Brandie Tobin

Mr. Smith
English 11 A
April 6, 2020

The beauty in homelessness

There are 6,412 homeless people in Hawaii, and this number is growing. How can we, as

a society, help them psychologically and enable them to feel more confident? An issue within the

homeless community that does not get much light is the idea of giving homeless people a symbol

of hope. According to Becky Blanton (a woman who went on a personal journey and lived in her

van), she realized how once people learn that you are not living in a standardized house, your

viewed differently. She did not have the same respect as before; this right here is a big problem

in the homeless community. Many people within the community are brilliant, but they have just

gone down the wrong path. People in this community still have much knowledge, which people

need to see. This whole idea of giving the homeless people a symbol of hope can be very

inspiring to them. Shirley, who works on a place called Skid Row, went to give homeless people

food and water every Saturday, throughout her years of working she realized that she needed to

do more, the homeless people needed more. She began to make personal connections with them;

she began to do their hair and makeup. One homeless person testified, saying that she feels that

she looks "up to par" now with her hair and makeup done. This transformation may be small to

us, but it can work wonders for a woman who is homeless.

We need to take more care of homeless people's psychological needs. Taking care of

homeless persons' mental health is not very hard to do; little acts of kindness give them that

sliver of hope, which can do wonders to their confidence. Many projects that involve homeless

people mainly only focus on things like food and water, which is not a bad thing, but as a
community, we can do more to help them. We can do this by doing makeovers, doing a symbol

of hopes, or doing acts of kindness for them.

People have a negative perspective towards people who are homeless without even

knowing them, as I had mentioned before Becky Blanton went through this first-hand. Before

she went on her journey of living in her van, she was a well-known and respected author who

had a lot of confidence. As she began her journey, she began to run into a lot of trouble getting

respect and finding jobs due to the sole reason of her living in her van. People began to take one

look at her, and they would just deny her service despite her being a person. Blanton being

beaten down realizes she must get some help, so she goes to a mental clinic. She is waiting in

line at a homeless mental clinic, and a former professor comes up to her and tells her, "Real

homeless do not have hope." The former professor talked to her and told her that he could tell

she was not a real "homeless person" because he can tell she still has some kind of hope or faith

in her. This former professor gave Becky insight into what problems are in the homeless

community that is not talked about quite often. When Becky realized that she still has the same

IQ and knowledge as before, she just went through some tough times. When she finished with

her journey, she was able to bounce back and do amazing things like writing a book and

presenting a ted talk. Becky's story just goes to show that when given some hope, anyone can

overcome anything.

Becky is a living testimony that is people can view homeless people from a positive

perspective; it would encourage them and help them bounce back. Once given hope as Becky

got, she was able to proceed with her life as an artist. When giving her speech, Becky left the

audience with a touching statement; "People are not where they live, where they sleep, or what

their life situation is at any given time." Some may argue that you cannot give someone hope or
that they need more than that. Well, Becky is a testimony that, when she got a little bit of hope,

she was able to bounce back.

This leads to the next quote from an experiment that, when analyzing results,

experimenters found that "Individuals who have lived on the street may have difficulty giving up

the homeless identity." Giving up the homeless identity is difficult because most people who see

people that live on the streets automatically get a negative stigma about the homeless person.

This negative idea has been ingrained into the homeless person to the point where it is hard for

them to have an identity other than being homeless. I am not saying that people who are

homeless should just forget that event that they went through, I am saying that people should not

only look at them as "that homeless person" because there is always a story to each person.

This brings me to my next point, which is; when we break the negative stigma of

homeless people, we are giving them hope. Arien Williams faces this impairment within society

every day as she is a working homeless woman. In an interview for a YouTube documentary,

Williams says, "When they find out that your homeless, they treat you a lot differently."

Williams is not much different from another human being, she has a job, and she just wants to

make it through another day. Williams wanted fair treatment like any other coworker, but it was

hard for her; she says, "I had a few jobs where I had to wear makeup to work every day because

that is what everybody else was doing and if I don't then I will definitely stand out." If Williams

did not have to spend money on makeup to please outside people who are pressuring her to use

it, she could use that money for other essential items. These two quotes go hand in hand with

each other; if she did not have the worries of people treating her differently, she would not have

to go out and buy makeup to hide the fact that she is homeless. She would be able to go out and

buy makeup for her pleasures and it would also alleviate stress off her mind. Arien left us with
her touching words' "After being treated as less than for being broke, I feel the world needs a

reminder." Imagine if everyone had an open mind for people like Arien Williams, and instead of

bashing, we uplift people. Williams and others like her would be able to get more opportunities

and be able to get out of their situations.

