Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps — the refrain of homelessness, marginalization, and futility
(This really should be two or three separate posts. I have the opportunity to work here and now, so I’m going ahead and posting what I’ve written, as is.)
Updates have been slow in coming, I’m aware. A post regarding my budget and how I’ve arrived at the figures I am trying to raise is an important step towards the future. It’s coming. Feels like a boundary I need to cross.
Been a hard couple of days. Not entirely sure why. Loneliness. A deepening sense of futility. If it’s not the rain interfering with my writing and work on the fundraiser, it’s eye strain. If it’s not eye strain, it’s interference from security guards.
The municipality, private security, and Police work in coordination to corral and move the homeless around the city. Why? Any number of reasons. Mainly in service of the public perception of homelessness. More about this subject in a later post.
The security company, Garda, and the city have decided to move me on from the place I’ve been prepping my meals and using the internet. They’ve cut power to the socket I’ve been using. Based on events I’ll not go into here, I have reason to believe it was a cooperative effort. It’s frustrating mainly because it’s meant to frustrate. Ah well. I’ve eaten elsewhere.
It’s important to remember security guards have only the authority provided by property rights. In Canada, that amounts to very little. Not to say they cannot take steps, including unprompted violence. They usually prefer not to.
They will, however, go to lengths to orchestrate events which exploit the vulnerable, manifest anger, and create problems where there were none.
I’ve not yet gone into specifics about my experiences at this location, but it includes a security guard trying to destroy my belongings. If it wasn’t so offensive, it’d be funny. That kind of thing, happening in the dark, unseen, is a commonplace interaction for homeless people.
I’m working, slowly, on a piece about the way private security use low-level, quiet harassment against marginalized people, and the broad application of such tactics in urban environments. We’re persistently targeted.
Orchestrated aggression and harassment events are routinely used as a pretext for violence and the criminalization of a target. Furthermore, you may not be aware that even you, a regular, normal, law-abiding member of the public are on file with the security companies operating the commercial spaces you pass through. Who controls that data? What do they do with it? Yes.
The homeless and marginalized are subjected to a high level of profiling, are frequently interfered with, and routinely provoked. Why? Because we are easy targets.
When — or more honestly, if — we stand up for ourselves, witnesses assume we are mentally ill, or we are in the wrong.
This is a broad and important subject I take a serious interest in. Undecided as to whether I should gamble my credibility on writing more deeply about it though.
Returning to the main point… People have offered advice, unsolicited, about what I ought to post, what kind of stories they’d like to see. The problem there is not that they have input, feedback, or advice to offer. I welcome input. I’ve sought it at every step this past year. I need help. Communicating with people means common ground, shared context and experience. I’ve been homeless so long I have no idea what a normal person’s life is like.
No, it’s not that some people have offered feedback. It’s that some have taken the attitude my homelessness is an entertainment, a reality TV show for them to enjoy. Updates about my life on the street is something they want not as a way to understand, or to help them offer the sort of help I’ve spent thirteen years fighting for. Instead, it’s ‘Survivor: Homeless Edition.’
Is it because I’m not a raving lunatic, writhing around, wearing my own filth? Is it because I’ve demonstrated a base level of rationality? I’m not actually dying in front of your eyes, far as you can tell? Must it always come down to perception and timescale? Either way, I am not shifting blame or pointing fingers.
It’s not an uncommon turn of events, people putting their deep-felt pain out into the public. Mourning, challenges, problems, struggles — human suffering often involves a performance today, and it’s an imperfect and nuanced thing. It’s interactive, to a degree, and, importantly, consensual. Not so with my homelessness, my appeal for your help. Sharing is the deal. I have no way to opt out.
Crowd-sourcing a fundraiser means I’m always thinking about my homelessness in relation to others’ experiences and how they filter my life and identity. It’s uncomfortable. It’s necessary. That doesn’t mean my suffering is entertainment. It feels like people have passed that over.
It’s disheartening. I know no other word for it.
(Lol, maybe I should’ve titled this one, ‘Insecurity and Finger Wagging.’ Nah. I like the title I gave it. Never mind it’s from a romantic ballad. It fits. If you want to hear some great versions of the song, try each from Trini Lopez, Ibrahim Ferrer, or Trío Los Panchos.)
