I see I am in the minority here. I just can't get past the fact she left her kids in an illegal and dangerous situation. I think she made a bad decision. How many flames do people get when they hear of a dog being left in a hot car? Maybe I have heard too many stories in the news of bad things happening when children have been left alone in a car or in a house.
She should have just signed up for a care.com account and paid for it and a sitter with her non-existent money. While sitting in her non-existent house with her non-existent computer and internet service. God, the nerve!
I'm seeing on twitter that she is a veteran. It's disgusting that this has to happen to anyone but you'd at least think we could support our veterans. I feel horrible for her and her family and am so glad to see her getting help.
I'm seeing on twitter that she is a veteran. It's disgusting that this has to happen to anyone but you'd at least think we could support our veterans. I feel horrible for her and her family and am so glad to see her getting help.
"Not gonna lie; I kind of keep expecting you to post one day that you threw down on someone who clearly had no idea that today was NOT THEIR DAY." ~dontcallmeshirley
I'm seeing on twitter that she is a veteran. It's disgusting that this has to happen to anyone but you'd at least think we could support our veterans. I feel horrible for her and her family and am so glad to see her getting help.
Yeah, the help is pretty slim for vets. If you're about to shoot up a mall, the VA will help. If your lungs are shot because of Agent Orange, they'll help. Job assistance? No. You kind of have some assistance, a few resources, but they aren't very helpful, imo. A resume writing class doesn't keep food in your child's mouth.
Post by hopecounts on Mar 31, 2014 12:10:13 GMT -5
Did I read that it was for an insurance company? Most insurance companies that I know of are pretty big on internal promotion so she may have been also thinking that this could be her way not just out of homelessness but into a secure and much better life. Work as a secretary for a couple years, do some online classes, get a promotion, repeat and she could be able to move them into a better area with better schools, maybe even save to help them pay for college and break the cycle. I'm ASSuming a lot but most I know of are pretty upfront that if you are a loyal employee and do the work and try for it they'll promote you if there is an open position.
Also, re: family help, its possible a lot of people in her life didn't KNOW she was homeless. Maybe she didnt want to admit to those around her how bad things had gotten. So it's possible she may have had people that could have watched her kids, but that might have involved her admitting that she was homeless, jobless, etc. I can see it being something that a person would not advertise, given the "bootstraps" nature of american society today.
Yes, the choice is much easier where I sit, I can't put myself in her shoes and I am very lucky for that. But I can still think that she made a poor decision and is lucky nothing worse happened. I am not burning her at the stake, I am just not as easily convinced she had no other better choice.
There's been a LOT of discussion recently about the poor and how they have to live near their support networks. It's the argument that there are tons of jobs in Provo, UT, and in western ND, so just move there! Except then you won't be near your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings. And out of all of those people, sometimes, someone doesn't work during the day and can watch your kids. Or one of those people owns a car. Or one of those people has a couch you can sleep on.
Fuck, my husband and I have a decent income and even I can see that when we have kids, the fact that our closest family members are almost 300 miles away makes it harder.
I once let a friend stay with me for several months. She had a job, but had struggled with long term unemployment recently, was in a domestic violence situation, and would have been at a shelter otherwise. My husband and I are lucky enough to be able to afford housing where we have an extra bedroom. She slept on our futon. What the hell else was I going to do?! That's what makes me believe that this woman had NO support network, and if she did, it was people who were in situations that were not very much better than her own.
(FWIW, I'm not blaming her for not living near a "network" - I have no idea what her family background is.)
I see I am in the minority here. I just can't get past the fact she left her kids in an illegal and dangerous situation. I think she made a bad decision. How many flames do people get when they hear of a dog being left in a hot car? Maybe I have heard too many stories in the news of bad things happening when children have been left alone in a car or in a house.
She should have just signed up for a care.com account and paid for it and a sitter with her non-existent money. While sitting in her non-existent house with her non-existent computer and internet service. God, the nerve!
