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I told you yesterday about my unconventional by modern Western standards experience of growing up in a small Southern community in the 1970s. I am sure that some of you were shocked at the responsibility of a six-year old caring for an elderly neighbor with dementia.

But let’s think for a moment…

About society…government…religion…charities response…

Imagine…

The police arrive at the place you have been living. They tell you that you have five minutes to grab ONE bag of your stuff. You will move to the place they have chosen for you…because the ‘powers that be’ have decided it is better for you.

You will live with dozens of others. You will obey THEIR rules. You will have no privacy. No rights. You cannot be with your partner…they will be taken to a different facility.

They will take your dog to the ‘pound’. If it is a certain type of breed, it will be killed instantly. Otherwise…it will be put up for adoption…and eventually killed if someone does not adopt it.

Or you can go to JAIL…

Those are your only options.

That is not some distant future dystopian novel…that is the reality for the homeless on our streets. Whether you are in America or the UK.

And if you think they deserve it…that they are nothing but druggies and alcoholics…well, you are reading the WRONG blog. I am not denying that drugs and alcohol are issues faced by the homeless. But more often than not they are attempts to self-medicate mental health issues that the ‘system’ has failed to address for DECADES…since childhood sometimes.

These are PEOPLE…who have been let down by their families…abused…shunned. By the schools as ‘stupid’…troublemakers…challenging. By health system…who treat only acute symptoms such as psychosis or suicide attempts…and not underlying issues such as anxiety or depression.

And before you say…they should get a job…WHAT JOB? McDonald’s and retailers are automating left and right. McJobs….now require a college degree (or more accurately with that college degree the only job you can get is at McDonalds). What chance does a homeless person stand against a college graduate?

The truth is…without family and strong communities…it is virtually impossible to break the downward spiral in which these PEOPLE find themselves.

They have been de-humanized by the very systems which are meant to ‘help’ them that they quickly loose whatever tiny bit of self-esteem they might have once had. And without that…even if given housing…they soon find themselves back in those same situations…self-medicating.

Over my fifty year life-span, homelessness has gone from occasional ‘hobos’ riding the rails and rarely passing through. People who community would offer a warm meal or a few dollars in exchange for a bit of work (sometimes jobs that were made-up just to give them dignity). It was rare…and a male issue.

Today, when we go out to the streets of Swansea (a relatively small city), we see almost as many women as men. Women who are vulnerable to sexual and physical abuse.

Government…religion…and charities are failing.

They are not ‘helping’ these people. Their solutions only further de-humanize them. Making these people more dependent. Doing nothing to build their broken minds or enable them to care for themselves.

We have become a NANNY state.

And it is not just the homeless.

Imagine…

You are a parent. You know that something is ‘different’ with your little human. She does not like loud noises or bright lights…she HATES going to the store. She does not really play with other children. She just sort of plays next to them. But you are told…she’s a girl…she’ll outgrow it.

Then she starts school. She won’t eat what they serve. But you are not allowed to send the food she will eat…because it comes from McDonalds. She goes hungry all day. She struggles with the noise, lights, and crowded conditions (thirty four-year-olds with two adults in a fifteen feet square room for seven or eight hours per day).

Her star is always on the yellow or red circle at the end of the day. Because as hard as she has tried to keep it together, the only thing that matters is the last thing that she did…not her overall behaviors…only the most recent. She won’t help pick up the toys so she ends every single day badly…no matter how good she was those other seven hours. other children get prizes as they leave. She and you get admonished.

She is bullied. She goes from a bright and loving child to withdrawn and sullen. She asks you every day…Am I dumb? Am I stupid? Am I ugly? When you go to the teachers and even over her head…you are told…you’re child needs to go a thicker skin. When you point to their own Zero Tolerance bullying policy, you are told that is just political correctness.

So you take responsibility for your little human. You de-register her. You educate her at home. You pay for EVERYTHING she needs out of your own pockets. Books. Computers. Art supplies. Gymnastics. Museum trips. You spend hours and months reading everything you can get your hands on about your child’s ‘behavioral problems’. You try a hundred different things and strategies. You are with your child 24/7/365. No breaks.

But you do it all because you love her. You want the best for her. You don’t want her broken and failed by the systems.

You don’t want her to end up on the streets…HOMELESS.

And there are other parents like you. The numbers are increasing every year. That scares the schools…the education system…the GOVERNMENT. So what they do? Do they correct the issues that drove you to home educate? The bullying? Early diagnosis of autism even for girls? Support for their sensory challenges like smaller class size, lower lighting, sensory/quiet rooms? Do they offer you support/education so you can better meet your little human’s needs?

No, they decide that these children are at risk of abuse. Based on one case. Ignoring the hundreds and thousands of little humans who are depressed and even suicidal because of the bullying at THEIR schools.

So they are attempting to pass laws…to change the rules…to force these same parents who have been failed by their system…to allow them to come into their homes. To allow some adult that they have never met before to be alone with your VULNERABLE little human. To interrogate her about her education…are you abusing her.

To threaten this child who was bullied in their schools with being FORCED back there…because they don’t like your methods of educating. Because of course…unless it looks like their methods…the ones that did not work for your little human to begin with…in their schools…then it could not possibly education.

This too is happening RIGHT NOW in England and Wales. Parents being bullied by schools because they had the nerve to accept full legal and financial responsibility for their little humans…after they were failed and bullied in those schools.

Their biggest supporter? Charities! A famous one who for a decade ran a fundraising campaign claiming that giving them your £££ would STOP child abuse. It did not! But that organization top executives took home close to a £1,000,000 of your money each and every year.

And now they have turned their eyes to home educating families…because the governments that are the major source of their income…even more than your millions and millions of pounds that you gave from those heart-rendering TV adverts…want it. Conflict of interest?

Not even one dozen cases of supposedly home educated little humans abused or killed in decades…WORLD WIDE! Versus how many bullied in THEIR schools? How many depressed…with low self-esteem? Scared for life? Bound for the streets because they were failed by schools? OR…dead by suicide…because the bullying got too much for them!

No, they don’t give a damn about our little humans. Don’t buy that LIE. Just their system. Their governments. Their jobs. White midddle-class, college educated executives mostly. Because they also don’t give a damn about the low level teachers…or the call center workers manning national charity hotlines…taking child abuse reports WITHOUT any social work qualifications!

That, folks, is SOCIETY’s…governments…and charities’ solution to big issues. Oh, I left out religion…they will pray for you. IF you send them a $100 donation.