Litter - a sign of our tragic pathology
Young children
Photo by Michael Alion Unsplashmichael-ali
On a splendid fall Saturday afternoon, a young man stood outside a convenience store with three children ranging in height from 2 feet to 3 feet. The little girl dropped her wrapper on the ground as they dug into their candy. Litter contributes to urban decay, but the remedy is easy.
I took a deep breath and suggested to the father that this was an opportunity to teach about not littering. Getting between me and his daughter, he didn’t exactly speak as much as physically demonstrate that I would not be entering his or his children’s world in any way, shape, or form. I protested. Glowering, he put two fingers within an inch of my nose, speaking far more eloquently than words could have. He tossed the Fudgsicle on the sidewalk and returned with the children to the store to replenish their supply.
I put the Fudgsicle and litter in the trash. After finishing my errand, I walked past him and the children waiting for the bus. With bags under his eyes and a tattoo on his neck, he looked defeated and depleted. I have no idea what it’s like to go home with three toddlers coming down from a sugar high, but I know intimately well what it’s like to be the child of overwhelmed, exhausted parents.
This vignette illustrates how utterly and miserably our country has failed that young man and his children. Poverty is a complicated problem with no ready answers.
The high incarceration rate of blacks has systematically castrated that community and left it defenseless. Women don’t have partners; children don’t have fathers. Role model? That is the quaint relic of the era before three strikes you’re out and mandatory sentencing. Young boys and men have meager earning power and crushingly high unemployment.
What is the logic of bleeding a community of resources and then punishing it for being poor? What resources does this community have to work with? How do you dig out of a hole without a shovel?
In his shoes, I wouldn’t cotton to a 50’ish white woman having anything to say about anything. Nevertheless, isn’t teaching children not to litter a basic, threshold behavior of a civilized society?
My lifelong inability to look away from suffering, and witnessing it daily in this vibrant, gritty city that I love, the feeling of despair is numbingly familiar. Our culture, tolerant of extreme poverty and homeless children, breeds it. If you don’t feel this, perhaps you 1) have been lulled into a stupor by insipid media and synthetic “food” or 2) have good blinders or 3) struggle to keep it from your consciousness.
My antidote to despair is action. I’ve settled on seeking to partner with religious and cultural organizations to build up their communities from the inside by creating opportunities for members to gather casually and often. These gatherings are fertile soil for making new friends, the foundation of strong, resilient communities.
