These past two weeks, we’ve seen three discussions, that have remained largely apolitical, surrounding the question of the extent to which society should make decisions for those who cause themselves harm. If it were only black and white, right?
On January 8, I posted the news that Governor Tim Kaine has proposed a statewide smoking ban. All 98 comments are interesting, but I’m pulling two. Andy contributed:
Parents who smoke around, or take their kids to smoke infested places should be prosecuted. People who have no choice must be protected. I also believe child endangerment laws should be passed for parents that feed their kids fast food all the time making them enormous at ten years old.
To me, it’s the same as starving or beating your kids. I have none by the way.
TheUpstart followed:
I lived in two cities during similar movements… people swore business would be hurt by the bans, but it actually improved. People who weren’t routinely eating out started to again. Smokers started congregating outside restaurants and socializing (remember the little smoker circle outside the dorm or dining hall in college?). I actually heard a word for smoker circle flirting on TV the other day: smirting. I imagine servers and other restaurant staffers were happier, too.
On Tuesday, Thor posted a news piece about a possible trans-fat ban in Virginia public school meals. The comments were all poignant, and the magic rat and TwoOFour, in particular, led the discussion. Wrote TwoOFour:
In Northern Europe it has been proven that popular demand can and will change the way the major food producers produce their food products. For instance you would be hard pressed to find a non organic milk in the dairy isle in a grocery store in Denmark, and that is not due to the fact that non-organic milk was outlawed. We can change the products that are fed to our kids by voting with our wallets.
On Wednesday, Floozy contributed anecdotal evidence of the obesity epidemic– her experience at the Golden Corral buffet with her sweet midgets. Wrote Flooze:
Speedo clad fellow was in a wheelchair (cue Ma Humps) but it certainly didn’t stop him from getting around the dessert buffet. I half expected Sears to pull up and do a quick tire change at one point, as he went in for his fourth plate of some vile sticky pie, each one covered in a gallon of whippy cream… I started to wonder if he had inadvertently eaten his own leg one night during a frenzied fried chicken extravaganza.
We’ve got another one for you. On Thursday, the Washington City Paper ran an expository piece about Carson Warner, a Buckingham resident who was the recipient of a publicly funded new home. It is a good story because it is a complex one; the ambiguity of his health and financial security really confound his perceived need. So interesting. It’s long, but a speed-read would suffice.
So, continuing our much-appreciated trend of not getting too political, I ask you: does this man “deserve” a home, and what qualifies “deserving”?
Popularity: 5% [?]
Tagged as: Central Virginia, Questions, Real Life
Well, first off I’ll say that I don’t think you can judge whether someone ‘deserves’ anything or doesn’t related to social issues without getting political - it’s just the nature of the discussion (in my mind).
I think there is more possible conversation in comparing who deserves what (and when), not if this man deserves a home specifically. Things are the way they are - people get lots of things they don’t deserve and lots of people don’t get things they do deserve.
All of that is nice and non committal, so I’ll throw in my short answer as well for the sake of just answering the question: no.
Lilith, I just read it and was doing okay until the end where they said they went out and spent $2000 (they don’t have) on new furniture. This made me spit my tea over the keyboard. Whoever gave them credit should fire their underwriters.
He stated that they furnished their house on credit 33 years ago and that precipitated a life of bill collectors and fiscal misery. Groundhog Day anyone? No money?… git your ass to yard sales and scour classified ads.
On the one hand, I think we should let this man have his 54″ TV and his xbox–what other enjoyment does he have in his life? I can hardly comprehend the misery of being poor in a rural area. It’s embarrassing that in the United States, in 2008, we have people trudging back and forth to an out door, contaminated well to get water, so if a non-profit wants to try and set things right, that’s fine. On the other hand, how long will these houses last if the people are not given the education to manage their lives from here on in? They’re already setting off on the wrong foot with the $2,000 furniture purchase.
In other words, I don’t begrudge these people their new houses, but I’m annoyed that people are able to get to that point of misery in the first place.
I like the comments at the end of the story, specifically the one about doing a follow-up story a few years from now about how these new houses will be falling down around them. You toilet doesn’t work so you go out and buy a big-screen tv? Your furnace breaks so instead you pay $10 a day for kerosene? Your well is contaminated because the pipes under you house leak, but you won’t fix the pipes or go shit in the woods away from the well? These folks clearly don’t hate the conditions in which they lived enough to actually do anything about them. I spent 18 months living in a one-room shack down by the rail-road tracks in Woolen Mills/Hogwaller (I’d like to think I was something of an urban legend, but probably not) with no electricity/running water, and I’d have resented most forcefully any attempt by an outside agency to ‘fix’ my life. On top of it all, this moron goes out and drops two grand on a new couch/loveseat combo? He might as well have ended the story with a “Thanks for the tax money so I can sit on my ass, suckas!”
