Race in America - Riots Explode in Chicago

[Typical Lax Dad]

"Reform not Defund."

How does that happen in the real world?

Simple. You invest in people and communities BEFORE they become criminals. BEFORE it's too late.

Dude, they have been trying that here in Rochester for a very long time. It goes all the way back to the midnight basketball leagues that were meant to keep kids off the street at night. It starts with the PARENTS. You can invest everything you want to. If the parents are not controlling and supervising their own kids you are peeing in the wind. What parent in your neck of the woods does not know where their 12 year old is at 11pm? If the parents don't care who the hell else will?

Not in my neck of the woods but in Illinois....you know the one that drives a 17 year kid out of state and lets him stay out and eventually kills 2 people and shoots another. That is the kind of parent.

The kid had no business bringing a rifle into that situation. The fact he wanted to play the role of security guard was stupid. That is not the point I was making but I know where you are coming from. I am disturbed by 12 year olds selling crack on street corners at 10 pm.

The vast majority of people are.

Disturbed, but not doing anything about it.

Like a lot of things. What are you doing about childhood hunger?

paying my taxes. What are all these parents doing with the SNAP benefits given to them by the government to buy food for their kids? I'm only asking for a friend.

https://otda.ny.gov/programs/snap/#benefits

The supplemental nutrition program in NYS provides 374 a month to buy food for your kids. That averages out to 85 dollars a week. That may not seem like a ton of money but there is something wrong when the parent is still letting their kid go to school hungry. I could buy 85 dollars a week in food for 2 kids and they could eat pretty darn good. Unless of course it is just more convenient to let your kid eat at school?

Avg American family of 4 spends $10k per year on food.

But you are correct that one can eat pretty darn well for an average of $3-4 a serving if making your meals at home using ingredients on sale at your grocery store (my company makes the technology of that easier).

But that assumes you live in an area where there is a good grocer, with fresh food with prices not jacked up. And that you have the transportation to get to that store. And that you have the space to store food, refrigeration and pantry, so that you can buy optimal sizes to save money. And that you have the resources to actually have pantry items, aren't living week to week.

In most of these situations we are discussing, there is no full line grocer with food at prices comparable to the suburbs, and there is little transportation. So, it often requires multiple bus trips just to go to such a store (delivery services don't serve these neighborhoods and don't accept SNAP). How many groceries can you carry on the bus? And you have two jobs as it is.

So...in these 'food deserts' of poverty, there are often lots of crappy bodegas with jacked up prices and little fresh food, but lots of access to fast food, fried chicken and fish, burgers, etc. "food swamps". Actually more like $4-5 a serving, eat out of a bag...any wonder why there's so much heart disease and diabetes in poor populations in America?

So, mom typically is scraping by, not feeding herself the last week of the month. Kids often needing to get their own food. And that's with school lunches.

Then let's feed all of the kids at schools and arrange for home delivered meals to all of the impoverished kids. We were not rich growing up MD. My mom was a fanatic when it came to making sure all of her kids were fed and taken care of. I do not want to insult you but your pathetic excuses here do not hold water to me. We were lucky, there was a Wegmans store near my house on Driving Park Ave. There was a Star Market several miles away that had cheaper groceries. I walked many miles with my mom to that store with her granny cart in tow. Your trying to feed me bullchit excuses. My mom taught me you do what you have to do for your kids. Why do you think she walked all those extra miles to save a couple of dollars? My mom grew up dirt poor during the worst years of the depression. What she taught me was you do whatever you have to do to take care of your family. That is the lesson I gave to my own kids. They knew where the food was and knew how to make their own breakfast and lunch. It was really complicated to pour the cereal in a bowl, put milk on it and pour yourself a glass of juice. It was equally as difficult to make their lunch. It involved bread and peanut butter and jelly and it got really tough when bologna was put into the mix. I guess I should have been charged with child endangerment, sometimes I bought twinkies for them. I was such a bad father teaching them to be self dependent and do things on their own. I guess I should have just let the village take care of them?

