{"id":2668,"date":"2021-04-15T08:30:28","date_gmt":"2021-04-15T06:30:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jungjungjung.alfahosting.org\/hotspot\/a-visit-to-the-donation-fence\/"},"modified":"2021-04-15T08:30:54","modified_gmt":"2021-04-15T06:30:54","slug":"a-visit-to-the-donation-fence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/hotspotsociety.com\/en\/a-visit-to-the-donation-fence\/","title":{"rendered":"A visit to the \u201cdonation fence\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Jutta Henke<\/h2>\n\n
You can visit a Gabenzaun \u2013 literally a \u201cdonation fence\u201d \u2013 to see solidarity, packed and hanging in bags. From Berlin and Hamburg to M\u00fcnster and from Elmsb\u00fcttel to Velbert and Iserlohn \u2013 plastic bags, transparent or opaque, tied to neatly labeled wrought iron fences or wobbly chain-link fences sporting cardboard signs that have obviously gotten wet.<\/p>\n\n
Unhoused people have no income in the pandemic. If no one is strolling around the city, there\u2019s no point in begging. What about collecting bottles for deposits? No dice \u2013 no one is going to soccer games or grabbing an organic soda to go meet up with friends. All that means a loss of earnings for the homeless. And the soup kitchens are closed.<\/p>\n\n
The pandemic has sharpened our perceptions: the poverty and privation of those whom no one provides for are immediately obvious. You can\u2019t stay home if you don’t have a home to stay in. The spring of 2020 brought an outpouring of concern for unhoused people like never before.<\/p>\n\n
This would all be fine if matters didn\u2019t stop there. But while our European neighbors in England launched the “Everyone in\u201d campaign, using government funds to get tens of thousands of homeless people off the streets in just a short time and place them in hotel rooms where they could stay safe with a roof over their heads, a different kind of boom arose in Germany: charity. Meals are now delivered to the homeless where they are staying. Millions in donations have poured in to support food bank supply chains. Sadly, this doesn\u2019t do much to fight the coronavirus \u2013 or homelessness.<\/p>\n\n
The pandemic has blinded us, with the misery of the homeless people we see in front of us distorting our view. We cannot see that living on the streets is not normal. That most people who are experiencing homelessness did in fact have their own home once, perhaps not even all that long ago, and that at some point, they had to leave that home behind, with no hope of salvaging anything. That only those who have a home can stay home.<\/p>\n\n
By expanding the sources of help for people from the street, we lose sight of the real solution to the problem. After all, homelessness is not an intractable problem, and Germany is unusual among social states in the breadth and effectiveness of the range of tools available to fight it. A city could simply decide no longer to put up with homelessness. No COVID? \u2013 Exactly, and no homelessness, either.<\/p>\n\n
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\nPhoto: Andre Zelck<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Jutta Henke is the managing director of Gesellschaft f\u00fcr innovative Sozialforschung und Sozialplanung e.V. (GISS), Bremen. She does research on topics including homelessness and participation, evaluates social services, and advises municipalities and other bodies on refining specific concepts geared toward providing social aid.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
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