HD…. so that was you that came and took a crap in my yard every night for 18 months?
Now that’s just plain wierd
H-D writes
And the mystery deepens
Hey Sil…. if you report a death you lose the benefit check. Dillwyn folk have cadavers stuffed in closets all over town.
Creepy assed place…
Silmo @6, great catch! How terribly awkward for everyone. Did you guys catch this? Read the first article:
http://cvillain.com/?p=772
I’ve heard these arguments before - and I have been guilty of thinking the same things. Everyone deserves a home. I don’t care who you are or what decisions you made in your life. Look at our own decisions - how much have we spent on drinks, dinners, wines, etc. By us I mean every one of us reading this site. We are mostly young urban hipsters who supplant the misery in our own lives with pretty trivial things. Don’t be so quick to judge because we have jobs and health that afford us luxuries AND a stable home environment. Granted priorities are a bit off for some people - but that crosses the boards. I know people who blow more in coke than I spend for a month of groceries.
And by coke I mean c-c-c-c-c-cocaine! (to quote Dr. Roxo, rock and roll clown)
This guy, in his one moment of bargain-hunting brilliance, found a used trailer for $3,000 (just slightly more than he’s now willing to spend on a couch, kind of ironic?) but became discouraged when he found it would cost another $3,700 to move it and set it up. Wouldn’t this organization have been better off spending the $6,700 (or better yet, just the $3,700 move/set-up cost) to provide this guy with a home he’d be perfectly happy with, rather than spending at least 10 times that much on a brand new one? Wouldn’t they be better off helping a lot of people a little bit rather than making a handful of folks feel like they’d won the lottery?
Just finished the article and I am confounded on so many levels…actually on every level. I DO think credit counseling or fiscal handholding or a declaration of financial incompetence was in order. With 2k worth of furniture bought on credit, I fear this family is back on the road to financial ruin. Sad really. And what of their daughter, surely not learning what she needs to succeed in the world; the cycle continues
h-d re:12. I do agree.
I agree H-D, somewhat. Would you wager that he’d be able to ask this same nonprofit for more money in a year when the shitty $3000 trailer starts having the same problems his old one did? That the new place they built for him will last 10 times as long and have a fraction of the problems? I’d be willing to put good money on the fact that this would save everyone money in the long run. I do agree that it would be better helping a lot of people - but you want to help get people on their feet - not help them get through just till next month.
Here’s a ? from a foreigner… how do you qualify for social housing here?
The only upside to this is that this family has a secure, stable roof over their heads. This article seemed to be written from a certain perspective - and I didn’t like it. The author tried to be objective but I don’t know how the bit about his TV and car and DVDs, etc were relevant to this guy getting a new house from the nonprofit. The only reason he put that in there was to try to steer people in a direction of distate for this guy getting his own house. That left a bad taste in my mouth about a warm hearted event.
“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for life”
Chinese Proverb
Unless of course he bought his fishing pole on credit from Rent-a-Center who are going to repo it at the end of the month because he didn’t make his payments.
”That left a bad taste in my mouth about a warm hearted event.”
Happens to me all the time
Backatcha Byo
The only social housing plan I’m aware of is the Section 8 program, which apparently is not accepting new applications. Even the residences at Friendship Court (née Garrett Square) are privately leased with rents subsidized by the gubmint, I think.
True enough Floozy, true enough. Don’t forget about rent-a-center taking advantage of its customers and encouraging the repo by charging outrageous and unreasonable interest rates. But that’s another post. Who knows. Maybe having a secure place to live and one that isn’t riddled with stress inducing problems will ease this guy’s health problems (and stress) a bit and give him a little perspective? Perhaps that’s unreasonable too. I just think that giving this guy a chance and a home is worth far more than the money it cost.
cbob RE: 17 - that’s good writing in my mind, playing off of what he/she perceives to be people’s buttons while still playing the obvious ‘unfortunate’ card of the situation. You read it as a warm hearted event, others pick up more on the references to TV and other spending habits and get pissed off. A good pick up by lilith regardless - has made for some interesting dialog.
Re 19: Flooz, Hey Im a vegitarian. We don’t leave a bad taste in the mouth. Ive been told many times. Ask around, you’ll see.
/end threadjack
cbob, the problem is when something goes wrong (lets say the water heater breaks?) this guy goes out and buys an X-box?!? then heats water in the microwave!?! He’s spent 50+ years of his life acquiring NONE, ZERO, NADA of the skills necessary to survive in this world? There are plenty of people I feel charitable towards, but someone who suffers from financial stupidity on an almost inconceivable level, along with occasional, infrequent dizziness doesn’t qualify. His trailer should have been condemned and his daughter taken and placed in foster care. That he could be as irresponsible as he clearly was with A CHILD is practically criminal.