In the same video, we meet Shirley (mentioned before), and we learn about her journey

with helping people who live on Skid Row. She has been able to meet many people in similar

situations like Arien's, and she wants to bring light about this issue as well. Shirley helps a lot by

giving makeovers to those who live on Skid Row. Makeovers help them look "presentable,"

which may help them get job opportunities or a place to live. In the video, we learn about how

many times homeless people are turned down when trying to buy/ rent a place to live. Shirley

gets much help when doing her work, a motorcyclist that accompanies Shirley every Saturday

preaches that "How you look, and your appearance is important to everybody." he goes on to say

that; "Everybody needs to look pretty." When more people begin to have the mindset of Shirley

and the motorcyclist, it would be a supplement to giving the homeless people food. Meaning

that Shirley’s work makes giving homeless people food complete.

My final point that I want to share is that appearance, precisely a woman's appearance,

affects their experiences with others. The first case that we will talk about does not have much to

do with a homeless woman, but I think that it is still relevant in proving this point. Naomi

Ellemers, who has a Ph.D. and is a professor, provides some evidence that women get judged

more for their looks instead of their capabilities/ achievements: "disapproval of her (Serena

Williams) black catsuit prevailed overpraise of her fitness and strong play." Serena Williams, a

world-renowned tennis player, wore a black catsuit after winning a Grand Slam contest, which is

a contest where a player wins all four championships in a year for a single event. Not to mention
Williams did this with a baby in her, yet most of the comments were not about her achievements,

but they were about the fact that she wore a catsuit. The next case is the Wiener Philharmonic

orchestra, this was an orchestra who struggled to pick woman during auditions. Ellemers is very

direct and blunt in her next statement "tendency to focus on their appearance instead of their

talents also determines the overall impression people have of women, as well as the way others

treat them." The orchestra resulted in having to do auditions without seeing the musician, after

doing this they finally hired a musician who was a woman and once again. Once the orchestra

took away the musician's appearance, they were able to see the musician for their talent and by

their looks.

One thing that all of these stories have in common is that they all needed some kind of

inspiration. My group and I decided that inspiration can come through jewelry that will have

meaning to it. We were planning on making jewelry for women and children in homeless

shelters, then write a note to them that will remind them to stay healthy. We were also going to

use social media platforms such as Tiktok and Instagram to try to influence others to do this in

their area. The reason why I think that this would work is that making jewelry is not very hard,

and it will mean so much to the women and children in those shelters. They may not be able to

afford many things outside of their necessities, therefore by us doing this, and they will have an

item that will "spice up" their look. Speaking from personal experience, I love to wear jewelry

that has meaning to it because when I look at it or wear it, it reminds me of the significance that

the piece of jewelry has, and it makes me feel good. For example, my mom gave me earrings

when I was going through a rough time, and now when I look at those earrings, I think about

how I was able to grow so much throughout the time I had my earrings. When I wear them, it

also gives me a boost in confidence. I hope to replicate the same feeling to the woman and
children in those shelters. I hope that when they look at the jewelry that they receive, it reminds

them of the note that came with it. I hope that it gives them the confidence and inspiration to

push through so that things will get better.

As a society, we can psychologically help a homeless person by giving them things that

will remind them to be healthy, hopeful, and have confidence. A homeless woman is the main

focus of this essay, but this concept can be generalized to men as well. From stories like Arein

William's and Becky Blanton's are inspirational and can be used as examples of why society

needs to help less fortunate people. The little things can help, just as simple as complimenting

someone, and hopefully, these little things grow and manifest into something big that will

primarily help to end the homeless crisis. Giving jewelry that has significance can turn into

something big like Shirley, who is helping the people on Skid Row. Sharing on social media as

Shirley has down will allow us to help homeless people in our community and hopefully inspire

more people across America to do something, anything in their community