Here we go with “my family had it hard stories”.... I bet my parents grew up "poorer" than yours.

Actually TLD, my sisters and brother did not have it hard. My dad had it tough, he lost 2 of his brothers one to cancer and one to a gangrene infection in his foot before he was 16. Then he dropped out of school to become an apprentice tool maker. Then he joined the army in 1943 and somehow lived to come back home. Yeah life was just a picnic for him. It took more than a few years before he stopped getting nervous and jerky at every thunderstorm that rolled in. It ain't about which of our families was poorer, it is about HOW they dealt with it.

Sounds like he had options. My Grandmother’s brother died young. Got hit in the head at 10 and lost his eye sight and was diminished mentally.....went out to the outhouse and lost his way back in snow and was found with frost bite on both hands. Fingers turned black and eventually fell off...never really recovered amd died not too long after that....speaking of gangrene....one of her siblings had it in the leg....it was bad when they saw the maggots. Nobody cares how bad your folks had it. “Poorer than thou” and “holier than thou” don’t go far with me. Keep it to yourself.

Our life experiences make us who we are today. i will never keep it to myself. Why would you even say such a stupid and thoughtless thing? If i had not had the experiences i had growing up for better or worse, i would be much worse off today. Why is very simple, because i would not give a flip about anybody or anything. I'm 62 years old TLD and i am still trying to get better. I may fail miserably on most days but i still keep on trying. This is one of those times where we just have to disagree.

Then don’t complain when someone responds to the “poor mouthing”.

[cradleandshoot]

"Reform not Defund."

How does that happen in the real world?

Simple. You invest in people and communities BEFORE they become criminals. BEFORE it's too late.

Dude, they have been trying that here in Rochester for a very long time. It goes all the way back to the midnight basketball leagues that were meant to keep kids off the street at night. It starts with the PARENTS. You can invest everything you want to. If the parents are not controlling and supervising their own kids you are peeing in the wind. What parent in your neck of the woods does not know where their 12 year old is at 11pm? If the parents don't care who the hell else will?

Not in my neck of the woods but in Illinois....you know the one that drives a 17 year kid out of state and lets him stay out and eventually kills 2 people and shoots another. That is the kind of parent.

The kid had no business bringing a rifle into that situation. The fact he wanted to play the role of security guard was stupid. That is not the point I was making but I know where you are coming from. I am disturbed by 12 year olds selling crack on street corners at 10 pm.

The vast majority of people are.

Disturbed, but not doing anything about it.

Like a lot of things. What are you doing about childhood hunger?

paying my taxes. What are all these parents doing with the SNAP benefits given to them by the government to buy food for their kids? I'm only asking for a friend.

https://otda.ny.gov/programs/snap/#benefits

The supplemental nutrition program in NYS provides 374 a month to buy food for your kids. That averages out to 85 dollars a week. That may not seem like a ton of money but there is something wrong when the parent is still letting their kid go to school hungry. I could buy 85 dollars a week in food for 2 kids and they could eat pretty darn good. Unless of course it is just more convenient to let your kid eat at school?

Avg American family of 4 spends $10k per year on food.

But you are correct that one can eat pretty darn well for an average of $3-4 a serving if making your meals at home using ingredients on sale at your grocery store (my company makes the technology of that easier).

But that assumes you live in an area where there is a good grocer, with fresh food with prices not jacked up. And that you have the transportation to get to that store. And that you have the space to store food, refrigeration and pantry, so that you can buy optimal sizes to save money. And that you have the resources to actually have pantry items, aren't living week to week.

In most of these situations we are discussing, there is no full line grocer with food at prices comparable to the suburbs, and there is little transportation. So, it often requires multiple bus trips just to go to such a store (delivery services don't serve these neighborhoods and don't accept SNAP). How many groceries can you carry on the bus? And you have two jobs as it is.