@23 unless you eat asparagus
Wow… you are right Byo… all the guys I asked said you taste just fine and dandy (although one muttered something about you having a touch Gorgonzola knob when the city water was off for 2 days)
Oh and is a ‘vegitarian’ just a vegetarian who is a git?
cbob… you sound like a very nice person.
gMonet: good writing for an EDITORIAL, maybe. Not a news feature.
And yeah this is a good topic of discussion. There were some pretty hateful comments on the article itself. It’s good that people are at least thinking about it - one way or the other. It’s easy to look the other way.
PS I enjoy how regardless of what is being talked about here this site’s crowd always seems to find a way to insert a Gratuitous sexual reference (e.g. taste differences between regular and vegetarian sex juices). Very naice.
Thanks Floozy. You may know me.
I have to say (thankfully) that now my name and Gorgonzola knob can now be googled together. Of course, so can yours and b’yo. His may already have been, I’m not the one to verify.
Silmo speaks truth. Asparagus is the enemy. The Hero? Pineapple.
Set you up for that floozy. Im beginning to feel like a bowling pin.
Least Im not the one with the spellcheckered past.
Cbob…. there is nothing like a good Googling, that’s for sure. We are now inextricably linked for eternity, or at least as long as cVillain archives exist… I think that’s brill.
@28 gMonet, glad I could be help
gMonet… we also do Bar Mitzvahs, Weddings, Funerals and greeting card poems. You can specify your preferred secretion/body fluid and we do the rest. Makes for a good living… might get me out of this leaky trailer one day. Now if it’s okay with you I have to go Tivo Days of Our Lives before Maury starts.
gMonet, Thor passed it on to me. He knows I like taking on serious stories, and watching them get splattered with spooge in the comments.
I don’t have an opinion about this one at all, actually. Way too much ambiguity. It’s hard to gauge how physically/mentally ill this man is. I’m probably with patience– I’d rather see a society where it doesn’t get to this point. But I really do like capitalism, and we get the bad with the good.
Admit it, lilith. It’s the invisible hand that does it for you, right?
Ahem. Welcome to the internet!
Beautiful…funerals I’m sure is a nice touch. You gotta have dreams, Flooz. Maybe you should buy a sweet ass computer and start your own website, you know, book listings and shows, maybe even start a blog or shit. Might need to unplug one of the flat screens first though, don’t want to trip the breaker.
I’m curious about this scene Thursday @ Crush…
Well then you must come and be sure to bring your paintball gear
I thought we agreed it was Pink Panther splooge? I love that word and am going to use it for ever. My old favorite ‘jism’ has been replaced.
OT: Anyone know any more about thistory about Milan Indian Restaurant? Blurb:
Whoops. Bad linkage. Here:
http://www.c-ville.com/index.php?cat=141404064434008&ShowArticle_ID=11432101083899779
Never eaten there, but the parking lot is always full o’ cars.
If this community is mostly family, you would think they could all pitch in to help each other out, instead of living in complete laziness. If all he’s suffering from is occasional dizzy spells, maybe he shouldn’t be driving, but he somehow found the strength or help to get the TV in his house and the 2×4s under his chair.
In this guy’s defense, he didn’t seem to be too upset when they almost didn’t get the new house. I would be really get upset if this guy had, at any point, said that he “deserved” the new house. He knew he was getting a handout and was grateful for it. Grateful enough to pretty it up with some new furniture.
And people who can’t afford to feed and clothe themselves, should not be allowed to procreate.
Flooz, happy to expand your vocab.
Stanley, I swear I can feel it. Gives great backrubs.
Good article. Good to once again read the sometimes oblivious and classist thought process of the snooty, privileged half of Charlottesville.
Time for me to play The Bitch again. Bring it.
A. This man didn’t ask for a goddamn thing. It was offered to him. What fool wouldn’t take it? His floor was gonna cave the fuck in any day; what kind of husband and father and representative for other family members would say “No” to someone offering them new houses? It’s a gov’t program set aside for people without running water, so if he didn’t take it, someone else in Alleghany or Rockingham would have. Hipster, you say you lived in your shack for 18 months, did you take note of how many *years* this family has lived on the edge? This family was maintaining, man. If this lady hadn’t come over, Warner and his kin would’ve probably lived just like this until they died, man. Surely you see that? Don’t differentiate yourself too much from Warner. Cuz there’s some other family out there who didn’t get this chance, and they’re going to end up living in some shack in some small town, maintaining the best they can until they die in that shack.
B. Our tax money has got to be used for something, why not this? It’s his tax money too. He gets to use it, just like I get to use taxes for my public education. And just like you get to use yours for your kids’ education. And developers get to use for tax breaks when they build apartments. And utility providers get to use for tax breaks when they give US water, gas, electricity, phone and internet. Taxes we all share when we swim in the rec center, enjoy Fridays after Five, call a cop or use the parking garages, parks, streets, highways and sidewalks. Why not use it to help a family living in a house that could literally fall over any day? The families assisted by programs like this are more important a natural resource than any lake or interstate or tax break for a developer.
