Hands on the Elephant

Yesterday I entered into a most interesting online conversation about the homeless that evolved into a discussion about public assistance and other programs designed to help the poor.

What was just fascinating to me is that of the more than dozen folks who had something to say on the matter, we each came at it from a different perspective.

It put me in mind of that old story about the blind men and the elephant. Each of them has a hand on the pachyderm, and each one offers up their opinion about what it is, exactly, they are touching.

They are all wrong, of course, because they are only "seeing" one part of it the only way they can -- by what is right there in their hand. So, all wrong -- but in a roundabout way, all of them are are also right, at least as far as their personal perspective goes.

There are profound differences in the circumstances that lead to homelessness -- lack of education (but not always), mental illness (likely at the root of most of the "hardcore" homeless), drug abuse, alcohol abuse, financial setbacks from a medical crisis or loss of a job.

You can't fix this problem, then, with one solution. What might work for the mentally ill isn't even going to begin to address the difficulties of being uninsured or underinsured.

The hardcore homeless -- those who have lived that way for so long that they refuse any offer of shelter or aid -- well, you just have to do the best you can to figure out a way to let them live with the dignity they deserve as fellow human beings, balanced with a need for public safety.

Conversations like this both energize and bother me. It's not fair to judge me -- or for me to judge others -- by their perspective on the problem when we don't deal with the same issues in our communities, or when the solutions to this issue differ so widely and ultimately can only fix one part of the problem.

Fortunately, the debate we had didn't get ugly. But it also didn't get us anywhere, and having been part of discussions like this in the past that did end up devolving into a very, very negative experience, I was relieved when it was over.