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Poverty: Looking at Why Instead of Who

by Neeraj Mehta 09-10-2009 | 2:06pm
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For many Americans, our current housing crisis, banking meltdown, and global recession are increasing the risk of falling into poverty. You can't turn on the television without hearing about both who the impacted people are and why they are being impacted. What I find interesting about these discussions is the consistent emphasis on the failure of the 'system.' We're not blaming the everyday American for his or her current situation, but instead, we're putting a lot of attention on the systems that have changed the world around us.

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Now don't get me wrong -- I think it's good for us to analyze these systems, since they played such a significant role in the collapse of our economy. I just wish we placed this much attention on the 'system' when discussing the lives of the millions of Americans who found themselves in poverty before the global recession as well as those who will find themselves in poverty after the economy recovers.

Historically, when trying to understand poverty in America we spend a considerable amount of time analyzing the individual, demographic, and social characteristics that might lead to a person's increased risk of impoverishment. We vilify those with less education, fewer job skills, or health problems. We characterize entire groups of people -- like single mothers or minorities living in the inner city -- as at fault for their own poverty. Our collective lack of response to the issues of poverty is often due to our view of the problem; we see it as impacting a few select groups of people plagued with moral failing or individual inadequacies.

We're good at critiquing the people who are experiencing poverty, but we spend much less time critiquing the system that can so often ensnare or even create the situations in the first place. We're good at identifying WHO is likely to experience poverty in America, but we do not consistently journey into looking at WHY poverty occurs in the first place.

portrait-neeraj-mehtaNeeraj Mehta has been working with others to uncover beauty and strength in North Minneapolis for the past 10 years. Previously he worked for Project for Pride in Living and most recently as program and strategic development director for the Sanctuary Community Development Corporation. Currently, he is working with the community-building intermediary Nexus Community Partners, partnering with others to create more engaged and powerful communities in the Twin Cities.

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by: csack

09-10-2009 @ 2:26pm

you are a victim! you are poor because the system beat you down! you have no choice! pass this legislation and everything will be solved!

here you have another good example of a key difference between liberals and republicans. liberals think the problem is the system.

i'm not saying people can't have bad breaks, but i can't stand this victim mentality.

has anyone else noticed how virtually all self-help books say the exact opposite? they urge you to take control and work hard?

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 3:01pm

Obama's speech to students this week highlighted personal responsibility and being in control of one's destiny. We need to help those who can't help themselves through illness or other tragedy. But we should celebrate the many who rise up out of poverty, in spite of their circumstances, to become successful. Obama also highlighted the fact that anyone can make it in this country. His speech highlighted the difference between a balanced approach to this problem to one of the typical liberal blame-it-on-the-system approach. If we really looked at the WHY of poverty, we might start taking people like Bill Cosby a little more seriously.

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 7:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 5:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: Jackafuss

09-10-2009 @ 1:14pm

Our failure is one of not helping others learn how to fish.

by: csack

09-10-2009 @ 2:26pm

you are a victim! you are poor because the system beat you down! you have no choice! pass this legislation and everything will be solved!

here you have another good example of a key difference between liberals and republicans. liberals think the problem is the system.

i'm not saying people can't have bad breaks, but i can't stand this victim mentality.

has anyone else noticed how virtually all self-help books say the exact opposite? they urge you to take control and work hard?

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 5:59pm

Why is it so easy to deny the negative impact systems can have on people? I am neither Republican or Democrat, but my own understanding of history and relationships with non white families, seem to show how long lasting and deep the negative impacts of slavery, racist Federal Housing policy and other systems are on people's lives today.

It boggles my mind why people are so quick to dismiss the impact of systems. I don't get it! Are we blaming the line workers in Detroit for their loss of work and plunge into poverty? Or the middle class white family who lost their savings in the stock market and now the parents can find a job in a weak economy for their poverty? No. We understand and accept today that certain systems failed us. Well, also certain systems failed nonwhite families in the past. Often, intentionally, but some unintentionally.

