Lennie Austin
December 9, 2015
FCS 4840-001: The Disadvantage Family
Instructor Moyer
Book Blog #3
In
the third section of the reading The American Way of Poverty by
Sasha Abramsky was very intense. Sasha talked about the view that people have
on individuals that live in poverty and why individuals that are not in poverty
tend not to help them. During this particular part of the book, she makes
personal connections with poverty, to provide the readers with a different view
on poverty. For decades, there have been poverty but poverty early on was not
fully recognize. Many knew there was poverty but only a few recognized and did
something about it. In recent years, poverty have become very recognizable and
much more have been done about it. Before reading this part of the book, my
outlook on helping those in poverty that I did see, was mainly shaped by
society view on poverty and by others around me. Whenever I saw a homeless
individual, I was not eager nor jump to help them or give them money because my
view was they were going to spend it on drugs or alcohol, some were pretending
to be homeless just to get money from you, and when you do help them by giving
them food, they do not want it. These thoughts came from other people thoughts,
experiences, and from society perception. It was never my own. When I got out
of everyone else thoughts, I was able to create my own thoughts off my own
beliefs. The reason why other individual’s thoughts are a factor into people
perceptions and doing is because we as a nation put labels on things. We use
label on things to make it be what we want it to be. By society and many individuals
having the perception that individuals in poverty are going to neglect help, use
the help for negative behaviors, and it is being their fault that they are in
poverty, then poverty will never change and those that are in poverty would not
get the help they need. Instead of letting labels misjudge a situation, we need
to destroy labels and pay closer attention to what been in front of our eyes
for years. This part of the book really touched me because I can totally understand
where the author is coming from and the direction she is headed in. This part
of the book really helped me maintain my own eyes on events that are going on
in the world and helped me want to do more than what I was doing when it comes
to poverty.
Test Question: By society having stereotypes on
poverty, what do you think can be done to remove these stereotypes, so the
individuals that are in poverty can receive the help they need.
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