Thanks! I try my best, even if there's little I can do as a single person. It burns me up how homelessness and poverty have been criminalized here in the U.S.
brizzzy
JoinedPosts by brizzzy
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Young adults who are disfellowshipped/disassociated and houselessness?
by Aaron Eldridge ini was wondering if anyone knew of any individuals that became houseless when they were disfellowshipped or disassociated themselves.
i know that i had to move out of my house within a few months after i disassociated myself, but i believe that if i did not have anywhere to go my parents would not have kicked me out of the house.. .
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Young adults who are disfellowshipped/disassociated and houselessness?
by Aaron Eldridge ini was wondering if anyone knew of any individuals that became houseless when they were disfellowshipped or disassociated themselves.
i know that i had to move out of my house within a few months after i disassociated myself, but i believe that if i did not have anywhere to go my parents would not have kicked me out of the house.. .
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brizzzy
*OK, abbreviated standard soapbox speech!* I am an advocate for the homeless and work with them on a fairly regular basis, give talks at homeless shelters and conferences, etc. Volunteer work, shelters, soup kitchens, etc. are important as an interim "band-aid" type solution and can definitely make a difference to at least a handful of homeless people, but the problem is growing and there are several (very valid) reasons why many homeless "choose" the streets over shelters (http://www.socialoutcast.net/blog/2009/03/24/10-reasons-why-homeless-people-choose-to-be-homeless/). There are also very finite limits as to the number of shelters/halfway houses and the number of homeless people they are allowed to take in (often they are also only allowed to accept applicants who meet very limited criteria, as well).
There are SO many reasons behind homelessness and it really can't be pinned down to one cause, such as addiction, mental illness, laziness, or an attitude problem (i.e., "they just don't want to follow rules!") A huge part of what I do each day is just trying to change the public's perception of homelessness, who is homeless, and what exactly the word means - showing them the faces and stories behind the label. Until a lot of the negative stereotypes and stigma can be rooted out, the general public reaction will continue to be apathy ("Why should I care?") or outright hostility ("they DESERVE to be homeless! They just don't want to help themselves! They just want handouts and to sponge off my taxpayer money!")
While I encourage volunteer work and will give homeless people money or food when I have it to give (as I am all for making even a small one-time difference to a single homeless person if possible), I always try to remind people that these are temporary, "band-aid" solutions and treat the symptom, not the disease. Which is why it is paramount to attack the root cause of homelessness by pushing to institute and support legislation that will provide affordable, sustainable housing for all. A lot of other countries (i.e, parts of Europe, Canada, etc.) have vastly improved, if not perfect, approaches to counteracting homelessness, versus the U.S.A.'s approach. It's really important to take a look at what is working in those countries and try to get those policies instituted here as well.
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Young adults who are disfellowshipped/disassociated and houselessness?
by Aaron Eldridge ini was wondering if anyone knew of any individuals that became houseless when they were disfellowshipped or disassociated themselves.
i know that i had to move out of my house within a few months after i disassociated myself, but i believe that if i did not have anywhere to go my parents would not have kicked me out of the house.. .
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brizzzy
In my experience, the police, social workers, and school officials all believed/sided with my parents.
When I was younger (about 10) my elementary school called social services when I came in to school bruised and bleeding all over from a beating. A social worker visited ONCE and then came by for a second and final visit to tell my parents that she was closing the case and believed it to have been an "isolated incident".
Then I was twice physically grabbed by the hair and dragged out into the street at 15 and 17 and told never to come back (school friends took me in those times). I continued attending high school and getting good grades. I made school officials aware of my situation, but they didn't want to be involved in that can of worms and turned a blind eye, encouraging me to go back. Within a couple of months, my parents sent the police to bring me back, saying that I was a "runaway" (I wasn't) and denying throwing me out. I told them the real story, which was corroborated by the people putting me up, but the police just told me I had two choices: To go back with my parents, or to go to juvenile hall, "where I would find out what real hell was like" (police officer's words, not mine). He showed me zero compassion and treated me like a spoiled child throwing a tantrum, rather than a desperate and terrified abused teen.
And then at 23 I moved back in with my mother for a very short stint, as I lost my job in the recession and had nowhere to go. The caveat she gave me was that I had to go to the meetings. I faked it for almost two months, as best as I could, for survival's sake, but what can I say...I'm a terrible liar. I was thrown out with only a couple of days' notice and nowhere to go, and ended up living out of a vehicle in a parking lot for 9 months, and in what was basically a converted shed in the desert for another year and a half.
