It's just self assigned welfare benefits!
After all, lying around and letting someone else house, feed, clothe, and medicate you IS stealing. What's the difference (for an able person) between taking a welfare check to buy a television, and walking into a store to carry one out? It just bypasses the expense and administrative trouble of the check sending and cashing process.
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There are looters at every level of society.
"I have made the observation that people in the Katrina catastrophe are doing what they've always done, only more so. The generous are being grandly magnanimous; the paranoid are losing their ever-lovin' minds; the depressed are catatonic; the poor are destitute; etc. To this let me add that I am now becoming quite seriously pissed off listening to some of my friends and aquaintances. The selfishness and sense of entitlement that some people are now demonstrating is incredible, and though I should expect it, disheartening.
The young Black women at work have been encouraging me to get me some of that "free money," as they know that my roof is a mess. The have told me, "Girl, you White folks don't know how to do it, get on down there and tell 'em you need all they can give you."
Let me tell you that White folks do know how to do it. I know of a doctor's family with very minimal damage who got the $2000.00 from FEMA and bought a $1300.00 clock for their mantle. And they think it's cute, how they scammed the system. People with a home in Michigan and a condo in Florida got FEMA to reimburse for their purchase of a generator, again having sustained minimal damage at their home in Mississippi.
Oh, White folks know how to do it, all right. And these are the same people who think that people on welfare are all scam artists, and the same people who begrudge working single mothers thier foodstamps. The aid that we are being given by various agencies is still welfare, people. Just because the stigma is not the same under these circumstances doesn't mean you are entitled to "free money." Just because your home is in a county that is a federally mandated disaster area doesn't mean you have suffered a calamity. Did you miss a meal? Then why the fuck are you getting the month's worth of foodstamps?
When I began doing mental health counseling years ago, I quickly learned that you cannot judge people's pain by your own. One young lady's lack of the "right" date to the prom can cause subjectively as much distress as another's friend's suicide. But, frankly, dear readers, I am getting quite put out at those people threatening lawsuits because thier cable is still out. Crying over thier smushed SUV when their home and Saturn are still fine. Worrying that they won't be able to take thier yearly trip to Cancun because the port of departure is no longer there.
I have not sought any aid, and this is not only out of the goodness of my heart. Frankly, I don't have the patience it will take to get some of this assistance, and I don't need it. I have been incredibly fortunate, both in the damage my home sustained (roughly $8000.00 in real damage, much of which will be covered by insurance) and in my close friends, who pulled together and helped one another out, and continue to still do so.
My real reason for staying out of these "free money" lines is this:
This country is my beloved home, though those on the right would probably label my liberal ass a traitor for some of my political stances. I love this country, and Rita scared the shit out of me, because I couldn't see how we could afford to bail New Orleans and Mississippi out, and still help all of the folks who might need the same degree of aid from Rita. Thankfully, Rita wasn't the absolute disaster that she could have been, but people in the area where she hit will need much assistance. We are in deep financial trouble here in America, people, and I will be damned before I accept aid that I only minimally need and put the country that little bit more in the hole. I know my little family's "take" would come to only about $3,100.00 ($2000.00 "automatic" FEMA aid, $190.00 x 2 for food stamps, and $360.00 x2 from the Red Cross), but multiply that by the tens of thousands of us Americans who are abusing the system for that amount and you can figure out that the bill collector is going to come calling sometime and it won't be pretty--you don't have to be a genius to figure that out. Or even a "True Patriot."
If you are reading this and you are getting angry and feeling a little defensive that I'm talking about you, I probably am, and I don't want to hear about it. Shut up and Shovel."
-Hattie's Blog
Ab so lutely.
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