To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking.

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 3:01pm

Obama's speech to students this week highlighted personal responsibility and being in control of one's destiny. We need to help those who can't help themselves through illness or other tragedy. But we should celebrate the many who rise up out of poverty, in spite of their circumstances, to become successful. Obama also highlighted the fact that anyone can make it in this country. His speech highlighted the difference between a balanced approach to this problem to one of the typical liberal blame-it-on-the-system approach. If we really looked at the WHY of poverty, we might start taking people like Bill Cosby a little more seriously.

by: paradoxtor

09-10-2009 @ 6:39pm

The situations you describe as plunging people into poverty are largely temporary and recent. Can systems affect things? Of course. But I say why is it so easy to deny the negative impact peoples personal choices make? The overwhelming majority of people I come in contact with who are long term poor are there because of personal choices. The second factor is simply their family of origin and the values that were passed on to them. If you really want to give all people equal opportunity, all children should be removed from their parents at birth and turned over to the state. Then it would be truly fair. Obviously, I would not be for such a move. I am all for helping people but ultimately there must be personal responsibility.

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 7:05pm

"To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking."

Perhaps you will want to tell that to Bill Cosby, or Juan Williams, who wrote the book Enough. Tell me one human system doesn't have a negative impact on people. Big government? I'm not just some middle-class white guy spewing out hatred for the poor. I work in a low-income school after living in Honduras for two years in the 1980s. I've travelled to Guatemala and Ethiopia. I can tell you about real poverty and failed systems. I can tell you about our adopted daugher's birth mother, who lives on 25 cents a day. She has little hope but God. Doesn't make excuses though. She just keeps making injera. I also can tell you about the many kids who make it in our "failed" system, through hard work, a strong parental figure and solid support from schools.

I also grew up in a blue-collar family where my parents' would have to borrow my newspaper money to buy milk at the end of the week. Can the system be better? Yes, but I hope you become a bit more bi-partisan, because your rhetoric is the same old "stuff" I come to expect from Sojourners.

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 11:06pm

ando, if you grew up in a blue collar family and are white, then you had certain advantages that nonwhite households didn't have. Can you accept that as true?

Of course, I understand the reality and importance of individual choice and responsibility. I live and work in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I am often confronted with behaviours and choices that make me say, "what?".

But yet, can we not all just take a look back in this country's history to see how poorly and unfairly we have treated entire groups of people?

Of course, these both play a role in current situations, but they are intricately tied together and if we want to see lives and cities transformed then we have to be able to address both.

Too often though I think we simply focus on the individual. 70% of Americans still think that people are poor only because of their poor choices. I just can't buy that as true. I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

Inner Cities are not accidents. Concentrating poverty in this country was systematic and strategic. Poor people didn't just all choose to live in these neighborhoods, they were pushed there, isolated there and disinvested there.

As a Christian I am aware that there is such a thing as individual sin. I've got many of my own. But I also know that individual sin can build up a head of steam and become engrained in systems. Solomon in the Old Testament is a great example of a King whose individual sin built up and he created a dominant empire that did not care about the people around him. These people who once were slaves were now the slaveholders (See 1 Kings 9, 10 and 11).

The OT prophets consistently reminded us to remember the poor.

Jesus as well was focused on bringing healing and shalom to those experiencing leprosy, poverty and isolation in the world. He addressed our individual sins, but also through his radical love and way of being called out unjust systems of the time. Tax systems, religious systems and more.

We have got to find a way where we can be willing to understand that these issues go hand in hand and to change the world we are going to have to change both.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:29am

Brian McLaren has said that it doesn't matter how good your answers are if you're not asking the right question. I'd like to challenge the question posed because we did not all start with wealth, affluence, and a highly productive society. Even accounting for some wealth disparities in the United States, most of the poor have access to and can afford things that were mere luxuries just a century ago. Even the king of England 200 years ago did not have refrigeration or climate-controlled rooms. Standards of living in society have risen very rapidly due to many factors.