Someone on one of the news stories said she should have used the YMCA or something. Um, where I am, the YMCA costs $125 up front and is $83/month for a single parent family. And our local one doesn't have drop in care or early childhood education/day care at all. And if they did, I'm sure it would cost more.
I know the Y has low-income assistance programs, but that probably wouldn't be my first priority if I was living in a shelter.
Someone on one of the news stories said she should have used the YMCA or something. Um, where I am, the YMCA costs $125 up front and is $83/month for a single parent family. And our local one doesn't have drop in care or early childhood education/day care at all. And if they did, I'm sure it would cost more.
I know the Y has low-income assistance programs, but that probably wouldn't be my first priority if I was living in a shelter.
My local Y had their childcare license revoked for being generally rather useless. Before that, they had a 6 month waiting list.
She should have just signed up for a care.com account and paid for it and a sitter with her non-existent money. While sitting in her non-existent house with her non-existent computer and internet service. God, the nerve!
Someone on one of the news stories said she should have used the YMCA or something. Um, where I am, the YMCA costs $125 up front and is $83/month for a single parent family. And our local one doesn't have drop in care or early childhood education/day care at all. And if they did, I'm sure it would cost more.
I know the Y has low-income assistance programs, but that probably wouldn't be my first priority if I was living in a shelter.
our Y has a regular preschool that's not a daily drop in care thing.
there IS daily drop in care at the Y... for members while they're using the facility.
Because OF COURSE she MUST have had a better choice...everyone has a plethora of choices. Especially when they're homeless. Why on earth do you think she had another choice? You think a mother is cavalier about leaving their children alone in a car? Especially when there are other choices?
You are making judgments about her. Because she is poor, because she is homeless. Just own it your own fucking privilege.
Alright simmer down, just because I have a different opinion than you, it isn't my "fucking privilege ". I am judging her decision to put her kids in danger, poor or homeless aside her kids need to be safe.
Post by mominatrix on Mar 31, 2014 12:42:55 GMT -5
One thing to add:
I want to put out there that this notion of "leaving kids alone (in a car or elsewhere) for even a few minutes is DANGEROUS!!! THEY COULD DIE!!!11!!" is a relatively new concept...
::puts on silly geeky hat:: A little while ago I was watching a Bionic Woman DVD [YOU DON'T KNOW ME, DON'T JUDGE ME]... and at one point the aforementioned Bionic Woman was walking down the (Ojai, California... therefore warm climate) street and ran into a friend. They exchanged greetings, BW asked friend where her daughter was, friend responded that she was in the car (!) while mom was doing some shopping (!!) [the implication being grocery (!!!) shopping], and BW could stop there and say "Hi" if she wanted to.
This episode aired in 1977. I was fucking nine years old. It was completely OK to leave a child alone in a car for the time it took to go grocery shopping. There wasn't a shocked, "ohmigod!!" out of Jamie Summers... it was fine.
In a generation, we've gone from something being perfectly OK to being criminal. And there really hasn't been a dialogue about exactly why.
I'm not saying it should be OK, but I think it's fascinating that this shift has occurred silently.
She should have just signed up for a care.com account and paid for it and a sitter with her non-existent money. While sitting in her non-existent house with her non-existent computer and internet service. God, the nerve!
Someone on one of the news stories said she should have used the YMCA or something. Um, where I am, the YMCA costs $125 up front and is $83/month for a single parent family. And our local one doesn't have drop in care or early childhood education/day care at all. And if they did, I'm sure it would cost more.
I know the Y has low-income assistance programs, but that probably wouldn't be my first priority if I was living in a shelter.
You can't just leave a kid in the gym childcare and leave the premises. Plus mine is limited to 90 minutes anyway. The local one has a daycare, but when I was looking for daycare for DD they had a long wait list. They do not offer drop in care. They also accept government daycare assistance vouchers, but you have to be employed and work at least 20 hours a week to qualify. There are a limited amount of financial assistance available, but I highly doubt anyone is getting free daycare. Even with government assistance, they still have to pay a percentage of their income.