So...in these 'food deserts' of poverty, there are often lots of crappy bodegas with jacked up prices and little fresh food, but lots of access to fast food, fried chicken and fish, burgers, etc. "food swamps". Actually more like $4-5 a serving, eat out of a bag...any wonder why there's so much heart disease and diabetes in poor populations in America?

So, mom typically is scraping by, not feeding herself the last week of the month. Kids often needing to get their own food. And that's with school lunches.

Then let's feed all of the kids at schools and arrange for home delivered meals to all of the impoverished kids. We were not rich growing up MD. My mom was a fanatic when it came to making sure all of her kids were fed and taken care of. I do not want to insult you but your pathetic excuses here do not hold water to me. We were lucky, there was a Wegmans store near my house on Driving Park Ave. There was a Star Market several miles away that had cheaper groceries. I walked many miles with my mom to that store with her granny cart in tow. Your trying to feed me bullchit excuses. My mom taught me you do what you have to do for your kids. Why do you think she walked all those extra miles to save a couple of dollars? My mom grew up dirt poor during the worst years of the depression. What she taught me was you do whatever you have to do to take care of your family. That is the lesson I gave to my own kids. They knew where the food was and knew how to make their own breakfast and lunch. It was really complicated to pour the cereal in a bowl, put milk on it and pour yourself a glass of juice. It was equally as difficult to make their lunch. It involved bread and peanut butter and jelly and it got really tough when bologna was put into the mix. I guess I should have been charged with child endangerment, sometimes I bought twinkies for them. I was such a bad father teaching them to be self dependent and do things on their own. I guess I should have just let the village take care of them?

Here we go with “my family had it hard stories”.... I bet my parents grew up "poorer" than yours.

I bet my mom would not have given a F**k about how bad your family had it. She was too busy taking care of her own family. More people should try that approach sometime. The concept is called taking care of your own family first. once you take care of your own family then your free to help others. I can't tell you how many strays my sister brought into our house when i was growing up. When you were in our house as a guest you were fed and taken care of and my mom would listen to you and share her wisdom with you. This world could use more people like my mom TLD. My mom did have it hard, grew up in a family of abusive drunken Irish relatives. I know what her advice would have been to you, she gave it to me often, sometimes you need to shut up and listen. You can be poor that does not mean you have to act poor. Sad that so many people in America today don't understand what the difference is.

I didn’t know your mom posted here? If it doesn’t matter, don’t bring it up. What is acting poor?

Holy chit, you can't possibly be that dense. When you act poor that means you throw your self respect and dignity to the curb. That is when you get your little cardboard sign and beg for money at the interstate off ramps. God bless... anything helps...

Like wealthy suburban girls from Chevy Chase having sex in front of some crack dealers in DC acting poor? That kind of dignity and self respect?

They are just acting like sluts. their problems go much deeper than i would ever know. Maybe they did not have a healthy lunch when they went to their little rich girl schools.

[Typical Lax Dad]

"Reform not Defund."

How does that happen in the real world?

Simple. You invest in people and communities BEFORE they become criminals. BEFORE it's too late.

Dude, they have been trying that here in Rochester for a very long time. It goes all the way back to the midnight basketball leagues that were meant to keep kids off the street at night. It starts with the PARENTS. You can invest everything you want to. If the parents are not controlling and supervising their own kids you are peeing in the wind. What parent in your neck of the woods does not know where their 12 year old is at 11pm? If the parents don't care who the hell else will?

Not in my neck of the woods but in Illinois....you know the one that drives a 17 year kid out of state and lets him stay out and eventually kills 2 people and shoots another. That is the kind of parent.

The kid had no business bringing a rifle into that situation. The fact he wanted to play the role of security guard was stupid. That is not the point I was making but I know where you are coming from. I am disturbed by 12 year olds selling crack on street corners at 10 pm.

The vast majority of people are.

Disturbed, but not doing anything about it.