A better question might be to ask, "What are those factors?" In other words, "What creates wealth, and what stands in its way?" Part of that answer rests on the axiom of peaceful activity and exchange. When people within a society are permitted to freely exchange and interact with other human beings peacefully, the society flourishes. When the rule of law protects those who do not wish to act and interact peacefully, such a society can remain relatively stable.

Correcting the individual and institutional evils that "create" poverty is indeed a worthy cause, but it is worthless without understanding why the opposite is true, and no solution will work by ignoring the connection between wealth creation and poverty reduction.

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 5:59pm

Why is it so easy to deny the negative impact systems can have on people? I am neither Republican or Democrat, but my own understanding of history and relationships with non white families, seem to show how long lasting and deep the negative impacts of slavery, racist Federal Housing policy and other systems are on people's lives today.

It boggles my mind why people are so quick to dismiss the impact of systems. I don't get it! Are we blaming the line workers in Detroit for their loss of work and plunge into poverty? Or the middle class white family who lost their savings in the stock market and now the parents can find a job in a weak economy for their poverty? No. We understand and accept today that certain systems failed us. Well, also certain systems failed nonwhite families in the past. Often, intentionally, but some unintentionally.

To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:33am

I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

You don't need friends to "prove" that. It's just a fact of life that life is complicated. Your comments are good. I don't buy into that it was all poor choices, and that some people truly are "forced" by others into certain situations.

by: paradoxtor

09-10-2009 @ 6:39pm

The situations you describe as plunging people into poverty are largely temporary and recent. Can systems affect things? Of course. But I say why is it so easy to deny the negative impact peoples personal choices make? The overwhelming majority of people I come in contact with who are long term poor are there because of personal choices. The second factor is simply their family of origin and the values that were passed on to them. If you really want to give all people equal opportunity, all children should be removed from their parents at birth and turned over to the state. Then it would be truly fair. Obviously, I would not be for such a move. I am all for helping people but ultimately there must be personal responsibility.

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 7:05pm

"To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking."

Perhaps you will want to tell that to Bill Cosby, or Juan Williams, who wrote the book Enough. Tell me one human system doesn't have a negative impact on people. Big government? I'm not just some middle-class white guy spewing out hatred for the poor. I work in a low-income school after living in Honduras for two years in the 1980s. I've travelled to Guatemala and Ethiopia. I can tell you about real poverty and failed systems. I can tell you about our adopted daugher's birth mother, who lives on 25 cents a day. She has little hope but God. Doesn't make excuses though. She just keeps making injera. I also can tell you about the many kids who make it in our "failed" system, through hard work, a strong parental figure and solid support from schools.

I also grew up in a blue-collar family where my parents' would have to borrow my newspaper money to buy milk at the end of the week. Can the system be better? Yes, but I hope you become a bit more bi-partisan, because your rhetoric is the same old "stuff" I come to expect from Sojourners.

by: bhaack

09-11-2009 @ 8:44am

"We vilify those with less education, fewer job skills, or health problems. We characterize entire groups of people

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 11:06pm

ando, if you grew up in a blue collar family and are white, then you had certain advantages that nonwhite households didn't have. Can you accept that as true?

Of course, I understand the reality and importance of individual choice and responsibility. I live and work in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I am often confronted with behaviours and choices that make me say, "what?".

But yet, can we not all just take a look back in this country's history to see how poorly and unfairly we have treated entire groups of people?

Of course, these both play a role in current situations, but they are intricately tied together and if we want to see lives and cities transformed then we have to be able to address both.

Too often though I think we simply focus on the individual. 70% of Americans still think that people are poor only because of their poor choices. I just can't buy that as true. I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

Inner Cities are not accidents. Concentrating poverty in this country was systematic and strategic. Poor people didn't just all choose to live in these neighborhoods, they were pushed there, isolated there and disinvested there.

