Normally, when I see shit like this, I blow it off. 'Oh well, whata ya gonna do?'. But in this case, I feel obligated to speak up.
I just clicked on a diary titled "I don't give a flying f--k how homeless people get food stamps"
Seemed like a good rant. I don't give a flying f--k how homeless people get food stamps either. So I clicked and read about how there were some "assholes" in another diary thread who "were not compassionate with their comments concerning the homeless to say the least." And furthermore, according to this diarist ranter, "Even the homeless deserve a smidgen of dignity and yet, some here on Kos want to deny them that. WTF? Is Eric Cantor a troll on this site or what?"
This diary was on the Rec' List, recommended by some smart people, so I assumed there must be something to it. So I clicked on that other, egregious, uncompassionate diary to track down the assailants. I bet it's those same assholes who yelled at me in one of my diaries. Now I'll get them!!! lol.
Oops. I read the diary and pretty much ever comment, and I didn't see one asshole who was lacking compassion for the homeless. In fact, it turned out that the Ranter, was completely wrong about everything he/she said about the other diary thread.
The "rant" diary was wrong from the first paragraph. It said this:
Earlier today there was a diary concerning the homeless getting food stamps.
Wrong. The diary in question was not "concerning the homeless getting food stamps." It was concerning where the people who receive food stamps get to use them - namely, at fast food restaurants or not.
In fact, the diary isn't about the homeless. The diarist, beach babe in fl, who's very much not an uncompassionate asshole, only uses the word "homeless" once in her diary. And there she's talking about "advocates for the homeless." The key word being "advocates".
In the comments, where those assholes were sure to reside, I only found one mention of the homeless not being able to get food stamps. It was kind of a weak argument. But it was in no way malicious. This is the relevant part:
WTF? "Access to cooked meals"? It should be thoroughly explained how the homeless even have access to food stamps before this insanity should go any further. Don't you have to have an actual address, in order to receive them in the first place?
The commenter was clearly talking about the logistics of the argument that homeless should be able to spend their food stamps at fast food chains when, as it seemed to the commenter at the time, the homeless can't apply for food stamps because you have to have an address to even apply for food stamps.
Granted, this comment was misinterpreted by a few people who thought the commenter was somehow implying that the homeless shouldn't be allowed to get food stamps because they don't have an address. It wasn't misinterpreted by me or a few others. But it was a dumb comment based on wrong information - the homeless can use shelter address in most states apparently (I personally don't know why anyone should even need an address but that's another matter.
So the commenter clarified quite convincingly that she wasn't saying that at all:
Oh, no (2+ / 0-)
I'm totally NOT saying that at all--just that I can't understand how that can be a justification to allow fast food to be purchased "by the homeless" because "cook facilities" aren't accessible to them.
As someone else pointed out, there are lots of things that you can buy with food stamps that don't have to be cooked. But my point was that if you're homeless, you don't have an address to begin with, so how could you be getting food stamps at all, let alone want to be able to buy fast food with them?
I think the homeless should have access to them too, but let's face it, there's no way to do that reasonably, given the transience of the homeless population. What ought to happen is an expansion of assistance to community outreach programs.
Now, maybe that wasn't good enough. But even if you mistook the commenter's comments in the worst way, that's still only one "asshole". Where are all these "goddamn assholes that need to look "directly into the eyes" of the homeless.
I found not one person who thought that the homeless shouldn't be able to get food stamps. Not one.
Finally, a few other people pointed out that the Rant Diary was a complete, bullshit misinterpretaion of the other diary and its comments. What was the response of the Rant diarist? Change the subject of course.
As I said, this is a complete misrepresentation (5+ / 0-)
of the other diary.
The question there was should policy be changed so that food stamps could be spent on unhealthy marginally nutritious fast food restaurants, aka another giant taxpayer subsidy in the wrong direction for big food.
It had nothing to do with who GETS food stamps. This is completely dishonest.
by fizziks on Thu Jun 30, 2011 at 09:01:38 PM CDT
asdf (8+ / 0-)
The question there was should policy be changed so that food stamps could be spent on unhealthy marginally nutritious fast food restaurants, aka another giant taxpayer subsidy in the wrong direction for big food.
So, because Taco Bell will basically get a subsidy and because the food is unhealthy and marginally nutritious the homeless should go hungry.
Wow. Such compassion for "the least of these" makes me want to puke.
I don't give a fuck about Taco Bell or fucking Moldy Mac. My concern is for the homeless first, you know that annoying little thing in the high holy book about feeding the hungry but you and others are avocating for mass starvation of the homeless or what?
So instead of acknowledging that the diarist's Rant completely misrepresented what the other diary was even fucking talking about, the Ranter moves on to discussing the merits, or lack thereof, of what the other diary WAS talking about, namely whether food stamps should be used to buy Big Macs or not.
Now, don't get me wrong. This is a valid debate, and both side make decent points.
But it's not what the Ranter's fucking diary was about! That Rant diary didn't mention once whether fast food with food stamps was a good idea or not. So to attack another commenter just for pointing out this fact with self-righteous indignation, effectively accusing him of not caring enough about the homeless, is nothing but slimy.
You know, it's easy to make mistakes reading so many people's view points. We all suffer from information overload. But I'm seeing this kind of bullshit far too often now. Inability to argue fairly, and honestly.
If someone misinterprets a comment or diary about the mating season of the dung beetle, that's one thing. But I'm seeing a lot of misinterpretations that involve the smearing of other people, including fellow Kossacks. That is unacceptable. Even if we can't make the time to parse every single point each other makes about every issue, when it comes to attacks and smears of our fellow members, don't you think that at least deserves some due diligence? Like clicking a link?
There were others in the Rant thread who also failed to acknowledge that the Rant diary was bullshit. They didn't care. It was just an opportunity to make their case about how elitist it is to deny food stamp recipients, homeless or not, Happy Meals, or whatever crap McDonald's is selling.
Whatever happened to honor in politics. I mean, I know what happened to it among the Beltway class. I mean, what happened to it among liberals? Maybe my view of liberals as being the good guys, the ones who tell the truth, even if it hurts, was misplaced.
Regardless, this was a bunch of stupid so I felt I had to blow 40 minutes of otherwise quality time pointing it out.
PS. To those who say that the government doesn't have the right, or shouldn't regulate what food stamp recipients eat with those food stamps, a dubious assertion on its face, I would just ask you to consider how far you would take that notion. We don't let food stamps buy tobacco products. But you don't eat tobacco do you? But what if a particular food was shown to be as deadly as tobacco?
It's one thing to say, Hey, I feed my kids fast food. Who am I to say the homeless should be able to buy it with their food stamps.
I agree, on a certain level. But I'm also aware that fast food is a FUCKING POISON that is killing as many Americans as cigarettes. There's no such thing as a Happy Meal. It's a childhood obesity, childhood diabetes meal.
This isn't the difference between Whole Foods and all-American burgers. It's the difference between Piggly Wiggly, genetically modified, pesticide infested, yet fully survivable food, and POISON.
You can't survive on McDonald's. You will fucking die. And it will cost a lot of money.
So, I may be wrong, but I think I'm going to come down on the side of "Not a good idea" opening up KFC to the food stamp program.
I wasn't even going to weigh in on that, but WTF. It's late. I'm done.