C. It’s different being poor and on your own vs poor and with a kid. You ride the rails and squat with your kid, then your kid’s gonna get taken away. Having a kid means you can’t wait a month or two being cold while you save up for a new furnace. Having a kid means that kid needs warmth NOW and if you got $10 now you don’t save it you spend it on warmth NOW. I’m not saying this guy’s a good budgeter. Warner even admits this. [With the average American household being $30,000 in debt, who among us can say we’re a land of good budgeters?] But we all know damn well that Rent-A-Center and its ilk will gladly sell you a 1000-dollar TV for a mere $10 a week. Of course, it’ll end up costing you $2000 in the end. Yet another way richer people pay less and poor people pay more for things in this world.
D. All of you motherfuckers reading these words and who have never had any debt in your life RAISE YOUR MOTHERFUCKING HANDS, and proceed to throw your stones at these Dillwyn sinners.
@ 43
RE: Milan
I have eaten there and it’s the wierdest Italian food I’ve ever had
having just read 46, 47 seems somehow out of place
Here here Uvalagrape. I couldnt have said it any better. Although it isn’t our tax dollars that paid for his house - it was a nonprofit that paid for it. It was not the ‘gubmint’ or whatever other pointedly classist word was used earlier. Gobbler I hope that you’re never in need of help or struggling. I am guilty of taking what I have for granted, but I am always aware of how close I could be to being on the streets. I lose my job? My parents die and mismanage their estate? I am seriusly injured without health insurance? Luckily I am single, relatively put together, and have a college degree, and I could sleep on a friends couch or get a new job pretty quickly. Not everyone has these options - and before you go making blanket statements take a second to think about that. You don’t have to disagree or tell me I’m right. Just THINK about your position. The warm bed you sleep in. The non-leaky roof over your head. Not trying to be a downer, it’s just something that is on my mind a lot.
Silmo…. LMAO….
UvaGrape… your anger management therapist asked me to tell you that if you miss your 67th appointment in a row, he is going to have to give your timeslot to Trashworth. Can you call to confirm. Please.
cbob:
“Warner Place was an ambitious project for the agency. SERCAP had been around since 1969, and had always built houses one at a time. This time, it would try to win a *Department of Housing and Urban Development Community Development Block Grant* and build all the homes at once.”
Non-profits don’t give money, they gather money and do the legwork. Other than that, your posts have been da bomb.
GRAPE: Good to have you back. I think most of the comments were pretty fair toward these folks (Gobbler excepted), and I agree with what you’re saying - particularly about taxes. I think Hipster and others do make valid points re: spending choices and efforts made/not made to repair their home. But the fact is some people are - due to some combo of mental, psychological, and physical limitations - unable to make sound decisions. I know otherwise solid adults who just make stupid choices. What’s needed is a better way for us as a society to deal with these issues so they don’t arise. Financial management classes in schools being a good start. Let’s not forget that at one time this couple was fully employed (albeit at rock bottom wages) and living rent free. Seems there only expenses were food, cars, and utilities. Hard to believe that they didn’t have enough to remain solvent. My feelings of sympathy and desire to see these people receive help doesn’t obviate the need to assign blame where it is due; particularly when it is evident that this couple haven’t learned the lessons they need to keep them from falling back into ruin.
Oops. Fuck. Thank you for correcting me UvaLagrape. I knew there was a reason I got a C in AP Government. I always figured it was ’cause we spent senior year (right before the 1996 elections) swiping every Bush placard from every neighborhood we drove through and posting them all in our teachers yard at 2am. There must have been 50.
But is that vandalism? Shoulda gone with the well… you know.
Floozapalolla:
The path of the righteous girl is beset on all sides by the inequities of the snooty and the apathy of evil yuppies. Blessed is she who in the name of charity and goodwill shepherds the weak through the Valley of Shenandarkness, for she is truly her brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children.
But She will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy her brothers!
AND YOU WILL KNOW MY NAME IS LAGRAPE WHEN I LAY MY VENGEANCE UPON THEE!
oh pickle!
Wait.
Am I a “snooty” a “weak” or a “poisoner”?
Hell, probably all three.
Uvagrape… I’ll take that as a ‘no’ then?
I’d say you got a C in that class because Bush (neither of them actually) didn’t run in 1996. That was Bob Dole’s year, if you’ll recollect correctly.
Ha! Maybe I should just stfu right now. omg. lol. wtf.
Wow HD…. a fellow pedant and champion of all that should be accurate. Good call… xx
Cbob… you have been unearthed as a liar and are thus most likely a police informer. Are you humming a Black Eyed Peas tune perchance?