As a Christian I am aware that there is such a thing as individual sin. I've got many of my own. But I also know that individual sin can build up a head of steam and become engrained in systems. Solomon in the Old Testament is a great example of a King whose individual sin built up and he created a dominant empire that did not care about the people around him. These people who once were slaves were now the slaveholders (See 1 Kings 9, 10 and 11).

The OT prophets consistently reminded us to remember the poor.

Jesus as well was focused on bringing healing and shalom to those experiencing leprosy, poverty and isolation in the world. He addressed our individual sins, but also through his radical love and way of being called out unjust systems of the time. Tax systems, religious systems and more.

We have got to find a way where we can be willing to understand that these issues go hand in hand and to change the world we are going to have to change both.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:29am

Brian McLaren has said that it doesn't matter how good your answers are if you're not asking the right question. I'd like to challenge the question posed because we did not all start with wealth, affluence, and a highly productive society. Even accounting for some wealth disparities in the United States, most of the poor have access to and can afford things that were mere luxuries just a century ago. Even the king of England 200 years ago did not have refrigeration or climate-controlled rooms. Standards of living in society have risen very rapidly due to many factors.

A better question might be to ask, "What are those factors?" In other words, "What creates wealth, and what stands in its way?" Part of that answer rests on the axiom of peaceful activity and exchange. When people within a society are permitted to freely exchange and interact with other human beings peacefully, the society flourishes. When the rule of law protects those who do not wish to act and interact peacefully, such a society can remain relatively stable.

Correcting the individual and institutional evils that "create" poverty is indeed a worthy cause, but it is worthless without understanding why the opposite is true, and no solution will work by ignoring the connection between wealth creation and poverty reduction.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:33am

I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

You don't need friends to "prove" that. It's just a fact of life that life is complicated. Your comments are good. I don't buy into that it was all poor choices, and that some people truly are "forced" by others into certain situations.

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 3:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: bhaack

09-11-2009 @ 8:44am

"We vilify those with less education, fewer job skills, or health problems. We characterize entire groups of people

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 3:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 7:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 5:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 5:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 5:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: Jackafuss

09-10-2009 @ 1:14pm

Our failure is one of not helping others learn how to fish.

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by: Jackafuss

09-10-2009 @ 1:14pm

Our failure is one of not helping others learn how to fish.

by: Jackafuss

09-10-2009 @ 1:14pm

Our failure is one of not helping others learn how to fish.

by: csack

09-10-2009 @ 2:26pm

you are a victim! you are poor because the system beat you down! you have no choice! pass this legislation and everything will be solved!

here you have another good example of a key difference between liberals and republicans. liberals think the problem is the system.

i'm not saying people can't have bad breaks, but i can't stand this victim mentality.

has anyone else noticed how virtually all self-help books say the exact opposite? they urge you to take control and work hard?

by: csack

09-10-2009 @ 2:26pm

you are a victim! you are poor because the system beat you down! you have no choice! pass this legislation and everything will be solved!

here you have another good example of a key difference between liberals and republicans. liberals think the problem is the system.

i'm not saying people can't have bad breaks, but i can't stand this victim mentality.

has anyone else noticed how virtually all self-help books say the exact opposite? they urge you to take control and work hard?

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 3:01pm

Obama's speech to students this week highlighted personal responsibility and being in control of one's destiny. We need to help those who can't help themselves through illness or other tragedy. But we should celebrate the many who rise up out of poverty, in spite of their circumstances, to become successful. Obama also highlighted the fact that anyone can make it in this country. His speech highlighted the difference between a balanced approach to this problem to one of the typical liberal blame-it-on-the-system approach. If we really looked at the WHY of poverty, we might start taking people like Bill Cosby a little more seriously.

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 3:01pm

Obama's speech to students this week highlighted personal responsibility and being in control of one's destiny. We need to help those who can't help themselves through illness or other tragedy. But we should celebrate the many who rise up out of poverty, in spite of their circumstances, to become successful. Obama also highlighted the fact that anyone can make it in this country. His speech highlighted the difference between a balanced approach to this problem to one of the typical liberal blame-it-on-the-system approach. If we really looked at the WHY of poverty, we might start taking people like Bill Cosby a little more seriously.

