On her book The Man in the Dog Park: Coming Up Close to Homelessness
Cover Interview of January 06, 2021
Lastly
In the opening paragraph of the preface, it reads: “Compassion
is described as the quivering of the heart in relation to the suffering of
others; it is accompanied by an impulse to relieve the suffering witnessed.” I
would hope that the book leads readers to a greater understanding of the
suffering that homeless people endure and a greater impulse to relieve that
suffering.
A study from the Center for Experimental Research on
Fairness, Inequality and Rationality at the Norwegian School of Economics found
that people in all political camps—conservative and liberal—want to take
corrective measures about inequality when they perceive that being
disadvantaged is not “earned.”
I wish that the book can offer readers another way to talk
about causation, one that focuses more on the impossibly slippery slope on
which people teeter before sliding into homelessness rather than focusing on their
choice of footwear. I hope readers will come to see the patience and ingenuity
it really takes to live homeless. I imagine they will wince, with me, at the
indignities of living with the stigma of homelessness. I wish that the book
will bring to light the unseen features of being poor and homeless: the
businesses that profit from the poor; the countless hoops and catch-22s in the
bureaucracies purporting to help the homeless.
I hope insights will prompt some action, although our book
is not prescriptive about the changes we expect. I take heart in whatever a
reader might be moved to do. Given our different proclivities and resources and
positions, this may vary widely. I was moved to volunteer at a homeless shelter
(and write a book!) but others might send donations. Perhaps the action taken
will be to put issues on one’s radar, like decriminalizing overnight camping or
regulating payday loans, that hadn’t been there before. Maybe a neighborhood or
a church group might take on the biggest obstacle to affordable housing in
their community: NIMBY (attitudes deeming housing as important but Not in My
Backyard).
I dream that those in positions of power might help rouse
the political will to squarely address homelessness, and the social and
economic inequities at its source. But the most real and tender image I hold is
that of multiple readers, some of whom have written me, who carry little bags
of snacks in their cars, with maybe a pair of socks, or a toothbrush, or a bus
pass, to hand out to homeless people they encounter.
[T]he Holocaust transformed our whole way of thinking about war and heroism. War is no longer a proving ground for heroism in the same way it used to be. Instead, war now is something that we must avoid at all costs—because genocides often take place under the cover of war. We are no longer all potential soldiers (though we are that too), but we are all potential victims of the traumas war creates. This, at least, is one important development in the way Western populations envision war, even if it does not always predominate in the thinking of our political leaders.Carolyn J. Dean, Interview of February 01, 2011
The dominant premise in evolution and economics is that a person is being loyal to natural law if he or she attends to self’s interest and welfare before being concerned with the needs and demands of family or community. The public does not realize that this statement is not an established scientific principle but an ethical preference. Nonetheless, this belief has created a moral confusion among North Americans and Europeans because the evolution of our species was accompanied by the disposition to worry about kin and the collectives to which one belongs.Jerome Kagan, Interview of September 17, 2009
Lastly
In the opening paragraph of the preface, it reads: “Compassion is described as the quivering of the heart in relation to the suffering of others; it is accompanied by an impulse to relieve the suffering witnessed.” I would hope that the book leads readers to a greater understanding of the suffering that homeless people endure and a greater impulse to relieve that suffering.
A study from the Center for Experimental Research on Fairness, Inequality and Rationality at the Norwegian School of Economics found that people in all political camps—conservative and liberal—want to take corrective measures about inequality when they perceive that being disadvantaged is not “earned.”
I wish that the book can offer readers another way to talk about causation, one that focuses more on the impossibly slippery slope on which people teeter before sliding into homelessness rather than focusing on their choice of footwear. I hope readers will come to see the patience and ingenuity it really takes to live homeless. I imagine they will wince, with me, at the indignities of living with the stigma of homelessness. I wish that the book will bring to light the unseen features of being poor and homeless: the businesses that profit from the poor; the countless hoops and catch-22s in the bureaucracies purporting to help the homeless.
I hope insights will prompt some action, although our book is not prescriptive about the changes we expect. I take heart in whatever a reader might be moved to do. Given our different proclivities and resources and positions, this may vary widely. I was moved to volunteer at a homeless shelter (and write a book!) but others might send donations. Perhaps the action taken will be to put issues on one’s radar, like decriminalizing overnight camping or regulating payday loans, that hadn’t been there before. Maybe a neighborhood or a church group might take on the biggest obstacle to affordable housing in their community: NIMBY (attitudes deeming housing as important but Not in My Backyard).
I dream that those in positions of power might help rouse the political will to squarely address homelessness, and the social and economic inequities at its source. But the most real and tender image I hold is that of multiple readers, some of whom have written me, who carry little bags of snacks in their cars, with maybe a pair of socks, or a toothbrush, or a bus pass, to hand out to homeless people they encounter.