Who chooses to be homeless?

They live in an environment that could change at any given moment. Today they could be sleeping in a tent somewhere and tonight it could be legally taken from them.

This non-permanence is the major destabilizing factor of the homeless population. They can’t rely on where they live from one day to the next.

Imagine how you feel Sunday night when you have to go back to work. Or if you’re a teacher, the last couple days of summer break. Transitions are incredibly challenging for humans. We crave a foundation. We need consistency.

A homeless person has no stability. The fundamental grounding of a permanent place to live is non-existent for them.

A homeless person is someone who is in a system where they have no control over their fundamental living stability.

If you don’t know where you’re going to live from one day to the next and you have not chosen that existence you are homeless.

At that point all your energy is focused on survival and minimizing suffering.

Your mental health issues spike because of the chaos of your life. Then your addictions spike as you attempt to self medicate. You are cold. You are hungry. You are dirty. You have no choice but to focus on basic survival.

Homelessness, by definition, is a total lack of choice.

Do people choose homelessness?

It has long been assumed that homelessness is a personal choice. As a choice, homelessness is embedded within debates about deviant behaviours and problematic pathologies. The “homeless person” is either making calculated and immoral choices to be homeless, or they are perceived to be powerless agents who lack the capacity to exercise choices. Rarely has it been adequately explained, however, what choosing homelessness means and how people who are homeless make sense of their choices. The structural and individual circumstances that situate and make choices meaningful require robust consideration. Drawing on ethnographic research with people sleeping rough, this article unpacks and illuminates some of the hidden complexities that underpin choices to be homeless. With an objective of retaining people’s sense for autonomy, the article contributes to the field by arguing that choice can be understood as an expression of agency and a commitment to a “normal” identity.

Many homeless people have had difficult lives

Some homeless people have had difficult transitions from the military, foster care, prisons and jails. Some have mental illness and have been in psychiatric institutions.

One of the harsh realities is that homeless individuals and families tend to come from communities of concentrated poverty. These neighborhoods typically have the highest rates of unemployment, poor health, crime, family violence, low educational achievement and overcrowding -- the very conditions that make people vulnerable to losing their homes and community supports. It's as true in New York as in Kansas and Florida.

The homeless will not support themselves

The ACLU wants to force society to house people who will not support themselves, who will not do it, because they want to get drunk, or they want to get high, or they want -- they don't want to work, they're too lazy. They say, "OK, that's a person's choice. The government should give them a house, and food, and walking-around money, and everything else." That's what it's all about. This is the hidden agenda.
Bill O’Reilly

It’s their own fault. They are the dead weight of society.
“I am sick to death of all the bleeding hearts and liberal blowhards attacking the mayor and conservatives over the homeless issue…If you all have such big hearts, it's time to put your home where your mouth is and adopt a homeless person or family. Just bring one into your home rather than shoving the burden on the rest of us who have our own problems to worry about. You're all a bunch of hypocrites; the solution is sitting in your spare bedroom or futon or back yard.
What's the matter? Are they too stinky? Untrustworthy? Too many bad habits? What's your excuse? Where's your sense of human decency?
Considering our current events, the homeless are the least of my problems so I refuse to pay any more taxes for more services for the dead weight of our society. Begging is the world's second oldest profession and it's not going away no matter how many more programs you force me to pay for. So I say put up or shut up.”
Ben Waschke of Anchorage, ADN 2011