Don’t worry, cbob, I won’t ask you for help, or any of my family or friends, I’ll just wait for some non-profit agency to get a gubmint loan to bail me out. or….
I’LL GET OFF MY ASS AND DO IT MYSELF!
That’s good Gobbler. Let me know how bailing yourself out of $50k in hospital bills goes without being able to work a job. And Floozy I am a compulsive liar. It’s easier on the internet cause you can’t see my shifty eyes and nervous tic.
cbob….You say you are a compulsive liar, but should I believe you?
Ummm…. no? Shit…
Cbob …So that means yes
I love everyone. I think we should all get paid the same wages, live in the same size houses and be allotted the same amount of food everyday, regardless of whether we work or not.
I’m not witty enough for this site. I don’t think I have the stamina to keep up. You guys are tough. Tough like nails. I should stick to my day job - making pins at the grenade factory.
LaGrape, I take issue with
muchsome of what you write in comment #46.Just because ‘Rentacenter’ will sell you a $1000 tv on credit for $10 a month (probably more like 100) does that mean its ok to have two of them but no working toilet? Apparently this family had enough dvds to shingle their roof with them, but preferred the waterfall effect? I don’t begrudge this family their good fortune in having a mis-guided non-profit shower them with mis-directed state funds (why are water quality $$s being spent on a new home rather than a new well??). We truly live in a land of opportunity where anyone can succeed with just a nominal amount of effort. If these folks had turned off Maury Povich and worked on increasing their skill-sets I don’t think things would have gotten to the point they did, but they seem to be more interested in being entertained than educated, so I have little sympathy for them.
I’m not all about getting down on Warner though. Here he is, with an unknown sickness that limits his ability to work, lifelong debt, probably got new medical debt, a daughter that needs to be fed, and probably a strong case of depression on top of it all…and he’s maintaining. This brother is struggling, but maintaining. Everybody’s eating and warm. And so what if he chose a library of DVD’s and video games instead of books.? He is American, after all.
And he has learned lessons. He has learned America’s number one consumer lesson: that corporate America will always be willing to give you credit…at a profitable rate, of course. So the furniture store is going to let him pay a few bucks a week for some new stuff. That gets him his stuff now, with free delivery, not in 2 years when he’s saved up enough to buy it outright. And yes, they will charge him an exhorbitant interest, but is the bank going to give this man a low-interest loan? Fuck no! The bank don’t give you money unless you got it already and everybody knows that. This dude can’t go to his relatives for money or a co-sign like you can because his relatives are all poorer than he is.
So there you are, faced with a choice that doesn’t seem so hard because everyone else in the world is doing it; so why can’t you? Everybody’s in debt, even rich folks. Why shouldn’t he be if it gets him some nice furniture right now and it’s all perfectly legal? If there’s anybody who knows about debt management it’s the Warner family, so they go with what they know.
Warner ain’t out robbin’ nobody to get what his family wants…but he’s gettin’ robbed. And he knows it, but it’s the American Way. Better than having an empty house.
As an aside I wonder how many folks in Warner’s position have undergone testing for depression in addition to other medical problems. Maybe that’s something that would help? At least to get folks in that position on their feet mentally as well as physically. Thoughts?
UVagrape…”Better than having an empty house”…. which he will have if he can’t make the payments. Instant gratification is fine if you have the $$ to keep the boat afloat. They need to lower their standards a bit and ‘make do’ with what they have got … I will not back down on my original post that the action of buying new furniture when they don’t have a pot to piss in makes them guilty of repeating history.
Yeah! Get ‘em all on meds…
La Grape, well put.
I should quit for the afternoon.. I shoulda read Lagrape’s post first
Much more well spoken than I!
My problem is that he chose a library of DVD’s over indoor plumbing! and he has a child! He seems like an active and willing participant in his own impoverisation (spellcheck says thats not a word, but I’m leaving it as is). Aside from that, what you write in #70 is all true, depressingly so.
impoverishment.
but i did like the impoverisation improvisation.
cbob, I like that your posting. Don’t get all discouraged. They shower loving kindness disguised and loathing fun times.
cbob.
cbob post.
post, bob, post.
those that sit on ass-
es asserting to laptops
aint workin either
i know i aint and
i’d read on a broke toilet
for entertainment
HD:
A.they won’t need a well if they’re hooked up to the county water system.
B. The wife, who’s also sick with arthritis, btw, watches Maury when she’s not working. What’s so criminal about that? She does still work.
C. Hasn’t anybody ever given you a financial leg up? A parent buying your first car? An uncle helping you with a down payment on your house? A spouse who worked while you go to college? What’s in your wallet, bro?
Oh lord. I’m flustered at my inability to form complete thoughts and process previous posts. That’s what I get for posting from work (see that past Cvillain article). I’m to go home and veg out in front of World of Warcraft - my brain has already become softened, why not seal the deal!