Like a lot of things. What are you doing about childhood hunger?

paying my taxes. What are all these parents doing with the SNAP benefits given to them by the government to buy food for their kids? I'm only asking for a friend.

https://otda.ny.gov/programs/snap/#benefits

The supplemental nutrition program in NYS provides 374 a month to buy food for your kids. That averages out to 85 dollars a week. That may not seem like a ton of money but there is something wrong when the parent is still letting their kid go to school hungry. I could buy 85 dollars a week in food for 2 kids and they could eat pretty darn good. Unless of course it is just more convenient to let your kid eat at school?

Avg American family of 4 spends $10k per year on food.

But you are correct that one can eat pretty darn well for an average of $3-4 a serving if making your meals at home using ingredients on sale at your grocery store (my company makes the technology of that easier).

But that assumes you live in an area where there is a good grocer, with fresh food with prices not jacked up. And that you have the transportation to get to that store. And that you have the space to store food, refrigeration and pantry, so that you can buy optimal sizes to save money. And that you have the resources to actually have pantry items, aren't living week to week.

In most of these situations we are discussing, there is no full line grocer with food at prices comparable to the suburbs, and there is little transportation. So, it often requires multiple bus trips just to go to such a store (delivery services don't serve these neighborhoods and don't accept SNAP). How many groceries can you carry on the bus? And you have two jobs as it is.

So...in these 'food deserts' of poverty, there are often lots of crappy bodegas with jacked up prices and little fresh food, but lots of access to fast food, fried chicken and fish, burgers, etc. "food swamps". Actually more like $4-5 a serving, eat out of a bag...any wonder why there's so much heart disease and diabetes in poor populations in America?

So, mom typically is scraping by, not feeding herself the last week of the month. Kids often needing to get their own food. And that's with school lunches.

Then let's feed all of the kids at schools and arrange for home delivered meals to all of the impoverished kids. We were not rich growing up MD. My mom was a fanatic when it came to making sure all of her kids were fed and taken care of. I do not want to insult you but your pathetic excuses here do not hold water to me. We were lucky, there was a Wegmans store near my house on Driving Park Ave. There was a Star Market several miles away that had cheaper groceries. I walked many miles with my mom to that store with her granny cart in tow. Your trying to feed me bullchit excuses. My mom taught me you do what you have to do for your kids. Why do you think she walked all those extra miles to save a couple of dollars? My mom grew up dirt poor during the worst years of the depression. What she taught me was you do whatever you have to do to take care of your family. That is the lesson I gave to my own kids. They knew where the food was and knew how to make their own breakfast and lunch. It was really complicated to pour the cereal in a bowl, put milk on it and pour yourself a glass of juice. It was equally as difficult to make their lunch. It involved bread and peanut butter and jelly and it got really tough when bologna was put into the mix. I guess I should have been charged with child endangerment, sometimes I bought twinkies for them. I was such a bad father teaching them to be self dependent and do things on their own. I guess I should have just let the village take care of them?

Here we go with “my family had it hard stories”.... I bet my parents grew up "poorer" than yours.

I bet my mom would not have given a F**k about how bad your family had it. She was too busy taking care of her own family. More people should try that approach sometime. The concept is called taking care of your own family first. once you take care of your own family then your free to help others. I can't tell you how many strays my sister brought into our house when i was growing up. When you were in our house as a guest you were fed and taken care of and my mom would listen to you and share her wisdom with you. This world could use more people like my mom TLD. My mom did have it hard, grew up in a family of abusive drunken Irish relatives. I know what her advice would have been to you, she gave it to me often, sometimes you need to shut up and listen. You can be poor that does not mean you have to act poor. Sad that so many people in America today don't understand what the difference is.

I didn’t know your mom posted here? If it doesn’t matter, don’t bring it up. What is acting poor?

Holy chit, you can't possibly be that dense. When you act poor that means you throw your self respect and dignity to the curb. That is when you get your little cardboard sign and beg for money at the interstate off ramps. God bless... anything helps...

Like wealthy suburban girls from Chevy Chase having sex in front of some crack dealers in DC acting poor? That kind of dignity and self respect?