There's a reason that parents can get away with this stuff. Very few people actually care about kids or view them as real people rather than an extension of their parents. It often has to get insanely bad before anybody is willing to take action, and often troubled teens are viewed as little brats just acting out of rebellion, rather than a human being with a legitimate problem. It's been my experience that adults in an authority position are usually far more likely to take the parent's side and believe the parent's version of events. And many JW parents are experts at turning on the waterworks and playing the martyr card..."We're just a good, helpless, loving Christian family cursed with a selfish, disobedient, ungrateful son/daughter!" It's bullshit, but effective.
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Young adults who are disfellowshipped/disassociated and houselessness?
by Aaron Eldridge ini was wondering if anyone knew of any individuals that became houseless when they were disfellowshipped or disassociated themselves.
i know that i had to move out of my house within a few months after i disassociated myself, but i believe that if i did not have anywhere to go my parents would not have kicked me out of the house.. .
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brizzzy
Yup, I did (never DF'd, just no longer believed in it, mother threw me out). And wrote a book about it. I've since been contacted by MANY young ex-JWs who were or are homeless due to DA'ing, being DF'd, or coming out as LGBT.
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Kingdom Hall remodel - scam
by Dagney ini was wondering from any here in the know, does it seem like there is a lot of "remodels" going on?.
in the last week i had the occasion to talk with two jw's in different halls, about 10 miles apart.
they both are undergoing major remodels.
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brizzzy
Your old hall is the same as my old hall, Dagney...really, they're remodelling again?
I drove by there with my boyfriend (also an ex-JW) last week to show him where I used to go. I know that forever it was that half steeple/half not-steeple because it was a church when they bought it and they couldn't decide whether to leave the steeple up or take it down, so they kind of chopped it off halfway and it looked ridiculous and completely ruined the architecture. It stayed that way for decades.
They tore down the hall/church completely about four years ago and rebuilt it from the ground up to look like every other KH, complete with hideous color scheme and busy Las-Vegas patterned carpets. Oh, it was cornea-searingly ugly. It was late 2008 (I had just been laid off and for a brief period I was staying with my mother, who was dragging me to meetings "if I was going to stay in her house"). I even went and handed out drinks/lemonade to the workers and stayed overnight in my mom's van to do security duty a couple of times.
And now they're redoing it again?!?!?! Maybe they got enough complaints about the vomit-inducing color scheme to change it up. -
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What's your Myers-Briggs?
by Londo111 ini am infp.. some former witnesses in my hometown had a meetup last night...alas, only four of us.
but it turned out we had an infp(me), two infjs, and an enfp.
therefore, it turned out we were all idealists.
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brizzzy
I've always consistently tested INFP, though I've spent a few years trying to develop more logical/rational thinking rather than relying on knee-jerk feeling quite as much.
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LGBT community rallies for Jehovahs Witnesses
by brizzzy inhow much do you wanna bet the irony flies right over their heads with a *whoosh*?.
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http://lgbtweekly.com/2012/01/05/lgbt-community-rallies-for-jehovahs-witnesses/ .
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brizzzy
How much do you wanna bet the irony flies right over their heads with a *whoosh*?
http://lgbtweekly.com/2012/01/05/lgbt-community-rallies-for-jehovahs-witnesses/ -
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Orange Co meetup
by Dagney innext tuesday, 12/06, a few of us will be getting together for little meetup in the irvine area.
i'm thinking around 6pm, haven't decided on a place yet.
it's open to all.
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brizzzy
These are the two we have coming up in January. One is a gritty drama, the other is a hilarious comedy (I read the script; it's gonna be really funny):
http://scr.org/calendar/view.aspx?id=4434
http://scr.org/calendar/view.aspx?id=4256
Unfortunately I can't get "Christmas Carol" comps because they sell out every year so they only let employees in to see one preview :-\
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Orange Co meetup
by Dagney innext tuesday, 12/06, a few of us will be getting together for little meetup in the irvine area.
i'm thinking around 6pm, haven't decided on a place yet.
it's open to all.
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brizzzy
It was lovely meeting you guys! We need to do it again sometime :) I bet I could get you all tickets to the theatre at one of our upcoming plays...
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Please vote for my JW Novel: Happiness: How To Find It!
by donuthole ini'm calling on the support of the vast apostate army to help get my upcoming novel "happiness: how to find it" to the next round in curiosity quills nano-virtuosos contest.
please follow this link and vote for anthony mathenia in the poll toward the bottom of the page.
thank you friends!.
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brizzzy
Voted! :) Looks like you're in 2nd place at the moment; good luck! (Voting is at the bottom of the page if anyone is looking; it took me a while to find it).