Assumptions/Turning Poverty into an American Crime/the Power of the Image as a Persuader - Assignment Example

Also in many cities, it was considered criminal trespassing to sleep on the streets. Other cities passed regulations outlawing food sharing. Furthermore, in Colorado, a city council is deliberating a ban on begging. Her thesis also opposes the criminalization of the not yet homeless by debt and racial profiling that has become a familiar pattern. For instance, the government is shutting down public housing, then making it illegal to be homeless. The government also penalizes the poor for falling into debts yet it does not create public-sector jobs (Einrech, 2010).

There were persistent suspicions of use of drugs and theft that she came across in low-wage workplaces. For example, most cities have ordinances designed to drive the destitute off the streets by outlawing such essential activities of daily life as sitting, loitering, sleeping, or lying down (Ehrenreich, 2010). She quotes the opinions of urban officials who boast that there is nothing discriminatory about such laws. According to Ehrenreich (2010), they state that “if you are lying on a sidewalk, whether you are homeless or a millionaire, you are in violation of the ordinance.

” She also quotes a city attorney in June 2009 at St. Petersburg, Florida. The attorney echoed Anatole Frances immortal words that “the law in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges.” (Ehrenreich, 2010). Some experts brand the poor as lazy, weak and to blame for the situation. This is somehow complex, for on the other hand, joblessness and suffering are prevalent. The poverty rate of the nation is also on the rise. Moreover, there is a combined suffering experience.

The number of those who were poor before the recession remains on the margins outside the hold of public compassion and under attack. She was introduced to 62-year-old Szekeley, by Eric Sheptock, a homeless