They are just acting like sluts. their problems go much deeper than i would ever know. Maybe they did not have a healthy lunch when they went to their little rich girl schools.

But you know the problems of those kids on the corner don’t run any deeper than poor parenting and a victim mentality?

[holmes435]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

[cradleandshoot]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

[Typical Lax Dad]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

[MDlaxfan76]

"Reform not Defund."

How does that happen in the real world?

Simple. You invest in people and communities BEFORE they become criminals. BEFORE it's too late.

Dude, they have been trying that here in Rochester for a very long time. It goes all the way back to the midnight basketball leagues that were meant to keep kids off the street at night. It starts with the PARENTS. You can invest everything you want to. If the parents are not controlling and supervising their own kids you are peeing in the wind. What parent in your neck of the woods does not know where their 12 year old is at 11pm? If the parents don't care who the hell else will?

Not in my neck of the woods but in Illinois....you know the one that drives a 17 year kid out of state and lets him stay out and eventually kills 2 people and shoots another. That is the kind of parent.

The kid had no business bringing a rifle into that situation. The fact he wanted to play the role of security guard was stupid. That is not the point I was making but I know where you are coming from. I am disturbed by 12 year olds selling crack on street corners at 10 pm.

The vast majority of people are.

Disturbed, but not doing anything about it.

Like a lot of things. What are you doing about childhood hunger?

paying my taxes. What are all these parents doing with the SNAP benefits given to them by the government to buy food for their kids? I'm only asking for a friend.

https://otda.ny.gov/programs/snap/#benefits

The supplemental nutrition program in NYS provides 374 a month to buy food for your kids. That averages out to 85 dollars a week. That may not seem like a ton of money but there is something wrong when the parent is still letting their kid go to school hungry. I could buy 85 dollars a week in food for 2 kids and they could eat pretty darn good. Unless of course it is just more convenient to let your kid eat at school?

Avg American family of 4 spends $10k per year on food.

But you are correct that one can eat pretty darn well for an average of $3-4 a serving if making your meals at home using ingredients on sale at your grocery store (my company makes the technology of that easier).

But that assumes you live in an area where there is a good grocer, with fresh food with prices not jacked up. And that you have the transportation to get to that store. And that you have the space to store food, refrigeration and pantry, so that you can buy optimal sizes to save money. And that you have the resources to actually have pantry items, aren't living week to week.

In most of these situations we are discussing, there is no full line grocer with food at prices comparable to the suburbs, and there is little transportation. So, it often requires multiple bus trips just to go to such a store (delivery services don't serve these neighborhoods and don't accept SNAP). How many groceries can you carry on the bus? And you have two jobs as it is.

So...in these 'food deserts' of poverty, there are often lots of crappy bodegas with jacked up prices and little fresh food, but lots of access to fast food, fried chicken and fish, burgers, etc. "food swamps". Actually more like $4-5 a serving, eat out of a bag...any wonder why there's so much heart disease and diabetes in poor populations in America?

So, mom typically is scraping by, not feeding herself the last week of the month. Kids often needing to get their own food. And that's with school lunches.

Then let's feed all of the kids at schools and arrange for home delivered meals to all of the impoverished kids. We were not rich growing up MD. My mom was a fanatic when it came to making sure all of her kids were fed and taken care of. I do not want to insult you but your pathetic excuses here do not hold water to me. We were lucky, there was a Wegmans store near my house on Driving Park Ave. There was a Star Market several miles away that had cheaper groceries. I walked many miles with my mom to that store with her granny cart in tow. Your trying to feed me bullchit excuses. My mom taught me you do what you have to do for your kids. Why do you think she walked all those extra miles to save a couple of dollars? My mom grew up dirt poor during the worst years of the depression. What she taught me was you do whatever you have to do to take care of your family. That is the lesson I gave to my own kids. They knew where the food was and knew how to make their own breakfast and lunch. It was really complicated to pour the cereal in a bowl, put milk on it and pour yourself a glass of juice. It was equally as difficult to make their lunch. It involved bread and peanut butter and jelly and it got really tough when bologna was put into the mix. I guess I should have been charged with child endangerment, sometimes I bought twinkies for them. I was such a bad father teaching them to be self dependent and do things on their own. I guess I should have just let the village take care of them?