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 5:59pm

Why is it so easy to deny the negative impact systems can have on people? I am neither Republican or Democrat, but my own understanding of history and relationships with non white families, seem to show how long lasting and deep the negative impacts of slavery, racist Federal Housing policy and other systems are on people's lives today.

It boggles my mind why people are so quick to dismiss the impact of systems. I don't get it! Are we blaming the line workers in Detroit for their loss of work and plunge into poverty? Or the middle class white family who lost their savings in the stock market and now the parents can find a job in a weak economy for their poverty? No. We understand and accept today that certain systems failed us. Well, also certain systems failed nonwhite families in the past. Often, intentionally, but some unintentionally.

To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking.

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 5:59pm

Why is it so easy to deny the negative impact systems can have on people? I am neither Republican or Democrat, but my own understanding of history and relationships with non white families, seem to show how long lasting and deep the negative impacts of slavery, racist Federal Housing policy and other systems are on people's lives today.

It boggles my mind why people are so quick to dismiss the impact of systems. I don't get it! Are we blaming the line workers in Detroit for their loss of work and plunge into poverty? Or the middle class white family who lost their savings in the stock market and now the parents can find a job in a weak economy for their poverty? No. We understand and accept today that certain systems failed us. Well, also certain systems failed nonwhite families in the past. Often, intentionally, but some unintentionally.

To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking.

by: paradoxtor

09-10-2009 @ 6:39pm

The situations you describe as plunging people into poverty are largely temporary and recent. Can systems affect things? Of course. But I say why is it so easy to deny the negative impact peoples personal choices make? The overwhelming majority of people I come in contact with who are long term poor are there because of personal choices. The second factor is simply their family of origin and the values that were passed on to them. If you really want to give all people equal opportunity, all children should be removed from their parents at birth and turned over to the state. Then it would be truly fair. Obviously, I would not be for such a move. I am all for helping people but ultimately there must be personal responsibility.

by: paradoxtor

09-10-2009 @ 6:39pm

The situations you describe as plunging people into poverty are largely temporary and recent. Can systems affect things? Of course. But I say why is it so easy to deny the negative impact peoples personal choices make? The overwhelming majority of people I come in contact with who are long term poor are there because of personal choices. The second factor is simply their family of origin and the values that were passed on to them. If you really want to give all people equal opportunity, all children should be removed from their parents at birth and turned over to the state. Then it would be truly fair. Obviously, I would not be for such a move. I am all for helping people but ultimately there must be personal responsibility.

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 7:05pm

"To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking."

Perhaps you will want to tell that to Bill Cosby, or Juan Williams, who wrote the book Enough. Tell me one human system doesn't have a negative impact on people. Big government? I'm not just some middle-class white guy spewing out hatred for the poor. I work in a low-income school after living in Honduras for two years in the 1980s. I've travelled to Guatemala and Ethiopia. I can tell you about real poverty and failed systems. I can tell you about our adopted daugher's birth mother, who lives on 25 cents a day. She has little hope but God. Doesn't make excuses though. She just keeps making injera. I also can tell you about the many kids who make it in our "failed" system, through hard work, a strong parental figure and solid support from schools.

I also grew up in a blue-collar family where my parents' would have to borrow my newspaper money to buy milk at the end of the week. Can the system be better? Yes, but I hope you become a bit more bi-partisan, because your rhetoric is the same old "stuff" I come to expect from Sojourners.

by: ando

09-10-2009 @ 7:05pm

"To deny the negative impact systems can have on people, is simplistic and not well rounded in thinking."

Perhaps you will want to tell that to Bill Cosby, or Juan Williams, who wrote the book Enough. Tell me one human system doesn't have a negative impact on people. Big government? I'm not just some middle-class white guy spewing out hatred for the poor. I work in a low-income school after living in Honduras for two years in the 1980s. I've travelled to Guatemala and Ethiopia. I can tell you about real poverty and failed systems. I can tell you about our adopted daugher's birth mother, who lives on 25 cents a day. She has little hope but God. Doesn't make excuses though. She just keeps making injera. I also can tell you about the many kids who make it in our "failed" system, through hard work, a strong parental figure and solid support from schools.

