Where are these conversations happening? Where are...

Sunday, June 10, 2012

“Where are these conversations happening? Where are people talking about what it’s like to be educated or from a middle-class family or any other form of privileged and poor, at the very same time? If it’s happening, it’s likely to end when someone says, “Go get a job,” perhaps responded to in 140 passive aggressive characters, spewed quickly in the back of a coffee shop.”

Young, Privileged, and Applying for Food Stamps | The Billfold (via meganwest)

The recession has forced a lot of folks who thought they’d never be one of “those people” to go on government assistance. It’s made many people a lot more humble. But most of us don’t talk about it, because it’s a little embarrassing to admit that, despite having a college education and coming from a “nice” neighborhood and doing everything “right,” sometimes you still end up jobless and penniless.

A good friend of mine was on food stamps after we graduated from college because her 60+ hour/week job paid less than $11,000 per year. She was teaching and mentoring inner-city students. My sister went on food stamps after graduating from one of the Seven Sisters. She was waiting tables and studying for the MCATS. When I was unemployed in the latter half of 2010, I took my unemployment and went on a state program that gave me a discount on my gas bill.

So, yeah. This stuff is real and it happens. Conservatives love to push the idea that only lazy people don’t work, only bums get government assistance, that these programs only benefit people who don’t want to work. The truth is, these programs are feeding a lot of recent college graduates who are still suffering from the recession.

(via stfuconservatives)