Social Commentary

I now live, as many of you know, in the nearest thing to a socialist city you're going to find in Arkansas. Our governor and legislature and much of the rest of this MAGA state hate us with a passion because so many progressives/hippies/liberals live here that it's easy to fund our library, the bike trails, the free busses and the food banks.

And yet. People are homeless here. People are living in their cars. (I encounter them often, since I go early to the dog park, when they're still in the parking lot there.) Some, I am sure, have addiction problems. Many just can't make the rent, which is high in this city, considering it's in Arkansas -- a single shabby one-bedroom rents for $1200/month, and requires passing background checks, providing paystubs, and putting up a sizable deposit as well as the first and last month's rent. Plus you have to sign a year long lease, and if you default before the year is up, you're evicted. Trying getting another apartment with an eviction on your record.

(Why so pricey? Everyone wants to live here, and then also we have a yearly influx of rich kids from Texas who come to attend our R-1 university, probably not because it's a good university as because it's got the Razorbacks. Razorback football is a cult.)

The city is working at building (a) affordable housing and (b) affordable housing aimed specifically at artists. This is what cities should be doing, obviously, but it's not here yet.

A lot of the people living in their cars, or occasionally in tents deep in the trees around the dog park, have jobs. Many also drive for door dash or deliver for Amazon. They're not "lazy," and they're not "illegal immigrants." They're unable to rent an apartment on minimum wage plus a side hustle. (We do have immigrants, but they're mostly working construction, which I assume pays better.)

Are they hungry? They're not eating well, I can guess that from the fast food wrappers scattered around their cars. (There are trash cans, but I guess I might not want to get out of my car when it's 20 degrees out either.) Food banks are useful, but frequently they require a kitchen, which someone living in their car will not have. They don't look healthy, or happy, on the few occasions I see one stumbling back from the single bathroom in the park.

Why do I bring this up? Well, I saw this clip from 1984*, over on PZ Myers' site. It reminded me of a boyfriend I had at about the same time -- 1983, this would have me -- who assured me that no one starved in America, no one was hungry in America. I didn't know enough to push back at him. My own brother said the same thing, a few years later: people were homeless in America because they wanted to be. None of them were starving, or even hungry.

I'm hearing the same rhetoric from conservatives today. MAGA conservatives, anyway. People are homeless because they choose to be homeless. People begging on the street corners are making a fortune, they all have nice cars and five bedroom homes. People going to food banks are driving there in BMWs.

It's the Welfare Queen lie Reagan started in 1980. MAGA loves to believe it because it justifies their bigotry. It's okay to persecute the poor and the immigrants, it's okay to strip food assistance from people because those people are just junkies anyway, spending their money on cigarettes and booze. Hate becomes a virtue in their little bubble. That so many of them claim to be Christian is pretty...I was going to say hilarious, but actually it's disgusting.

They aren't just disgusting. They're immoral.

*I'll tell you what really astonished me about that clip -- how polite Pryor was the the wealthy old lady. He treated her with so much respect. I'd have lost it by the second lie she told. He slips a bit when she tries to take the moral high ground, but he's still saying, "Yes, ma'am," and "No, ma'am," to the very end.