I also grew up in a blue-collar family where my parents' would have to borrow my newspaper money to buy milk at the end of the week. Can the system be better? Yes, but I hope you become a bit more bi-partisan, because your rhetoric is the same old "stuff" I come to expect from Sojourners.

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 11:06pm

ando, if you grew up in a blue collar family and are white, then you had certain advantages that nonwhite households didn't have. Can you accept that as true?

Of course, I understand the reality and importance of individual choice and responsibility. I live and work in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I am often confronted with behaviours and choices that make me say, "what?".

But yet, can we not all just take a look back in this country's history to see how poorly and unfairly we have treated entire groups of people?

Of course, these both play a role in current situations, but they are intricately tied together and if we want to see lives and cities transformed then we have to be able to address both.

Too often though I think we simply focus on the individual. 70% of Americans still think that people are poor only because of their poor choices. I just can't buy that as true. I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

Inner Cities are not accidents. Concentrating poverty in this country was systematic and strategic. Poor people didn't just all choose to live in these neighborhoods, they were pushed there, isolated there and disinvested there.

As a Christian I am aware that there is such a thing as individual sin. I've got many of my own. But I also know that individual sin can build up a head of steam and become engrained in systems. Solomon in the Old Testament is a great example of a King whose individual sin built up and he created a dominant empire that did not care about the people around him. These people who once were slaves were now the slaveholders (See 1 Kings 9, 10 and 11).

The OT prophets consistently reminded us to remember the poor.

Jesus as well was focused on bringing healing and shalom to those experiencing leprosy, poverty and isolation in the world. He addressed our individual sins, but also through his radical love and way of being called out unjust systems of the time. Tax systems, religious systems and more.

We have got to find a way where we can be willing to understand that these issues go hand in hand and to change the world we are going to have to change both.

by: neerajmehta

09-10-2009 @ 11:06pm

ando, if you grew up in a blue collar family and are white, then you had certain advantages that nonwhite households didn't have. Can you accept that as true?

Of course, I understand the reality and importance of individual choice and responsibility. I live and work in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I am often confronted with behaviours and choices that make me say, "what?".

But yet, can we not all just take a look back in this country's history to see how poorly and unfairly we have treated entire groups of people?

Of course, these both play a role in current situations, but they are intricately tied together and if we want to see lives and cities transformed then we have to be able to address both.

Too often though I think we simply focus on the individual. 70% of Americans still think that people are poor only because of their poor choices. I just can't buy that as true. I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

Inner Cities are not accidents. Concentrating poverty in this country was systematic and strategic. Poor people didn't just all choose to live in these neighborhoods, they were pushed there, isolated there and disinvested there.

As a Christian I am aware that there is such a thing as individual sin. I've got many of my own. But I also know that individual sin can build up a head of steam and become engrained in systems. Solomon in the Old Testament is a great example of a King whose individual sin built up and he created a dominant empire that did not care about the people around him. These people who once were slaves were now the slaveholders (See 1 Kings 9, 10 and 11).

The OT prophets consistently reminded us to remember the poor.

Jesus as well was focused on bringing healing and shalom to those experiencing leprosy, poverty and isolation in the world. He addressed our individual sins, but also through his radical love and way of being called out unjust systems of the time. Tax systems, religious systems and more.

We have got to find a way where we can be willing to understand that these issues go hand in hand and to change the world we are going to have to change both.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:29am

Brian McLaren has said that it doesn't matter how good your answers are if you're not asking the right question. I'd like to challenge the question posed because we did not all start with wealth, affluence, and a highly productive society. Even accounting for some wealth disparities in the United States, most of the poor have access to and can afford things that were mere luxuries just a century ago. Even the king of England 200 years ago did not have refrigeration or climate-controlled rooms. Standards of living in society have risen very rapidly due to many factors.

