was trying to illustrate that often those who look like they need help dont, and often to the response to "no thanks i dont need help" is (especially from missionaries) "oh, you just dont get what im offering, here let me explain."
Apologies for the off-topic.
Not only is the majority of missionary work well intentioned, but missionaries have a complex first-hand understanding of social problems small-scale and large-, and can do an incredible amount of good. (I say this as a steadfast athiest.)
Christian missionary work has in the past, and sometimes continues to have, an ugly side. But unless you have some direct experience with what spending a lifetime trying to help people at an individual level is like, your blanket condemnation is neither useful nor appropriate.
Anthropologists and the other two are very different...anthropologists mostly don't raise social movements. In fact even having their actual presence known in the field is mostly considered a downside as it affects the way people act (longer discussion not for here). Anthropologists are studiers, primarily interested with understanding and interpreting the world for others to act on. I don't think they belong in this discussion.
Marxists and Christians absolutely have a TON in common. I will agree on that. I don't blanket condemn anyone who isn't pushing their views along side with the help they give. I do have very direct experience with a wide variety of Christians (from Catholics to Greek Orthodox to fundamentalist Presbyterians) and many of them did some sort of mission work. The vast majority of it had little to do with religion, but without fail they all prayed with the people they were helping and helped work towards some greater mainstay of Christian faith in the area (usually working on building some Church, repairing some Church). Unfortunately I think missionary work is inextricably about the broader goals, and it's not as clear cut as you make it out to say you are helping someone - this is a slippery slope to cultural imperialism.
I obviously don't have any issue with feeding people, and helping them rebuild after disaster (widespread like war, or personal like homelessness), but take a nation like Korea. Before Americans came in it was almost entirely Buddhist. After the Korean War the Americans came in and said "hey we'll help rebuild your nation, just let us build this Church." In many cases the first generation (those who made these deals) paid little mind to the Churches, but the second generation was completely culturally slaughtered. South Korea now has a thriving economy and is between 35 and 40% fundamentalist Christian. It is now culturally necessary to be Christian in many cases to be in the upper class (the wealthy social networks are mostly Christian). So look what the trade off there was in terms of culture for stability.
Is it not possible to understand that such a thing could happen on a personal scale as well? There is no moral ambiguity about feeding someone who is starving, there absolutely is when you package that food with your beliefs. You force them to compromise themselves, and I think that's neither useful nor appropriate.
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In response to this second comment:
In the places I have any experience with full of desperately poor people, the outsiders who decide to settle down, whatever their official institutional ideology, mostly care about helping people, at an individual level.
> this is a slippery slope to cultural imperialism.
I’m somewhat skeptical about this. In the places with the most severe cultural imperialism – for instance, Latin America – said imperialism was done in the name of god and the king, but was at root much more about material advantage and personal self-interest (read: theft) than salvation, the latter being mostly a convenient rationalization.
Today, pretty much everywhere in the world has been under the “cultural imperialist” influence of the west, linked by a globalized economic system.
Moreover, I think you oversimplify in suggesting that Christianization is just a mechanism for hegemony. I don’t know much about Korean culture or religious diversity, but from your description it sounds to me like Korean elites seized on Christianity and bent it to their own ends, quite independently of the missionaries who had brought it there. At the same time, Korea was industrializing and urbanizing full speed, building an export-led factory economy. We could speculate about what the power structure would be like in Korea if the population had remained entirely Buddhist, but it’s not as if feudalism would have survived, and I don’t think the outcome can be blamed on Christian missionaries without likewise indicting centuries of Western technological advances, foreign bankers, American consumers, and the rest of the prevailing world economic system. (And Koreans of all stripes, too.) In short, it’s complicated.
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For what it’s worth, I also find packaging aid to desperately poor people with religious ideology to be distasteful/awkward and agree that it is potentially abusive.
"For what it’s worth, I also find packaging aid to desperately poor people with religious ideology to be distasteful/awkward and agree that it is potentially abusive."
This was my main point and we agree :)
They are in fact the parasites of the bourgeoisie, getting sweet salaries from a bankrupt, overtaxed city while pretending to be performing a good deed.
Why must some people make everything about race?
Source: www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL30442.pdf ("By race, the homeless population was estimated to be, on average, 49% African-American, 35% white, 13% Hispanic, 2% Native American and 1% Asian.")
Using the phrase "poor people" instead of "poor black people" is equally effective -- more, actually, because "poor black people" makes you wonder why the hell it matters that they're black -- and has the virtue of not perpetuating (many) people's unconscious associations of "black" with "poor".
I mean, I bet these guys only help homeless people because, while they're out on the streets doing that, it's a convenient opportunity for kicking puppies . . .