Lagrape:
A. I don’t think there’s county water in Buckingham (Buckingham Chickie, can you help me out on that?) and you dodge the point of water quality $$ being spent on a new house
B. The Maury thing was just an example of a larger trend of poor choices.
C. My first car was a Volkswagen I bought for $10. My uncle helped out once by stealing all of the money out of my corporate account.
An old man was sitting on a bench in the mall when a teenage boy with spiked hair came over and sat down beside him. The boy’s hair was yellow and green and orange and purple. He had black make-up around his eyes. The old man just stared at him. The boy said, “What’s the matter old man, haven’t you ever done anything wild in your life?”
The old man answered, “Well yes, actually, I have. I once got drunk and had sex with a parrot. I was just wondering if you were my son.”
71cbob AGREED and how!
yeah HD but those DVD’s cost $5 a pop at WalMart, not $1000 a pop. He did try to fix the plumbing, but it just kept breaking. HD, I don’t know this family any more than you do. But judge not lest ye be judged, is all I’m saying. We all get financial legs-up in this world, but some people don’t have access to as many as we college-educated, single and healthy young people with relatives who are financially stable. And I say that’s who government aid is for. Because there, but for the grace of the Goddess, go we.
My state taxes paid mean I pay less than half to go to UVA than a girl from New Jersey. The Warners don’t need tuition help right now. They need a house…badly. Why not help them have that? I’m gettin’ mine, why can’t they get theirs? You’re gettin’ yours every time you use a street. Warner doesn’t even use the streets anymore, he just comes out to mow his lawn. Are you gonna tell me he should be mad because you’re driving on streets paid for by his taxes?
We’re all connected, man. It’s like you’re saying “Firefighters never had to put out a fire at my house, so I don’t need firefighters!” But, bro, if they didn’t put out the fire down the street, the whole city would burn down. I think that’s how gov’t services work. Every service helps some directly but all indirectly. And every citizen has a service that helps them directly.
You’re acting all Han Solo, man. Talking about how you lived in a van down by the river for 18 months. You ain’t gonna tell me you had no help, brother. Whose land was it? Did you use public bathrooms? Were you off the grid, or just working while living in a cheap place? You weren’t squatting were you?
No dude is an island, entire of itself. Any dude’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in dudekind.
shst: hilarious
Just trying to stay in topic.
man… great topic. sorry i got to it so late. im surprised there hasnt been more talk about the misguided mission of the nonprofit. a variation of the “white man’s burden,” i think. la grape, nice job articulating your argument. i think it is easy to forget how hopeless it must feel to be in that situation. obviously this family has mismanaged their resources, but dont they have the right to be proud of something, even if it is only a big screen TV and dvd collection? this guy was hurting no one and only got all this attention because some folks in roanoke felt obligated to help someone. there are far greater parasites in this world than a harmless guy watching star trek peaceably in his trailer. i am all for my tax dollars going to his daughter getting free counseling, though. too bad that will probably never happen.
also, slighty off topic, a great article from malcom gladwell in the new yorker a few years ago: http://www.gladwell.com/2006/2006_02_13_a_murray.html
talks about how it is actually more fiscally efficient to give apartments and counseling services to the chronically homeless. in the long run, it saves taxpayers a ton. im not sure if that applies to the buckingham case, but very interesting nonetheless.
And by the way, I love Star Trek
Silmo… come over to paintball thread
Thats an interesting article, indie, but when it goes off on police brutality and car emissions tangents, it makes me think its more about statistics than how to deal with the homeless problem. Plus Denver, which bought heavily into the helping-them-out-is-cheaper philosophy has a 600 person waiting list for their program?!? If they’re saving so much money on every enrollee, I think they’d find a way to cover everyone who qualifies (unless some unscrupulous people are taking advantage of a well-intentioned program to get a free apartment {who’d have seen that coming?})
Ha!
blahblahblah y’all have way too much time to spend on the computer.
hey, did you know giving a guy pineapple is supposed to make his sperm sweeter but giving a dog pineapple makes his poo taste so bad he won’t eat it?
but giving a dog pineapple makes his poo taste so bad he won’t eat it? (worth repeating)
Y’all are a fucked up crew.
Seriously. More than ten minutes and no one asks how the dog’s, uh, you know, skeet-skeet tastes.
Stanley… I wrote a post and deleted it… came across as too sicko.
And for me to say that means it sounded FUCKING SICKO
Floozy, too FUCKING SICKO? y’all yeah g’night and see you thirsday silmo
one hud’red
i feel like a thread-jacker for this, but…
hipster- im sure denver only started the program as a trial, hence the waiting list. if nothing else, it proves that there is no magic bullet for solving extreme poverty, whether it be in buckingham county, va or on the streets of denver. at least its something for the people who are helped?
shenanigans you are awesome.