A better question might be to ask, "What are those factors?" In other words, "What creates wealth, and what stands in its way?" Part of that answer rests on the axiom of peaceful activity and exchange. When people within a society are permitted to freely exchange and interact with other human beings peacefully, the society flourishes. When the rule of law protects those who do not wish to act and interact peacefully, such a society can remain relatively stable.

Correcting the individual and institutional evils that "create" poverty is indeed a worthy cause, but it is worthless without understanding why the opposite is true, and no solution will work by ignoring the connection between wealth creation and poverty reduction.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:29am

Brian McLaren has said that it doesn't matter how good your answers are if you're not asking the right question. I'd like to challenge the question posed because we did not all start with wealth, affluence, and a highly productive society. Even accounting for some wealth disparities in the United States, most of the poor have access to and can afford things that were mere luxuries just a century ago. Even the king of England 200 years ago did not have refrigeration or climate-controlled rooms. Standards of living in society have risen very rapidly due to many factors.

A better question might be to ask, "What are those factors?" In other words, "What creates wealth, and what stands in its way?" Part of that answer rests on the axiom of peaceful activity and exchange. When people within a society are permitted to freely exchange and interact with other human beings peacefully, the society flourishes. When the rule of law protects those who do not wish to act and interact peacefully, such a society can remain relatively stable.

Correcting the individual and institutional evils that "create" poverty is indeed a worthy cause, but it is worthless without understanding why the opposite is true, and no solution will work by ignoring the connection between wealth creation and poverty reduction.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:33am

I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

You don't need friends to "prove" that. It's just a fact of life that life is complicated. Your comments are good. I don't buy into that it was all poor choices, and that some people truly are "forced" by others into certain situations.

by: xfree9

09-11-2009 @ 12:33am

I have too many friendships with people whose lives are so much more complicated then their individual choices.

You don't need friends to "prove" that. It's just a fact of life that life is complicated. Your comments are good. I don't buy into that it was all poor choices, and that some people truly are "forced" by others into certain situations.

by: bhaack

09-11-2009 @ 8:44am

"We vilify those with less education, fewer job skills, or health problems. We characterize entire groups of people

by: bhaack

09-11-2009 @ 8:44am

"We vilify those with less education, fewer job skills, or health problems. We characterize entire groups of people

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 3:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 3:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 5:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 5:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 5:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: arachne646

09-11-2009 @ 5:49pm

It's not being a victim to realistically look at what barriers you need to deal with in order to succeed. The best way to overcome those barriers is to look, together with your neighbors and Christ, at the life you're living, and the society you're in. Work together with your brothers and sisters, not to be Ms. Superwoman CFO and loot the company and get big bonuses, although the self-help books might consider that success. The truth is, just telling kids "you can be anything you want to be, just dream it, set your goals, and work hard"--it's not true, there are very real roadblocks for some children that others do not face. Acknowledging this is the first step to changing it.

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 7:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)

by: JoannaCW

09-11-2009 @ 7:02pm

Individual choices matter, and that systemic injustice matters. We need to take responsibility for both, emphasizing whichever part we are most reluctant to confront in our own lives.

I've spent the last 8 years as a full-time volunteer on a Catholic Worker farm in a low-income rural area. I'm still learning how to be a good neighbor. And I'm finding it even harder to learn how to communicate about my work with more affluent folks. It seems that most people have a simple story about poverty.
Some say it's caused by personal irresponsibility, shiftlessness and sloth. I think of the migrant workers (many of them legal immigrants!) who come here and do exhausting work for long hours so they can send money home to feed their kids, and I think this story has got to be wrong.
Others say it's a systemic failure and poor people have no responsibility for/control over their own lives. And I think of the families I know who live in wretched housing because they can't afford anything better and yet smoke heavily and have cable. They do have a choice to make. (Of course, the rich families get smokes and cable and nice houses too, not always by dint of visible hard work...)