Three words sum up Pam Elgar’s experience participating in the Lifewise Big Sleepout fundraiser: “Challenging but amazing.”
The Lifewise chairperson was one of about 60 people who gave up their warm beds and homes to sleep outside on cardboard last week to raise awareness of homelessness.
[…] “Some of the takeaways for me was the clear messaging that they didn’t just arrive there because of one incident. There were several incidents that slowly had this impact on their life and… one or two incidents can take your life completely off track.”
Chose booze and meth over paying rent, got kicked out, family had a gutsful…
[…] “I was also really aware of the privilege of having a manufactured experience and not the reality of having to sleep on the street,” Elgar said.
Well most of us don’t even have the “privilege” of larping as bums.
Oh, and what about the half-empty cartons of Cody’s? The burnt meth pipes lying here and there? I mean, you have to at least be a little bit realistic.
“I went to bed with food in my stomach and I was gonna get up to a meal. I knew I had security, both from AUT and from our own staff who were checking on us throughout the night to make sure that we’re all OK, as opposed to a woman sleeping rough and having the sheer terror of maybe someone being violent or accosting them.”
In other words what you did was no different from lining up overnight for a Taylor Swift concert.
[…] “I don’t think there’s much choice about being homeless,” she said. “Another message the speakers all gave was, if you want to solve the issues of homelessness, then you need to solve the issues of poverty.”
Oh, but there is.
Here’s the elephant in the room. The vast majority of homeless are alcoholics. For alcoholics booze comes first – ahead of responsibilities, family etc.
And, speaking of family, you might be asking how come their families don’t help out. They do, but even family get to the point where they’ve had enough. It’s like trying to save someone who’s drowning. The last thing you want to do is dive in the water. They’ll just drag you under with them.
And sure, there are homeless who aren’t alcoholics and find themselves homeless because of bad luck. But these people are usually homeless for a very short time.
[…] “It was an education event, as well as a fundraiser. I am really grateful for the people who turned up and wanted to listen and wanted to seriously learn and find out what they could do differently.”
The Big Sleepout raised funds for Lifewise’s Merge Café on Karangahape Rd, which supplies food and social services to rough sleepers. So far the event has raised $172,641.
As a reminder, the target was $500k.
Here’s my solution. Make homelessness illegal if it isn’t already and, most importantly, enforce it. Get them off the street and into court. Give them a choice. Either clean up and we will give you all the help you need or you can just fuck off somewhere else.
At least then we won’t have to put up with the smell of piss and the sound of “Got a dollar, bro?”
