What is homelessness?

[Whitney (Psyduck) *BiscuitSenior]

I recently found myself in an argument over the above question. I had joined said argument midway. There were two sides.

Side One- Homelessness is a disease.

Side Two- Homelessness is not a disease.

Sufficed to say, I chose the latter. 

My argument at it's basics is this.
  Homelessness is not a disease, it is an effect. An effect caused by the choices a person makes in ones life.

The reasons to which a person is homeless are many, such as..
 Poverty, Lack of work opportunities, Housing, Addiction, and mental illness.

  After throughly yelling.. I mean explaining.. this to Side One He then a little later changed the way he worded his argument, to say that the majority, at least 70-80%, of homeless people are mentally ill or have some form of mental handicap.
 

  Once again I disagree quite fully.
As you can read here, http://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/who.html (yes I know the statistics are a little old) Mental illness does not even account for 30% of homeless people.

This has been stirring around my head for several days and I would like to know more people's views on this subject. Such as..

What have been your experiences with those who are homeless?

Have you ever been homeless?

Anything and everything y'all have to say on this subject I would greatly like to read about.


dftba 

[Whitney (Psyduck) *BiscuitSenior]

  Kurt. Apparently you didn't noticed where I corrected myself. Latch as well rephrased what he had said. Please make sure you read all that has anything to do with what you are responding to before you do so.

So, just to be clear now on what I meant.
  You are right. With the way I worded it, it did come off that way but I did not mean it in that manner. I meant a large portion. I was not meaning in the ranges of 70-80% or what not. I am fully aware, as I said before, that there are many other reasons for homelessness that are not caused by the choices in a persons life.
  That being said. Kurt, you say that what I said before "implied that actually DISEASES are NOT the fault of the person" Which you are also right on. Though, you are also incorrect. What I said may have implied that, it is clearly not what I meant. The manner in which you are incorrect is that disease and illness can very easily be caused by a persons personal choices like such as choosing to not wash your hands after being around an ill person, etc.

---

One last thing. "Do not change what I said?" Really, Kurt? Isn't the point of a debate to speak your mind and hear the opinions of others to in the end either change your own opinion, change others opinons, or come to some kind of agreement? I'd say changing what I said to better suit the truth and express my opinion is perfectly acceptable.

[Latch33570]

Kurt I think you were talking to me when you said that it was I who compared homelessness to a disease. If you are directing a comment to me put my name up there like I put yours so that I would know.

Nit wit the psycho who started this thread is the one who mentioned it and I was responding. Once I said that homelessness was caused by the choices. I then corrected myself and said that I should have said MOST homelessness is caused by choices people make. Just plain lack of planning and preparing. I cut and pasted an article from heritage.org to support my statements.

[CD]

I wonder how many of the choices made by people are by bankers and real estate agents?  And not just mortgagees running out of money,  tenants who are kicked out because their landlord doesn't pay the mortgage, or because the real estate agent is a fraudulent c**t  or otherwise?

And what about homelessness caused by decisions to not prosecute violent members of the household?  Or to fire a victim of workplace violence, rather than the offender?  Or because a person is of a particular ethnicity and won't get hired?  All of these things can cause a person to be homeless - because of other people's decisions.

[Latch33570]

Don't know how many. But I do know that most people just plod thru life. They don't plan for things to happen. In life doo doo occurs. One must plan for that. I did. Its a good thing too cause some doo doo happened to me.

[CD]

That's true but there are things you can't plan for. And things that make it virtually impossible to plan for anything else. 

Some doo doo buries people right at the beginning, and just keeps piling up until all anyone sees is a pile of shit, and not a person.  By that point, you'd be lucky to be alive, let alone on the street.

Your solution works for people who probably don't need to plan for doo doo cos it's falling on other people anyways.  Hence most people don't bother planning at all.

[Latch33570]

I agree CD. Some stuff you can't plan for. But most things you can.  Insurance and investing and not "shooting yourself in the foot" by having yunguns before you are ready. That stuff counts.

[CD]

I reckon we need more free condoms and less baby bonuses.  But that's not the only thing that's going to prevent homelessness, likely it won't make much of a dent at all.  And I'm sure there are people who have arisen from 'broken rubbers' too....just not sure how often I believe that story, lol

[Khadija]

I don't have personal contacts with people who are homeless, but I know that there are homeless people out there. I have never been homeless and I think I am blessed for that. Though, I have never literally been homeless.

Do you have a home when you don't feel home in the house? When you are abused or neglected?  When a family member dies? A house is not a home but a home is not a house either. Some people who are living outside just prefer to actually live outside. Just some examples.

There are so many paradigm's to look to. It is just what you choose to look at. 

[Latch33570]

I guess there are urban outdoorsmen for different reason.