I'm not your enemy on this, cradle.
Not sure why you're attacking me.
I wasn't attacking you or anything you were saying, rather I was simply answering your earlier question, as it's an area I've spent quite a lot of attention to in my company's development. We devote 10% of our revenue (not profits) to making our services available free to people without an employer or health plan sponsor, with a particular interest in reaching those underserved communities. We're barely scratching the surface with our pilots, but there's at least some real promise in helping address the challenges.

I described the reality of single moms and grandmas in poverty raising kids. If I recall correctly, you had two parents to handle the load. That does matter.

The realities of these situations aren't excuses, they're simply reality for too many folks. Let's applaud any of the folks, including your mom, for doing their utmost to keep their kids safe and well, setting them on a positive path in life. It's not easy.

[cradleandshoot]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

The self respecting poor people never needed advice from people such as yourself. They always knew what they needed to do to get out of poverty. That was to ignore people such as you. When they take your advice they always wind up staying poor. Imagine that?

[MDlaxfan76]

Hilarious, Holmes.

My dad used to tell us about having to walk 10 miles in the snow to and from school, with just newspaper wrapped around his shoes with holes in them, uphill, both ways...and when we'd ask him about the McDonogh School bus we knew he took, he'd say, ohh, I just meant on Saturdays... for detention...and wink.

[Typical Lax Dad]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

The self respecting poor people never needed advice from people such as yourself. They always knew what they needed to do to get out of poverty. That was to ignore people such as you. When they take your advice they always wind up staying poor. Imagine that?

Your family wasn’t poor.

[cradleandshoot]

"Reform not Defund."

How does that happen in the real world?

Simple. You invest in people and communities BEFORE they become criminals. BEFORE it's too late.

Dude, they have been trying that here in Rochester for a very long time. It goes all the way back to the midnight basketball leagues that were meant to keep kids off the street at night. It starts with the PARENTS. You can invest everything you want to. If the parents are not controlling and supervising their own kids you are peeing in the wind. What parent in your neck of the woods does not know where their 12 year old is at 11pm? If the parents don't care who the hell else will?

Not in my neck of the woods but in Illinois....you know the one that drives a 17 year kid out of state and lets him stay out and eventually kills 2 people and shoots another. That is the kind of parent.

The kid had no business bringing a rifle into that situation. The fact he wanted to play the role of security guard was stupid. That is not the point I was making but I know where you are coming from. I am disturbed by 12 year olds selling crack on street corners at 10 pm.

The vast majority of people are.

Disturbed, but not doing anything about it.

Like a lot of things. What are you doing about childhood hunger?

paying my taxes. What are all these parents doing with the SNAP benefits given to them by the government to buy food for their kids? I'm only asking for a friend.

https://otda.ny.gov/programs/snap/#benefits

The supplemental nutrition program in NYS provides 374 a month to buy food for your kids. That averages out to 85 dollars a week. That may not seem like a ton of money but there is something wrong when the parent is still letting their kid go to school hungry. I could buy 85 dollars a week in food for 2 kids and they could eat pretty darn good. Unless of course it is just more convenient to let your kid eat at school?

Avg American family of 4 spends $10k per year on food.

But you are correct that one can eat pretty darn well for an average of $3-4 a serving if making your meals at home using ingredients on sale at your grocery store (my company makes the technology of that easier).

But that assumes you live in an area where there is a good grocer, with fresh food with prices not jacked up. And that you have the transportation to get to that store. And that you have the space to store food, refrigeration and pantry, so that you can buy optimal sizes to save money. And that you have the resources to actually have pantry items, aren't living week to week.

