by Layne Scopano
Most students in South Carolina express a feeling of uncertainty while walking past a homeless person, but the people experiencing homelessness are most commonly the victims of violence.
I was walking in Charleston, SC one day when I was approached by a mother who was homeless. She had three children and was in clear need of money, food, shelter, “anything would help,” she said. As she walked up to me, the first words out of her mouth were “I don’t mean to scare you.” Here was this woman, who carried herself with her head down, talking about her inability to feed the three mouths that were dependent on her. I was on holiday strolling through shops. Hers was by far the scarier situation. After donating the only cash that I had on me, she started to tear up. She held out a candy cane, saying “this is all I have to give you in return.” I decline, hoping that her children would have the chance to munch on the candy instead. As I walked away, I tried to think of anything more terrifying than being unable to feed my children. I couldn’t. Yet, society has made her out to be the treat. How?
More than 80% of mothers experiencing homelessness have previously experienced domestic violence (1). Mothers often must make a difficult decision: either stay in an unsafe home or have no home at all. Especially for mothers that lack familial support, them and their children can be on the streets in seconds. This experience is one of many women: in one day in 2016, over 41,000 adults and children fled from cases of domestic violence to emergency shelters or transitional housing (2). What awaits them can also be a trigger for trauma, especially if there are not private or separated spaces. Additionally, with the current welfare systems in place, an income is necessary to achieve stable housing for women and their children, even with subsidies. This income is difficult to achieve with the ever-mounting cost of childcare, which is South Carolina, costs roughly 25.5% of income for single mothers (3).Childcare, food, shelter, transportation, all the basic needs begin to pile up. This is the area in which the mentality that “homeless people should just get a job” is challenged. Clearly, there are situations in which “a job” is not enough.
For those who may be thinking, “well, I’m not afraid of the mothers. I’m afraid of other homeless people,” there are many assault cases against “other” people experiencing homelessness as well. I was in Savannah, GA, when I was stopped by a man with only a suitcase, a love of the Georgia bulldogs, and a hankering for the BBQ place on the corner. After chatting with him, I couldn’t help but notice he was missing a few of his front teeth. I found out he was recently assaulted by a young man in broad daylight. The incident went unreported. Over the past 18 years, there have been 1,758 reported attacks committed against homeless individuals, and 476 of those victims died because of the assault. Most of the assaults were perpetrated by men below the age of 30 (4).
This targeted violence against people experiencing homelessness became so prevalent that an entire video game was named after the attacks. HoboHunt is a photo sharing app where app users uploaded photos of people experiencing homelessness and “hunted” them with virtual weapons. Different weapon packs cost money. The creator of the app, Joel Usher, said the following
“’The 'Hobo' part [of the title] came about as a friend of mine, who commutes through Washington, DC, was constantly sending me camera phone pictures of hobos along his route, and making jokes about "hunting" them as he drove. He also told me that a group of attorneys… all do the same, and that really triggered the idea behind the app’” (5).
Ah yes, rich people, attorneys, true servants of justice, finding a way to laugh at impoverished people. By fake killing them.
Media often portrays people experiencing homelessness as criminals—because people are criminalized for being poor. Data points are shared about how many crimes are committed by homeless persons, but only because city ordinances are made that create legal issues. Because of a lack of public restrooms, unlike restrooms in restaurants in which people are usually expected to buy something before using the facilities, there are high rates of ticketing and arrests for public urination for people experiencing homelessness. If these tickets go unpaid, the fine can propagate into a felony. People experiencing homelessness are not any more likely to be a criminal, with the exception of camping ordinances and nuisance laws (6)
. It’s almost as if these laws were created to perpetuate the idea that homeless persons are dangerous, instead of understanding the daily instability and vulnerability that they face on the street.
South Carolina opens conversations wide open about people experiencing homelessness being a nuisance. In 2013, there was controversial conversation are the Columbia Cares plan that was addressed at Columbia City Council. This plan effectively outlawed homelessness, giving people experiencing homelessness three options: 1) go to a new shelter, 2) leave town, or 3) be arrested. The plan would also ensure that police officers would rotate in three-man shifts to strictly enforce nuisance laws and kick out anyone who appeared homeless (7). This plan was never passed, but Columbia received national attention for its baffling lack of humanity.
Money is often equated with morality, though there is little to no statistical support for this learned fear. At the very least, people experiencing homelessness experience daily terrors, traumas, vulnerability, and stigma that cast them to the peripheries of society and beyond the reach of the support systems many of the rest of us take for granted.
Works cited
1. Lyon, E., Lane, S. (2008). Meeting Survivors’ Needs: A Multi-State Study of Domestic Violence Shelter Experiences. National Resource Center on Domestic Violence. http://vawnet.org/sites/default/files/materials/files/2016-08/MeetingSurvivorsNeeds-FullReport.pdf
2. National Network to End Domestic Violence (2016). 11th Annual Domestic Violence Counts Report. https://nnedv.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Library_Census_2016_Report.pdf
3. Single Mother Guide (2021). Cost of Child Care for Single Mothers. https://singlemotherguide.com/cost-of-child-care/.
4. Leomporra, A., Hustings, M. (2018). Vulnerable to Hate: Survey of Bias-Motived Violence Against People Experiencing Homelessness in 2016-2017. National Coalition for the Homeless. https://nationalhomeless.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/hate-crimes-2016-17-final_for-web2.pdf.
5. Taete, J. (2012). Hobo Hunt is Appalling. Vice.https://www.vice.com/en/article/8gvqyk/hobo-hunt-is-appaling
6. Department of Commerce. (2016). Homelessness Myths and Facts. http://www.commerce.wa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/hau-chg-mythsfacts-12-8-2016.pdf.
7. South Carolina Policy Council. (2013). What (Not) to Do About the Homeless. https://scpolicycouncil.org/commentary/homeless-plan.
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