Poverty Essay, Research Paper

Poverty

Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not being able to go to school, not knowing how to read, not being able to speak properly. Poverty is not having a job, it is fear for the future, it is living from hand to mouth. Poverty is losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water. Poverty is powerlessness, lack of freedom.

Poverty has many faces, changing from place and across time, and has been described in many ways. Most often poverty is situation people want to escape. So poverty is a call to action for the poor and the wealthy alike a call to change the world so that many more may have enough to eat, adequate shelter, access to education and protection from violence.

Unfortunately, poverty is a hidden agenda. The voices of the poor are seldom heard. What makes me feel like writing about poverty is the unwillingness of our society to deal with this preventable problem. Another reason is that politicians who rule the country pretending that poverty is simply part of life a force of nature unstoppable and eternal.

In fact what makes a good life?

These are material and physical well-being, security, freedom of choice and action the very things that bring joy to human existence. It is living healthy and peaceful lives in love with no hunger; no warring about the future of children that brings the principal pleasures of everyday life.

Physical health, strength and appearance are of great importance to the poor. The body is poor people s main asset, but one with no insurance. If it becomes infirm, hunger and destitution hover at the doorstep. Shortage of food and sickness not only cause pain, they weaken and devalue the asset, make a person highly vulnerable. Illness can plunge a household into destitution. Anguish and grief over watching loved ones die because of lack of money for health care is silent crisis of poverty.

Bad life is deeply embedded in insecurity. Not knowing what tomorrow will bring and where the next meal is coming from slowly drive poor people crazy. It is the way that peace of mind and confidence in survival. Not just livelihood but also sheer physical survival in the face of rising corruption, crime, violence and absence of justice. Insecurity is also the experience of wary and fears that makes life unsustainable.

The poor are caught in a trap of powerlessness that constrains their choices – it is that they have no freedom of choice and action because the rich are the ones who say: I m going to do it and they just do it. But poor people cannot control what happens, they do not fulfil their wishes because of poverty. While kept on a biological level of existence, focusing on food and shelter, one cannot enjoy everyday life.

Together all these disadvantages not only hold poor people down, they make it possible to lose even what they have. There is usually nothing to prevent them from falling into the abyss. And when they do fall there is often nobody waiting to catch them at the bottom. And it s the criminality of it all even wild animals are capable of fending for themselves but a person saddled with poverty isn t able to. Hasn t the society undertaken to protect individuals? Can t we get beyond mere eating and breading and move to what is called human civilization ?

Still some may say I don t have the right to discuss that topic any further because fortunately I ve never fall asleep hungry but the nature of poverty is a human rights issue and aren t we all humans?

It seems that some are more humans than others.