Why are there trash cans in poor neighborhoods
Every time I drive past the projects, I see litter all over the ground.
Every time I drive past the projects, I see litter all over the ground.
As someone who lives in a poorer neighborhood myself, I'm virtually certain the downvotes you're getting are from people who don't, but are appalled at the idea that you'd make such a cheeky comment about poor people.
It's a sad truth that lax community hygiene is a common consequence of the societal problem that is chronic poverty. The sidewalks in my neighborhood are perpetually dotted with dog shit, because none of the dog owners here bother to clean up after their dogs. Likewise, if you're outside before the street cleaners come through on Saturday morning, you'll see a ton of chicken bones and fast food containers littered about the sidewalk. Part of the reason ghettos look like shit is because of societal neglect; but the rest of it is neglect from the community itself.
People are understandably defensive of the poor, because they're on the bottom of our society and thus in many respects the least empowered to change their circumstances. However, those people do tend to forget that there are reasons even people from those impoverished communities don't like living around each other. I can't find it right now, but I read a poem back in high school about a little Black girl watching crabs try to climb out of a plastic bucket on the beach. In trying to get out of the bucket, the crabs would climb on each other, but this would ultimately just result in the crabs on top pushing the crabs below them down, which would in turn keep them from getting out. The poem uses this as a metaphor for urban ghettos, noting how people in those communities often sabotage each other in their own desperate attempts to escape their collective circumstances. This is referred to as the crab mentality and has been observed by plenty of people. It's one of the many factors that reinforce these societal structures and make them very difficult to change.
Source: I'm a social worker who deals with the chronically poor, mentally ill, and homeless on a regular basis, as well as living in a low-income neighborhood, so please don't give me shit about "judging" these folks. I'm not judging, I'm stating facts, and plenty of the people I serve would corroborate what I just wrote.
I’ll give a different perspective on why I downvoted. Not because there isn’t trash around there, I’ve been around enough to see such phenomena, but because it’s a counterproductive way to approach the problem. I’ve seen countless wealthy people wonder why their money goes to resources for the poor even when they aren’t regularly used, but things won’t improve without such resources. The effectiveness of such resources should obviously matter, but I don’t think of this as the best way or place to ask it.
I’ve heard it far more with respect to drug addicts and resources for addiction. Part of helping people is making sure the resources are there when they need it.
Worst case scenario just be glad the trash cans are there so that no matter where you are in the city you have a place to throw something away that isn’t someone else’s yard.
Understandable, but does a person who lives in that environment have the right to just complaint/vent about it? We don't always have to be productive about the problems in our lives, right? This is kind of what I meant when I said I bet the people downvoting don't live in such environments themselves--you're looking at it from the outside, more concerned with how the OP's comments either help the community or serve a pragmatic function, rather than what said comments are doing for them by posting them. If you know what it's like to live in one of these communities, you empathize with the frustration being expressed.
I dunno. Every viewpoint has some validity to it, and I don't mean to make you feel bad about yours, it's just I worry the downvotes punish the OP for just trying to get something aggravating off their own chest for a moment.
Fair, I read it far more in the tone of the wealthy complaining about the poor than the poor complaining about their home and neighbors. From my initial perspective it comes off not as a view of frustration but of self elevation. We have the right to insult our peers and our homes, but it’s a dick move to insult those we don’t understand and someone else’s home, especially when you hold a lot of privilege over them.
Funnily enough I routinely complain about my neighbors trash habits, but it feels like it would be wrong in some social contract way to vent about it on the internet where those who’ve never lived somewhere where that’s a concern would see. But I think that comes back to having heard how nasty the upper middle class can get about it.
Agreed, and to be fair, I was assuming the opposite about the OP: that they are from one such community. If my assumption is wrong and yours right, I agree it's rather cringey to make such a comment.
stupid question: do you think rich people don't litter or are you lacking the though there might be people paid to clean up outdoors in not-so-poor hoods?