This is sad. On so many levels.
This is sad, first and foremost, because the pictured individuals feel as if this is the best way to survive for another day. This is sad because of how extremely unsafe this is for these individuals not only because of the threat of injury from a distracted or drugged driver swerving off the exit ramp, but because of their exposure to vehicle exhaust and this summer’s heat.
This is sad because the government’s “mainstream” experiment has failed miserably although the plan seemed to make sense after so much physical and sexual abuse took place in mental health hospitals back in the 1950s and ‘60s, and this is sad because of a lack of mental health help that exists these days in the Wheeling area.
This is sad because so many people see “ugly” instead of “tragedy;” because folks feel the city needs to “clean up the corner” instead of witnessing the struggle, and because such a scene captured above becomes the “Face of Wheeling” for first-time tourists when it’s really the “Face of America” during the country’s current addiction epidemic.
This is sad because lawbreakers are using the unhealthy as human shields to hide from authorities; because it’s easy to broad brush-blame the homeless population for the crimes committed by some but not all, and because during an election year, people are more worried about sustaining political division instead of what is consuming – ravaging – the core of our country.
And this is sad because homelessness has been made to be side-versus-side political, and that does nothing for the people sitting – and sometimes lying – along dangerous offramps and roadways so they can fuel what life has become.
This is sad. On so many levels. We need to understand more and work harder. All of us. On all of it.