In most of these situations we are discussing, there is no full line grocer with food at prices comparable to the suburbs, and there is little transportation. So, it often requires multiple bus trips just to go to such a store (delivery services don't serve these neighborhoods and don't accept SNAP). How many groceries can you carry on the bus? And you have two jobs as it is.

So...in these 'food deserts' of poverty, there are often lots of crappy bodegas with jacked up prices and little fresh food, but lots of access to fast food, fried chicken and fish, burgers, etc. "food swamps". Actually more like $4-5 a serving, eat out of a bag...any wonder why there's so much heart disease and diabetes in poor populations in America?

So, mom typically is scraping by, not feeding herself the last week of the month. Kids often needing to get their own food. And that's with school lunches.

Then let's feed all of the kids at schools and arrange for home delivered meals to all of the impoverished kids. We were not rich growing up MD. My mom was a fanatic when it came to making sure all of her kids were fed and taken care of. I do not want to insult you but your pathetic excuses here do not hold water to me. We were lucky, there was a Wegmans store near my house on Driving Park Ave. There was a Star Market several miles away that had cheaper groceries. I walked many miles with my mom to that store with her granny cart in tow. Your trying to feed me bullchit excuses. My mom taught me you do what you have to do for your kids. Why do you think she walked all those extra miles to save a couple of dollars? My mom grew up dirt poor during the worst years of the depression. What she taught me was you do whatever you have to do to take care of your family. That is the lesson I gave to my own kids. They knew where the food was and knew how to make their own breakfast and lunch. It was really complicated to pour the cereal in a bowl, put milk on it and pour yourself a glass of juice. It was equally as difficult to make their lunch. It involved bread and peanut butter and jelly and it got really tough when bologna was put into the mix. I guess I should have been charged with child endangerment, sometimes I bought twinkies for them. I was such a bad father teaching them to be self dependent and do things on their own. I guess I should have just let the village take care of them?

I'm not your enemy on this, cradle.
Not sure why you're attacking me.
I wasn't attacking you or anything you were saying, rather I was simply answering your earlier question, as it's an area I've spent quite a lot of attention to in my company's development. We devote 10% of our revenue (not profits) to making our services available free to people without an employer or health plan sponsor, with a particular interest in reaching those underserved communities. We're barely scratching the serve with our pilots, but there's at least some real promise in helping address the challenges.

I described the reality of single moms and grandmas in poverty raising kids. If I recall correctly, you had two parents to handle the load. That does matter.

The realities of these situations aren't excuses, they're simply reality for too many folks. Let's applaud any of the folks, including your mom, for doing their utmost to keep their kids safe and well, setting them on a positive path in life. It's not easy.

Yeah i was harsh on you, i don't look on you as the enemy, i never have. Despite what TLD claims we were not rich. The reality also does not change if you are a single mom or grandparent raising a child. IF the government is giving you SNAP benefits to feed your family, then use those funds to feed your family. You may live in a grocery desert, then you do the same damn thing my mom did with me back in 1965 or so. She took me hand in hand with our granny cart and took the 45 minute walk to Star Market on Lyell Ave. They also gave out green stamps to boot. My mom NEVER took the attitude that the grocery store was too far away... BOO HOO HOO. We had a Wegmans store 5 minutes away from us. They were too expensive for my mom, convenient yes, practical no way. I just grew up being raised in a completely different mentality than some folks here MD. There is no way effing way in hell my mom would have ever let her kids be fed lunch at school. We lived in a neighborhood my sister has called the Catholic ghetto of the 10th ward. Some of the parents use to take advantage of food handouts from surplus food from the government. The most popular were 1 gallon jars of peanut butter and 5 pound bricks of cheese.