“one hud’red”
You makin’ from of me and my working klas roots arnt you shst, you big sity sofisticat, eleetist, klikk-thing … and stuff … and you’re butt stinks too
shenanigans - Re: 94 - bringing it back to basics - I like that. I need to get some of that into my dog’s food - last month’s highlight was surely my beagle gracing me with a thrown up frozen turd biscuit…on my bed; Au jus, of course. True story.
But honestly well said LaGrape in 85 - worth repeating at some point I’m sure.
indie, I LOVED that article. I’m a big Malcolm Gladwell fan in general. Did you know that a lot of his statistical work comes from a Dr. Wilson at UVA? It does. I served Gladwell and Wilson at a certain downtown restaurant once.
To answer H-D’s question (am I cool enough to call you by your initials?) Buckingham does not have a county water system. There is probably a town system in Dillwyn, and possibly in Maysville, where the county office building and court house is. Since the high school and middle school are in between the ‘towns’ the system may extend a bit to cover that area but I really have no idea. I have a well, as does everyone else that I’ve ever talked to around here.
I have no opinion on this (well I do, but it’s not articulated enough to share) but it might help if people realized just how poor our county is. We certainly aren’t another up and coming Fluvanna. Some of our elementary schools don’t have a/c (or maybe all…I just know that the one my kids will attend doesn’t) and are so old they can’t even put window units in. That probably doesn’t sound like a big deal, and doesn’t really have much bearing on the topic but I do have a point somewhere, if I can just find it. I doubt any of you would be willing to send your kids to school at the end of August, when it’s 95 degrees out, and not raise a fuss when you hear that they are sweltering all day long. Here, there’s not a lot that can be done about it because there is no money. Other than the prisons and a couple slate and lumber companies there are no large employers. This means that not only are there not a lot of jobs, there’s not a lot of tax revenue.
When you’re raised in a situation like the one above (and thank God I wasn’t) you do what you know. It may not be right, it may not be smart, but if you don’t know how to change, its hella hard to do it.
Growing up in West Virginia, this sort of thing is extremely common. The “poorest” citizens, i. e., those on welfare, were always the first to get amenities that the middle class could not afford. They were the first to get DVD players back in the late 90’s, and more and more already have HDTV’s and expensive consoles. The wanton corruption of our welfare system has left me with absolutely no sympathy for poor people. I’ve seen so much bullshit, that I would honest favor abolishing the entire welfare system even despite good, hardworking people that have fallen on hard times as long as it removes the luxuries from those who do not deserve them. I’d like a 54″ HDTV, but I have rent, bills, college loans, and food that I actually have to pay for myself. Fuck those people, and I mean that.
Oh, and UVA LaGrape, it’s NOT his tax money. He has no job; he pays no income tax. Sure, he pays some sales tax when he buys is $2000 TV, but that pales in comparison to the 27 or 28 percent the government takes out of my paycheck every two weeks. And that TV was purchased on Earned Income Tax Credits or welfare cash anyway, so it’s just our tax money going back into the coffers of the government. What a naive little flower you are.
ethan vs. lagrape! my eyes are burning!
As for the topic, I personally err on the side of helping someone. I haven’t read this completely, this is more a general response to the ideas discussed.
No one wants to be taxed into an oblivion, but we are a rich nation and can afford to help the less fortunate. He has absolutely made terrible terrible financial choices, as do many of the poor. Predatory lending, slick rental agencies, cheap retail outlets, and easy credit are all attractive and seemingly affordable ways the uneducated poor get trapped. That he chose consumer goods over basic necessities says everything about his need for outside advice/help. You can’t go back and erase the choices he made, so why not help him two ways: first with the house, second with financial counseling.
…cracked my shit up. Thanks, mc.
small point to correct
the earned income tax credit
requires some income
WTF? With all due respect, I started this fight… If anyone’s gonna mud-wrestle LaGrape over this I’m asserting my position of ‘first in line’. If however its to be ‘pistols at dawn at ten paces’, well, then I’m happy to step aside and let Ethan handle this matter…
why boys always gotta bring the guns out?
Ethan: I call bullshit.
A. If poor people are at the front of the amenity curve, why do so many poor people not own computers or have internet access?
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-118889368.html
And so what if you have anecdotal evidence of people abusing the system? Every system is abused. Should we not have police because some cops are crooked? Should we not provide schools with computers because some students will look up how to build stink bombs? Should we not vote because ballots from african-american-heavy districts disappeared? That Malcolm Gladwell link was so awesome because it showed how so many government services boil down to a battle between fairness and effectiveness. To some, it’s not “fair” to just “give” people a house or food because they don’t have it. But the other option, not giving it to them, costs everybody much more when we have to deal with the effects of that same person’s life being fucked up.
B. Mr. Warner is in his 50’s. He and his family have paid plenty of taxes. More than I have, and I’m already getting a buy-one-semester-get-one-free discount on post-baccalaureate education that students from New Jersey don’t get.
