Yesterday I spoke up about the problem of homelessness in Los Angeles. Today I went to Skid Row, Skid row is a whole community of homeless people that span several blocks in downtown LA where the Art District ends. People here live in tents, cardboard homes, and sometimes in nothing at all, they toss down whatever they have be it a blanket, jacket or just an extra shirt onto the ground to have a place to lay. I have to tell you there is nothing that could have prepared me for what I witnessed. By the time I got midway down the first block I was in sobbing tears.
These people have a story and communities of people make their already difficult life even harder, almost impossible to climb up out of their circumstance. When these people cant use a public restroom, have no place to shower, wash clothes, or even sit to rest without fear of being scrutinized or worse arrested for loitering it makes their already bad place worse. Many of these people have mental health problem and no help to manage it.
When speaking to one woman, she stated "We are not all bad, but we get discriminated against because we are homeless, I cant even rent a house or apartment because I am homeless. I have had a home before I know how to keep one clean", as she began to sob "these streets can make you lose it" There are so many stories like this. These people, at least the majority of them, do not want to be homeless, they need someone to care. Someone to help.
I cant stand by and do nothing when so many of them are hurting, so many of them just need someone to care, so many are just like us. I am begging everyone to please have a heart, Please help me by just simply hitting the upvote, simply by resteeming. Help me help them. Who are we as a people if we can help others like us?
It seriously takes the smallest gesture from you to help us to help them. I am not saying that this is he solution, but it is a start to helping them get a meal, a shower, some clothes. If we reach out to help and give them their dignity back, maybe just maybe we can begin to get some of them off the streets and give them a life back. One man spoke with a man that said "I want to live but this is not living, not like this". Please help me make a difference.
Dayzie