The gym membership has financial assistance available, but they do not give away free memberships. There is still a charge even if it's less than the full amount. They wave the application fee, but they do not allow monthly charges for scholarship memberships. This means even if they qualify for say $10/mo they have to pay for the entire year at $120 at once. Plus there is usually a month or two wait for the financial assistance application to be processed. But none of this even matters because the childcare is for people using the facilities and parents cannot leave while their kids are in the gym childcare.
Or MAYBE, she had friends who were willing to watch her children, but were just unable to do so. It's possible a lot of the people she may rely on for care on weekends or the like work during the day at jobs that do not have flexible hours or allow you to take time off to watch someone else's kids for two hours. If this was at 11 am on a weekday (I missed what time of day it was) her options are going to be even further limited.
I mean, look, hell, I am posting all these different factors and issues that could have been at play that led to her decision to leave the kids in the car. It's not that difficult to imagine a hundred scenarios that all left her with no other option. The fact that are multiple posters (bc it wasnt just sunshineluv) that cant see that is kind of mind boggling to me.
LMAO at the people saying this person should have found other options. I mean, every time we have the jury duty discussion, there's 8 million people here with money and resources that are all, WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MY CHILD?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!? I can't put them in COURT daycare! I don't KNOW those people! You don't know my lyfe!!!ELEVENTY!!!!
But a homeless person, yeah, they must have TONS of options.
Post by statlerwaldorf on Mar 31, 2014 12:50:17 GMT -5
Another thing to consider is how many homeless women were victims of domestic violence. It's pretty common for abusive partners to alienate the abused partner from friends and family. I know someone who was being abused. She finally pressed charges against her husband and decided to leave. The DV shelter turned her away because her husband wasn't considered an immediate threat since he was in jail and they didn't have enough space for her and her children.
This just makes me want to start a charity the provides childcare for women looking for jobs. Hey Oprah, Bill Gates, other rich people! Anyone want to toss me some money to get this idea off the ground???
I've actually thought about this exact same thing! In a, when I win the lottery kind of way.
This just makes me want to start a charity the provides childcare for women looking for jobs. Hey Oprah, Bill Gates, other rich people! Anyone want to toss me some money to get this idea off the ground???
We actually have one of these in town - there may be one in yours. Here's it is just in a house with a kitchen, internet access, and a really nice park attached. Women can drop in, use the computer to look for jobs, get assistance with child care, etc. I think they do cooking lessons and other types of basic life skills training.
This post makes me think I should start donating to them.
how many friends do you think a homeless person has? Do you *REALLY* think that if she had another option she wouldn't have chosen it? REALLY?
These choices are so easy where you sit, aren't they?
Yes, the choice is much easier where I sit, I can't put myself in her shoes and I am very lucky for that. But I can still think that she made a poor decision and is lucky nothing worse happened. I am not burning her at the stake, I am just not as easily convinced she had no other better choice.
Have you been homeless with 2 kids? Do you regularly work with the homeless community?
In a generation, we've gone from something being perfectly OK to being criminal. And there really hasn't been a dialogue about exactly why.
I'm not saying it should be OK, but I think it's fascinating that this shift has occurred silently.
I think there has been actually. I'm looking at the 80's/90's with Dateline, America's Most Wanted, Law and Order.
People stopped doing this things because the dangers became more publicized but not the rates of those dangers. And then of course, once the dangers became well known enough that it changed behaviors and perceptions so drastically, it was far less publicized that the rates of those things had become much lower.
Crime rate has gone down but the perception of crime rate is as high as the rate actually was in times where we didn't know.
And that may have been the worse sentence I've ever written in my life.
It's something of a big question, isn't it? Are kids safer because we've become paranoid?
In a generation, we've gone from something being perfectly OK to being criminal. And there really hasn't been a dialogue about exactly why.
I'm not saying it should be OK, but I think it's fascinating that this shift has occurred silently.
I think there has been actually. I'm looking at the 80's/90's with Dateline, America's Most Wanted, Law and Order.
People stopped doing this things because the dangers became more publicized but not the rates of those dangers. And then of course, once the dangers became well known enough that it changed behaviors and perceptions so drastically, it was far less publicized that the rates of those things had become much lower.