It’s like everyone is forgetting that being poor or being middle class doesn’t control your morality and humanity. But being middle and upper class certainly means you have more of a cushion when you make mistakes. You get all mad when a poor man owns a big screen TV while he his roof leaks, but you don’t say jack about the middle-class shopaholic who has more credit card debt at 30 than Mr Warner will ever accrue. There’s no cultural vein feeding the stereotype of the creditfare mom, buying SUV’s and private-school tuition while her financial future sinks. Mr Warner feeds his pain with $10 DVD’s. She feeds hers with $100 skinnyjeans. But her acting out is protected by the money she earns from the job she acquired through the college she attended paid for by the parents who could afford it because they had the jobs they acquired through the college paid for by their relatives who could afford it because of the jobs they got because the good jobs were reserved for Whites by the…but we won’t get into that.
“Well we don’t have to pay for her!” you may say. But you do pay for her: every time she decides to pay you less than she pays herself. Have you ever delved deep into the reasons why those who control the paycheck consistently decide to pay themselves more than employees, instead of sharing equally with them? But we won’t get into that….
Skinny jeans is just as bad as leaky roof. They are both aweful. They both are the results of thier own bad decisions. Do they “need” help? yes. Do they “deserve” help? Arguably, no. Have either one of them “earned” help? Definitely no.
I’m not mad that this guy got a house with my tax dollars. I’m mad that the first thing he did was to go out and buy furniture on credit. I’m mad that he’s raising a child in an environment that teaches that entertainment and the comfort of his lazy ass is more important than a healthy living environment. I’m mad that the rest of the neighborhood didn’t want to help thier neighbors. I’d be less disappointed if the DVD money had gone to buy a few books, if the TV money had gone to pay for a litteracy class, or maybe some plumbing. Instead of sitting around watching TV, he could be wittling wooden statues, knitting blankets, or anything he could sell to save some money to improve the situation, if not for himself, for his daughter. He should be teaching her about hard work, and earning the things you have. The man got a free house when his grandmother passed away and he let it go to shit. Don’t you think he’s gonna do the same with the new house? What happens when the jealous neighbors throw a brick through the window? It’s gonna stay broken, probably with a piece of cardboard over it. And the cycle continues.
The man doesn’t need fish, he needs a fishing lesson.
You can’t really lump entertainment and information technology together, LaGrape. How often do you think someone on welfare needs to hope on the internet to do academic research? And please spare me your race and socialism rants. You’re insufferable.
And you can call bullshit all you want, but that doesn’t change the fact that there are people out there with no running water and satellite dishes attached to their trailers. You might not choose to believe it, but it’s true, and as long as people like you refuse to believe that a significant number of people on welfare are fleecing all of us hard working taxpayers, the problem is going to continue to get worse. People on welfare do, after all, have more children than middle class families. In a few generations, we’re going to be fucked.
… which is why everyone who HAS the means (time, mostly) to help show these kids a life outside of friendship court or south central or appalachia or [insert poverty-stricken neighborhood here] should do so. its certainly not an eight-year-olds fault that he/she is growing up there. regardless of your opinion of their parents choices, the children deserve to be encouraged in school, shown a little more of the world, and have their creativity fostered, just like i was. even a cynic would say that its good to do purely for my financial future… if our mentoring works, then thats one less person on welfare i have to pay for.
I disagree, indie. Community service requires a willing participant and a willing recipient. Not every kind of community service “fits.” I’ve chosen non-traditional ways of working with those less fortunate than I. So I’d say, if this appeals to you, awesome, if not, find something that works.
Dear Made-To-Suffer:
A. You can’t bifurcate home computers and entertainment.
B. How often do you think the 99% of computer owners who are not academics hop on to the net to do some academic research?
C. Of course I believe there are running-waterless people with satellites…that’s what the whole article was about. But that wasn’t your point. Your plan was to take what I said and flip it to make your point look superior to insufferable me. Fine. As long as my recognition of such strawman-ism is now as visible.
D. There are people fleecing us everywhere, which I plainly acknowledged. You can’t stop helping your fellow man because some of them cheat you. You can stop electing them, though.
E. I like how you just dropped the semi-factoid of welfare recipients having more children than middle-classers. Ignoring the lack of clarity of your factoid, the facts behind which I understand, I say that your fear of the welfare rodents spreading their verminity does not take into account that children can *make* you poor–being poor doesn’t *make* you have children.
and finally
F. Your whole belief that poor people, not rich people, are the first to adopt new home technology en masse is still a little ludicrous. Don’t you watch Cribs? In fact, the richest of the rich get the new technologies for free so they’ll show it to their other rich friends. I mean fudgebiscuits, man: if being poor is so friggin awesome give me your paychecks. I got student loans like a motherfunker over here.
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