Articles:The Government & Capitalism are NOT responsible for homelessness

From EveryonesHome.org.uk

You thought it was the Government and Capitalism that was responsible for homelessness? Sorry. There's only two sets of people responsible for homelessness.

There's homeless people.

Then there's people working in homelessness.

Between these two groups of people - all the problems of having people whom want homes but for reasons undefined cannot have them arise and so society looks in turn to these two groups to make a change.

Change.

That's Obama's word de jour I know - I'm sure he repeats it over and over in his mind whilst boffing his missus - but I notice one thing about "Change" - nothing changes.

George Orwell's writings of poverty in the book "Down and out in Paris and London" reminded me of the very same situation we find for the same number of people broadly proportionately here today - Orwell cites some 40-60 thousand people in the London 'spikes' - otherwise known as our modern hostels/foyers/shalters.

Today around 10,000 live in the London spikes of old, and 100 thousand more live in temporary accommodations under the watchful and reproachful eye of Big Brother.

Big Brother has many friends. Co-opted by their good intentions, religious or otherwise, these homeless helping well intentioned souls toil seriously and in love with the ideas of social justice, reform and progress.

Their literature hums with pleas of vicarious sadness and carefully restrained growls of political outrage.

The call for change is now in terms of 'everyman' - the scurrillous lie of the socialist - that we are all equal, and in duty to the other, that charity can be enforced and complete - even - democratically accountable and efficient, even solve the unsolvable problem for good.

But, they lie with every breath they take. Yet they are innocent. They lie because they have never had the mind or heart to know the awful truth. Your good intentions - your heart - your campaigning - your mind - your hands are all just little working soldiers - in the militarily ordered industrial machine that we all labour within - scared it will one day stop working, scared that we shall stop working for it, then it will stop working for us, and we shall have to start working for ourselves.

Unthinkable isn't it?

So to come back to the point - who's responsible for homelessness - you'd think it was the government, combined with business. Land - apportioned by the monopoly of government grant, finaglement, and sale - and property, leveraged, insolvent, ever changing ownership and ever escalating price above the common mans means. The Englishman's obsession with home ownership is the greatest lie of his lifetime - and the resignation to this state of affairs is the economic crime of history. First they stole our land. Then they stole our labour. They stole our capital with credit and now, in a sea of prosperous destitution, homelessness charities shift their focus from relief of the least fortunates burden to the middle class fears of 'hidden homelessness' or simple 'bad housing'.

These economic factors and inequalities have always been and will never go away with our current approaches and complacency, and the motivations of those whom perpetuate their existence and the manifold miseries created also in innocent, assume it is their place, their fortune, their role in the great pyramid of society to take from the low to give to the high for patronage and glory.

Homeless people are responsible for homelessness - homeless charities are responsible for homelessness - government and capitalism are NOT. They are the cause - but they bear no responsibility. They never have and I doubt they ever will.

Why else does government speak of 'intentional' versus 'unintentional' homelessness?

Shelter was established in the Seventies to be a voice of homeless people. I recently commented on the blog of the Chief Executive Adam Sampson - nothing warrenting censorship - but certainly challenging forthright opinions. Quelle suprise - once again I was unpublished.

Homeless people are incapable, naturally, individually or collectively even perhaps of ending the need for homelessness,

Homeless charities won't. They will raise the numbers on street counts. They will raise barriers and integrate with government in so far as it perpetuates their purpose. They will lie through their teeth as to good intentions and lamentations on the state of the world - and they will cut the pay and conditions of their staff and abuse the charity of both volunteers and donees alike.

This leaves one option untried. To truly blur the distinction between the homeless and the homeless charity.

How you do that - is what this site is about. Bringing it all together. Not so much to solve the problem. No. There's too many fingers in too many misery pies for the homelessness cash cow of charity, government, and corporate interest to be thrown out like so much rotten mutton.

But at least we can truly bring a democratic open source voice for people whom have been abused, thrown out, moved around incessantly and degraded by the systems of homelessness. At least we can in freedom analyse and rebuke the varied absurdities of our social system of transactions which caused our homelessness and vent our anger at the mendacity, ponderous complacency, simultaneous duplication yet paucity of practical help on the streets.

And at the very least - we can show - HOW to end the need for street homelessness, with a simple change in practise on the part of charitable, social, corporate and governmental institutions. As mental clarity and focus lifts the spirit - so the body must follow. And that's regardless of whether Jesus is your homeboy or not.