The city of Windsor has become the site of a heated debate over the issue of the rights of panhandlers. The question that keeps coming up in this discussion is: do people living in poverty have the right to ask for change, whether it be in the form of coins or policy?
Windsor is considering creating no-panhandling zones and implementing new measures to help the homeless population, such as installing care meters. Care meters are like parking meters that people can put their change into, in this case as an alternative to giving change to panhandlers.
Some people in the community think that installing care meters is not a solution. They advocate for justice based changes that will improve conditions for people living in poverty. They suggest that by considering installing care meters, the city is allowing for a band aid solution. For example, Joe Hermer, a professor of sociology at the University of Toronto asks “are care meters not just a sort of private tax to make up for inadequate social service budgets?”
But, this debate only masks a larger problem – there is blatant discrimination happening in Windsor against poor people. There needs to be a conversation about how people living in poverty are being portrayed in this debate – both in the media and the larger community.
Joe Hermer noticed this problem when he pointed out the care meter proposal seems to be driven by the idea that, “panhandlers are aggressive, dangerous and are duping the public by not being homeless.” The idea is that since panhandlers cannot be trusted to be “really” homeless and cannot mange their money, people should not be encouraging them by giving them money. Our concern is that this perspective lacks any recognition of the dignity of people living in poverty.
This way of vilifying panhandlers is especially evident in the words of Chris Vander Doelen’s article “Don’t Encourage Street Pests” in the Windsor Star. In this article Vander Doelen uses very discriminatory language when referring to people living in poverty. He labels homeless people as pests, and says that they are “infesting the downtown like fleas.” His solution to homelessness is to “starve them and they’ll sneak back to where they came from.” Quite simply, Vander Doelen uses hate speech against an already disadvantaged group when describing his opinion on the issues.
No matter what your view is regarding panhandling, whether panhandling zones should be put in place or whether care meters are a terrible idea, hate speech has no place in this debate. To turn this discussion into an opportunity to demean an already marginalized group is just not okay .
If you believe that that the Windsor Star should not be publishing this kind of hate speech and that no matter your opinion on panhandling, hate speech has no place in this discussion then join our letter writing campaign! Check out the details here.
