According to statistics provided by the National Alliance to End Homelessness (2020), every 17th out of 10,000 people suffers from the absence of a permanent residence. On the national scale, it means that in 2019 more than 560,000 have no place to spend the night. The personal experience suggests that ordinary people rarely empathize with the homeless and help them. In this speech, I argue that the assumption that the homeless are outcasts who do not deserve to live a normal life is wrong. It is hard to make a person who has a warm shelter understand what homeless people experience daily. Still, it is in the power of every person to help reduce the number of homeless on the streets of our city or at least improve the quality of their lives. To begin with, let’s talk about why people become homeless.
Some people find themselves on a street because they are alcohol or drug-addicted, and their addiction prevents them from getting employed and, hence, having money to pay rent. Nonetheless, not all of the homeless are addicted. Most of them have to spend a night on the street due to economic crises (Gilroy et al., 2016). A lot of businesses go bankrupt every day, and their employees lose their jobs and salaries. Additionally, it should be noted that big cities are overcrowded and their capacity to provide affordable housing is limited and, this way, fired people, employees with low income, or newcomers are at the risk of experiencing housing instability.
Besides, some people have no relatives and friends to rely on, and if they cannot get employed due to intense competition, they have no money to pay even the cheapest rent and, therefore, become homeless (Bakar, Zain, & Salim, 2018). Apart from the roof over the head and a piece of bread, these people need one more chance to change their life for the better. More than thirty years ago, Breakey (1987) conducted a study on treating the homeless and helping them recover. The author concludes that moral support is an essential feature of their rehabilitation program (Breakey, 1987). Indeed, it does not matter what circumstances made an adult or a young person homeless; everyone deserves a second chance to begin a new life from scratch.
The easiest way to help people who found themselves in such a situation is to become a volunteer in a homeless shelter or make regular donations to a charity organization that helps people who have no home. In 2020, in the US, there were almost 12,000 homeless shelters (IBIS World, 2020). Thus, it is relatively easy to find a shelter that needs the assistance of volunteers. In addition to that, at least seven organizations provide support and help to homeless people. Donating some money every month to a homeless organization would not affect the well-being of an average person who sleeps every night in a warm bed and starts a day with a nourishing breakfast. If one doubts that money will be used for the benefit of the homeless, it is possible to donate old but good-looking clothes or food that could be stored without a fridge.
If a person does not want to make any donations and become a volunteer, he or she still could do something useful for people in need. More precisely, it would be a good idea to inform shelters whenever you notice a homeless person. Calling special services to help such people will be a practical method to improve their lives. Undoubtedly, the workers of such services do their best to find people who live on a street. Still, sometimes they might not be in the right place at the right time to help a homeless person.
To conclude, it is essential not to forget about less fortunate people who have nothing to eat and nowhere to live. The behavior of such people is not always deviant. More often, people lose their homes due to unfavorable circumstances that are beyond their control. These people need help, and we can assist them via donations to charity organizations or doing a voluntary job in the shelters. As the Scottish trade unionist Sheila McKechnie put it in one of her speeches, “People who are homeless are not social inadequates. They are people without homes.”
References
Bakar, M. Z. A., Zain, R. M., & Salim, A. Z. (2018). The homeless life: a profile study in Penang. Indian Journal of Public Health Research & Development, 9(11), 1417-1422.
Breakey, W. R. (1987). Treating the homeless. Alcohol Research and Health, 11(3), 42-47.
Gilroy, H., McFarlane, J., Maddoux, J., & Sullivan, C. (2016). Homelessness, housing instability, intimate partner violence, mental health, and functioning: A multi-year cohort study of IPV survivors and their children. Journal of Social Distress and the Homeless, 25(2), 86-94.
IBIS World (2020). Community Housing & Homeless Shelters in the US – Number of Businesses 2005–2026. Web.
National Alliance to End Homelessness (2020). State of Homelessness: 2020 Edition. Web.