Crime rate has gone down but the perception of crime rate is as high as the rate actually was in times where we didn't know.
And that may have been the worse sentence I've ever written in my life.
It's something of a big question, isn't it? Are kids safer because we've become paranoid?
I honestly think the answer to the bolded is a big fat NO.
This just makes me want to start a charity the provides childcare for women looking for jobs. Hey Oprah, Bill Gates, other rich people! Anyone want to toss me some money to get this idea off the ground???
We actually have one of these in town - there may be one in yours. Here's it is just in a house with a kitchen, internet access, and a really nice park attached. Women can drop in, use the computer to look for jobs, get assistance with child care, etc. I think they do cooking lessons and other types of basic life skills training.
This post makes me think I should start donating to them.
I honestly think the answer to the bolded is a big fat NO.
I think it depends on the crimes you're looking at. I do think it's harder to snatch up children off the street because no one lets them hitchhike anymore or even ride up to the corner store in many neighborhoods.
Of course, there are also less neighborhoods where you can ride a bike or walk to a corner store anyway so I'm sure that's part of it.
But abduction even when it was a higher rate a few decades ago was still a very rare crime. I'm not sure our current perception and so called safety measures commensurates with the actual risk.
I wonder if our car theft rate is higher than it was. I'm only aware of the reduction in crime rates as it pertains to crimes against children.
Post by sugarglider on Mar 31, 2014 13:06:55 GMT -5
mominatrix I'm glad you posted that. I remember my parents leaving my brother and me in the car in the late 80s and early 90s. Granted, it's far more overcast in Indiana than Arizona, but still. The window was cracked...she wasn't trying to cook the kids. And my parents weren't some crazy hippy let the kids be independent type, either. They were very over-protective, likely stemming from my dad's job as a prosecutor.
There are a lot of great organizations offering a "hand-up"; they should include daycare to their services. Maybe large corporations that have in-house daycare should also offer the service to applicants.
LMAO at the people saying this person should have found other options. I mean, every time we have the jury duty discussion, there's 8 million people here with money and resources that are all, WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MY CHILD?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!? I can't put them in COURT daycare! I don't KNOW those people! You don't know my lyfe!!!ELEVENTY!!!!
But a homeless person, yeah, they must have TONS of options.
JHC.
Well, duh, beggars can't be choosers. Poor people can't afford to be picky and only leave their children with well-reviewed child care providers who serve organic whole foods as snacks and limit screen time. As long as there's no visible broken glass, they should be FINE! You know, for a poor person's kids. Not, like, MY kids or anything.
I will say though that there is a difference between leaving an older child in the car and a 6 month old. My mom left us in the car as well, but we werent strapped into car seats, and were capable of winding down a window (no automatic windows) if necessary, or even running in to get her if there was a problem. It isn't really fair to compare the risks of leaving a 5 year old in the car and an infant.
Again, I'm not condemning this woman so this isn't really in response to her actions, but rather to the latest posts in this thread about the dangers of it.
But I agree in general that our paranoia has not made us more safe, and I blame the internet and national TV etc in large part for that paranoia. A child gets kidnapped and everyone hears about it. so it may seem like it is happening more often because you are hearing about it more, but thats not necessarily the case.
mominatrix I'm glad you posted that. I remember my parents leaving my brother and me in the car in the late 80s and early 90s. Granted, it's far more overcast in Indiana than Arizona, but still. The window was cracked...she wasn't trying to cook the kids. And my parents weren't some crazy hippy let the kids be independent type, either. They were very over-protective, likely stemming from my dad's job as a prosecutor.
There are a lot of great organizations offering a "hand-up"; they should include daycare to their services. Maybe large corporations that have in-house daycare should also offer the service to applicants.
My concern with that idea is that if a job applicant needs to use the in-house daycare just for the interview, the company may believe she would be too risky to hire (i.e. since she has children and can't even find someone to watch them for a couple of hours, if the company's daycare has to close then this woman won't be able to come to work, etc.). I could be overthinking this but that's where my mind went.