Homeless Families: Hopefully Not in the 22nd Century
There is not anything quite as satisfying as a good night’s rest before a busy day of school and dance team practice. It is Monday morning, when I crawl out of a comfortable bed of soft-cotton sheets and fuzzy throw blankets. My iHome alarm clock sounds a dreamy melody of ocean tides to wake me from a peaceful slumber. I step into slippers, put together a matching outfit, and grab the New York Times on my way into an all-you-can-eat dining hall. When I relax to a full tray of breakfast, I come upon an ad that makes me feel guilty about my standard of living. The advertisement is not in color, but the creative black font on the page gets my attention anyway with the words “For the first time in history”. I continue to read about devastation to humanity, and I immediately lose my appetite. Although an illustration takes up less than a tenth of the page, its powerful image draws me into the announcement. The featured collapsing “shelters” are real pictures mounted to an animated background of both urban and rural lands. These slums look rancid and polluted. I see shanties made of scrap metal and plastic. I see shacks made of old branches and mud. I am sure that certified building inspectors would never pass these “homes” with superior or even satisfactory ratings. Then I begin to doubt myself. Suddenly my breakfast doesn’t taste so appetizing. I am struck with guilt, so I feel a moral obligation to look into the efforts of Slam the Door on Poverty Housing! Curious about the issue, I research the housing project online.
As I type away at my new laptop computer, mindlessly snacking and sipping bottled water, I can’t hold myself back from crying after seeing a horrific slideshow of people living in conditions unimaginable to me. The innocent eyes of a homeless three-year-old capture my attention and restrain me from abandoning the page that I am destined to explore. The single mother, the concerned grandfather, the tired baby, and the hungry schoolboy share in a suffering unknown to me, despite the fact that we live in the same world and were created by the same God. Though these people weren’t pictured in the NY Times advertisement, their voices are critical components of the movement. I feel like the pleading images on the website are speaking to me as I read their cries for help:
An exhausted mother of six asks, “Will we have enough food this week?”
“I skip meals so my children won’t have to”, an overworked father admits.
A self-sacrificing teenage-daughter wonders, “How many miles will I walk for clean water today?”
And a troubled grandfather questions, “What if the city bulldozes my house again?” These are merely echoes of a desperate civilization seeking help from their neighbors. This is an issue that needs to be addressed with combined forces; furthermore, the advertisements for the anti-poverty housing movement order everyone to ‘stop tolerating poverty housing in our world’.
A suffering within any population affects the ‘non-victimized’ sphere in one way or another. The World Habitat Day Proclamation trusts that the joining forces of advocates for improved housing will save future generations of mankind. Millard Fuller, the founder of Habitat for Humanity International (a project endorser), believes that “There are sufficient resources in the world for the needs of everybody, but not enough for the greed of even a significant minority”. His words humble me, as I am from privileged, middle-class America, and I am not troubled by financial insecurity or a lack of safety. I realize that I am the kind of person that the advertisement aspires to influence. As Fuller says, “Habitat for Humanity is counting on all people- especially talented and wealthy people and richly blessed churches, companies, and other organizations-to come forward and to freely open their hands and hearts so that additional resources, both material and human, will be made available to rid the world of shacks and other poor housing and homelessness”.
Poor-quality living environments concern economic, social and political realms of life. As the advertisement stresses, “more than 1.6 billion people suffer some form of shelter deprivation”. The devastation is recognized with an argument that “durable, affordable housing can and should be made a priority everywhere”. The problem is addressed, and world leaders have a strategy to fight the crisis. Now the effectiveness of the movement is left to the responsibility of a significant “global village”. I debate whether the advertisement in the New York Times is actually arousing to its other educated readers? The ad is not typical, because it has a lot of text and lacks color. Readers must spend more time going over the avowal than perhaps a retail or business advertisement. Even still, the emphasis on sentences of bold print and the variations of letter sizes spark my interest. Where my eyes scroll, to the bottom of the fibrous page, the most popular endorsers of the project are listed beneath the proclamation. I am certain that this advertisement is intended to influence audiences with political clout. It is idyllic for government legislators to take notice of this project and spread awareness within their local communities. When the government addresses an issue, Americans respond. The project will get serious headway with substantial government support.
The ad publication in the nationally sold New York Times is not the only way that the movement is raising awareness for its cause. As listed at the bottom of the ad, if one ventures to ‘slamthedoor.org’, he/she may sign the World Habitat Day Proclamation and petition to congressmen with a few clicks of the mouse. The site also features a pre-formatted e-mail to easily send out information about the project to friends. By sparing fifteen minutes, webpage visitors may explore the anti-poverty housing project in depth. Anybody who wants to give to this effort may. ‘Slam the Door on Poverty Housing!’ is a big project that has many opportunities for people to help: donate money, spread awareness to friends, spend time leading a local chapter, contact government legislators, travel to the impoverished areas, or actually build homes.
The unequal distribution of wealth in the world’s globalized community is keeping too many families below the poverty level. The 2007 World Proclamation aspires to eradicate slums with the support of powerful organizations. This year the World Habitat Day Proclamation informs the public that one billion people in the urban population “live in slums without adequate shelter, clean water or sanitation”. The Slam the Door on Poverty Housing movement is asking for the masses to work together, to rid worldwide homelessness, and lend a hand to humanity.
The writings of Mother Teresa illustrate the importance of giving to others; “At the end of life we will not be judged by how many diplomas we have received, how much money we have made, how many great things we have done. We will be judged by ‘I was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was naked and you clothed me. I was homeless and you took me in’”. It is my hope that many people take heart in this project. Like the advertisement in the newspaper exemplifies, the planet should not have masses of people living in such underdeveloped environments that they risk death to preventable diseases, have trouble finding ‘safe’ water and struggle to find a bite of food. Privileged families of the world are needed in conjunction with endorsers of the effort, like the United Nations, to effectively wipe out homelessness. With encouragement from the words of Millard Fuller, “many hearts and minds must go through a radical transformation. With God: all things truly are possible!”
Works Cited
World Habitat Day 2007. October 1, 2007. Slam the Door on Poverty Housing.
http://www.slamthedoor.org