Essay Database

Peter Marin's piece, "Helping and Hating the Homeless" first appeared in Harper's Magazine (January 1987). It is an account of why some marginalized people "choose" homelessness and why middle-class culture finds them so threatening. In this piece, Marin explains to his readers that homeless people were once just like the rest of us. Homeless are considered annoying by most Americans. Marin describes the problem of homeless people and the lack of help for this growing problem. …

…the world that they, too, have contributed to. Just because twists of fate or bad luck have put them where they are now, does not give us the right to deprive them of the right to live a decent life just because we fear them, think that we are better than them, or simply believe that they are not our problem." It may not be a moral Obligation,..., but an obligation non of the less."(¶ 47).