Forum Post: women, children, disabled people, welfare recipients needing more of a voice @ ows, but how?
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 25, 2011, 11:32 p.m. EST by turtlebeanz
(40)
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my son and i have gone to ows a few times. i am disabled and alone with him. he is three and has significant health issues as well. so it's taken about all i have to get us there the few times we've gone. and i've made a point of letting folks know we are open to hosting people who need a break from the ground. i feed and offer showers, bed. i am a person who was always gainfully employed. but shortly after having a child, i got really sick and the dad left. i have had the totally unexpected experience of living the past three years in the welfare system. i know in some ways i'm what everybody at ows is fighting against appearing to be -- someone who is taking more out of the system than i am putting in. but the bottom line is, the welfare offices are full of people who look just like me and the little boy. women and children. and so many of those other women are so exhausted, just like me. there is not an inch of room for a big mistake. if i get arrested there is nobody to take care of the kid. the subway trip down to zuccotti and a few hours there wipes me out for days -- and that costs my child. i would really like to see the movement taking more into account women and children in crisis, as well as the disabled. i read a post by another woman a while back who was talking about similar stuff. i don't agree with her that going down for a few hours is half hearted. actually, it takes my whole heart and hurts my body and i have to recover for several days. i have yet to be able to participate in a general assembly. we made the trip down for the first one at washington square park and had to leave very early.
so so so many of the poorest are women and children. and i guess i'm just concerned that the very worst off of us can't be there to communicate on our own behalves the way we'd like to. there is so much i think should be happening around welfare -- i'd like to have a chance to talk to people about what welfare offices are like, the process of getting needed help, ways in which perhaps the money available for welfare could be more intelligently used, as well as what seem to be pervasive, punitive policies now in place (for eg, it seems like they are making women with children be in these job programs full-time in order to receive minimal benefits. there are NO jobs. so women are forced to leave very small children in order to be warehoused so everyone can feel happy that we're being adequately tough on the poor. but what the hell's the point??? for a single mom, i'd say that looks like a vacation. it's the kids who lose out). anyway, i just feel like there really needs to be a conversation around women, children and poverty in this country -- and my kid's asleep at 8 and i'm here with him, in our room without a bathroom or kitchen, keeping him safe immediately, but not really getting the chance to participate in a conversation that could help him out longer term. so, yeah, i'm sure people have plenty of judgment about people receiving welfare and i hope i don't get kicked in the head for raising my concerns. but there it is. peace.
and by the way, just because i'm a mom doesn't mean i want to be at parents' night only. i was actually snubbed by another mom at zuccotti park, i kid you not -- a monied brooklyn hipster toting around her shabby chic tot and apparently not thinking my neighborhood was cool enough.
i am an extremely low-income woman, chronically ill and with a child. the others i have met like myself do not seem in the main to be at zuccotti park -- they are stuck in welfare offices and punitive jobs programs that will get them nowhere but will keep them from showing up to protest on their own behalves.
I'm with you all the way, and I do want to see tax reform and welfare overhaul. I'm also sorry to hear that people are unwilling to listen to you simply because of your class; my family was working poor because my mom decided to homeschool my sister and I (we couldn't afford private or Catholic schools even on two salaries and the public school where we were was a standard inner-city school) and when my dad's plant closed we wound up on food stamps for a while until he was able to land another job. I firmly believe that we need to restructure welfare into something more akin to AFDC (pre-1996) than TANF(what we have now) and change the tax code accordingl to help pay for it.
would someone perhaps consider bringing my post to a GA at wall street? i just feel like women and children need a different kind of scheduling than what is happening. peace.
I don't have a specific recommendation for how to reconcile OWS and your responsibilities, but I know that I urgently hope and wish to make things better for you and your child, and I think that is part of OWS's mission. When you take care of your kid, you're doing OWS work; when you take care of yourself, you're doing OWS work; and when you can get to the park and demos, you're doing OWS work.
you rock, mr5roses.
many thanks for gentleness. so... any suggestions? how can i get my voice heard when i can't participate in ga's, in the main? how can i help get women and children in the welfare system more into focus in this movement? i do like the idea of going to the welfare office. there are many, many deeply frustrated, awesome people there. but we are a particularly impeded lot, most of the time lugging our kids around, kids who are pissed off enough in the welfare offices, nevermind for any period of time at ows. and there are others, like me, who are sick and disabled. feeling frustrated, looking for some allies to work with..... peace.
I've been working with families in my state's family shelter system for the last 7 years. I was completely in shock when I learned what single mom's (and some dad's) go through on a daily basis and how they are treated by workers in the welfare bureaucracy and shelters. Punitive is exactly the word for it. My employer has actually told me to tone it down when I've try to speak out about it because they are worried about maintaining a good relationship with state agencies that fund them. The shelter system here is in total disarray and the policies seem to change every few months so no one ever knows what going on and families are left not know if or when they will get out of shelter. I would gladly get involved in some sort of "occupy action" with you if we were in the same state. I think OWS and similar type protests will probably be with us for a while given how the economy is going and I'm sure there will be opportunities in the future to get involved. Keep talking with people...I know there are allies out there. This Brooklyn agency got banned from providing advocacy at welfare offices/job centers so they must have been doing something right! http://www.maketheroad.org/ http://www.gothamgazette.com/article/law/20040917/13/1114
oddgrrrl & karai2 -- you have seen what i have seen. thank you for speaking out.
I feel you. I am one of 4 children raised by a single mom, and welfare, it was not an easy life. I have found myself in a situation as an adult, after a lifetime of refusing to be in the welfare system, which has brought me into a state of need and dependence upon the welfare, medicaid, and rental assistance programs of New York City. It is a nightmare, bureaucratic time consuming process which sets certain income limits(ex:if one earns more than $780 per month one will be disqualified from medicaid) upon people to assure that one must remain well below poverty levels in order to keep a level of assistance which barely enables survival. Additionally, it is a full time job just filling out paperwork, waiting for phone calls that never arrive, going to meetings that take hours to convene and chasing down case workers who never return calls. Personally, if I had the full power of my health, I would not participate in the welfare system. I know your situation of having a child and being disabled makes everything more challenging, the welfare process is exhausting with little benefit. The question of how to outreach to people in the welfare system and support their participation in OWS is important and valid. Two ideas: #1Transportation: Outreach to DC37 and request metro cards which can be given to people bearing benefit cards, who come to OWS to participate.
2 Have folks from outreach organize a day when a group of OWS folks go to the food stamp and medicaid offices to give out information, I would suggest the 1st and the 15th of the month.
You make some good points, I hope someone hears you.
peace