Tough Economic Times Call for Community Action

[deutsey]

About 10 years ago, I worked briefly in a small homeless shelter in Frederick, Maryland.

I remember thinking one evening as I looked out from the staff room to where our residents watched TV in the lounge that the televised images they saw must have seemed as alien to them as transmissions from Mars.

It was the late ‘90s, so the dot-com bubble was still inflating many Americans’ perceptions of endless prosperity while heralding a new faith in cut-throat corporatism. Popular shows like Who Wants to be a Millionaire and Survivor reflected these prevailing sensibilities while the persistently high homeless rate at the time barely made a footnote in the national narrative relentlessly promoted on TV sets around the country.

As I saw our homeless residents in the shelter’s lounge that evening watching commercials for shiny new luxury cars and SUVs, I wondered how they must have felt seeing the elusive promises of consumer bliss beamed into their impoverished reality night after night.

After watching an unsettling episode of Frontline recently, I think I may have an idea. Called “Close to Home”, the show “chronicles the recession’s impact on one unlikely American neighborhood -- New York’s Upper East Side.” http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/closetohome/


MORE at:
http://www.midshorelife.com/content/tough-economic-times-call-community-action

PS: I didn't have time to develop this the way I wanted to, but it gets across my main point.

[Ruby the Liberal]

1. I watched that the other day. Good documentary.

Thank you for working with the homeless. I wish more people could find the time. It really keeps one grounded in their priorities.

Going to read your full link now.

K&R