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L0oniX

(31,493 posts)

17. I doubt you have ever known a cronically homeless person.

Reply to Cleita (Reply #4)

Sat Mar 30, 2013, 12:45 PM

Mar 2013

I've worked the homeless food lines. I have homeless friends. One guy has become a special friend who I go out of my way to see. I hear and see the reasons why people remain homeless. 20% are vets with PTSD, some are drug addicts, some have criminal records, some lost their jobs and home, some show up with children, some are way over 65. There's a wide variety of reasons for their homelessness and most those reasons are extremely hard to over come and return to what some call normal living. To say it is a simple matter to regain a home and job would only reveal the ignorance some people have about being homeless. It ain't the 60's anymore.

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The coming homeless die-off [View all] Paul E Ester Mar 2013 OP

I suspect that's part of the plan. PDJane Mar 2013 #1

They will just be replaced by MORE unwanted, unemployable 50-somethings. kestrel91316 Mar 2013 #2

"Life expectancy on the street is about 64". SheilaT Mar 2013 #3

Look at it this way. They turn to the cigarettes, alcohol and drugs because of despair. Cleita Mar 2013 #5

Probably not smoking. eom Blanks Mar 2013 #14

No, not the smoking, but with the price of cigs today, they probably Cleita Mar 2013 #15

Finding butts to smoke isn't as easy as it used to be but it's still not that difficult Fumesucker Mar 2013 #18

It's probably true that they turn SheilaT Mar 2013 #16

Not a single person needs to be on the streets, who doesn't want to be, not a single one. Cleita Mar 2013 #4

Would a mentally ill person be an 'other societal drop out'? HereSince1628 Mar 2013 #6

Don't know where you lived, but where I lived the state hospitals took care of the Cleita Mar 2013 #7

The movement to community based care actually gained steam shortly after WWII. HereSince1628 Mar 2013 #11

I doubt you have ever known a cronically homeless person. L0oniX Mar 2013 #17

That's because it's become institutionalized and many of those who are mentally ill Cleita Mar 2013 #19

3 or 4 of my homeless patients are in their 70's. Aristus Mar 2013 #8

guys like that fascinate me datasuspect Mar 2013 #9

He seems like a burned-out husk of a man. Aristus Mar 2013 #10

they don't make tough like that anymore datasuspect Mar 2013 #12

He's my generation and back in his twenties he would have had what Cleita Mar 2013 #13