My mom called it "welfare food" she would have thrown it out if given to her. She was a very stubborn and hard headed irish woman. Accepting free government food was an insult to her, in a huge way. That is how i was raised, that is what i know. My mom would never let any person into our house without being fed and any need they had taken care of that she could deal with. The concept of parents sending their kids to school to be fed would have put my mom waaaaaay over the edge. That must make me a dinosaur on these boards and i am fine with that. When the government is actually PROVIDING the resources for parents to buy the food to feed their kids, and the parents STILL can't feed them. Something is seriously wrong. That is not about the parent being poor or having difficulties in their lives. If you are being given the money to feed your kids... WHY CAN'T YOU FEED THEM?? This horsechit about kids going to school hungry when the parent has been GIVEN the resources to by food. Then where the hell has that 374 dollars gone that was meant to feed your kids. I get it, nobody wants to ask that question.

[6x6]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Thanks Holmes, brought back great memories for me but for a different reason.

My Welsh father-in-law watched Python and I’m sure he would have laughed his ass off over this skit. However, his favorite was Benny Hill. He was one of eight, five boys and three girls, although one brother died at a young age. The parents and the seven kids lived in a two up/two down row house with of course, an outhouse, in the village of Pontblyddyn. All seven kids slept together in one small room until WWII when all the lads went off to war. He came to the states after the war and when in his mid 60s with some health issues, moved in with the wife and me along with our 6 kids, for his last 14 years on earth. It was great having him in our house answering questions from the kids about his experiences growing up in his time, the war etc but never once did I hear him complain about anything. He explained, it was just the way it was, you made do and everyone he knew was in the same situation.

Sorry for continuing to divert from the topic at hand but immediately thought of him with a smile after seeing the clip.

[cradleandshoot]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

The self respecting poor people never needed advice from people such as yourself. They always knew what they needed to do to get out of poverty. That was to ignore people such as you. When they take your advice they always wind up staying poor. Imagine that?

Your family wasn’t poor.

Yet my family was never rich. That is be cause what we had my parents worked their f***ing asses off to provide. What they provided for their kids had nothing to do with the f***ing government giving them jack chit. There was a time when many families did not want the government giving them jack f***ing chit in the first place. There was a common term for it.. not being beholden to anybody. Of course you would probably just call it foolish pride.

[Typical Lax Dad]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

The self respecting poor people never needed advice from people such as yourself. They always knew what they needed to do to get out of poverty. That was to ignore people such as you. When they take your advice they always wind up staying poor. Imagine that?

Your family wasn’t poor.

Yet my family was never rich. That is be cause what we had my parents worked their f***ing asses off to provide. What they provided for their kids had nothing to do with the f***ing government giving them jack chit. There was a time when many families did not want the government giving them jack f***ing chit in the first place. There was a common term for it.. not being beholden to anybody. Of course you would probably just call it foolish pride.

Your parents didn’t work as hard as mine.

[cradleandshoot]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

The self respecting poor people never needed advice from people such as yourself. They always knew what they needed to do to get out of poverty. That was to ignore people such as you. When they take your advice they always wind up staying poor. Imagine that?

Your family wasn’t poor.

Yet my family was never rich. That is be cause what we had my parents worked their f***ing asses off to provide. What they provided for their kids had nothing to do with the f***ing government giving them jack chit. There was a time when many families did not want the government giving them jack f***ing chit in the first place. There was a common term for it.. not being beholden to anybody. Of course you would probably just call it foolish pride.

Your parents didn’t work as hard as mine.

I never realized your parents worked in a mine.

[Typical Lax Dad]

Luxury! We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

Those beatings did not do you any good. Your dad should have used the tried and true baseball bat to yer head. Those broken bottles just leave tiny little scratches. Damn you were lucky.

Very funny stuff, thanks for posting it. I can't believe your dad was rich enough to afford broken glass bottles to thrash you with.

The poor people had to cup their hands.

The self respecting poor people never needed advice from people such as yourself. They always knew what they needed to do to get out of poverty. That was to ignore people such as you. When they take your advice they always wind up staying poor. Imagine that?

Your family wasn’t poor.

Yet my family was never rich. That is be cause what we had my parents worked their f***ing asses off to provide. What they provided for their kids had nothing to do with the f***ing government giving them jack chit. There was a time when many families did not want the government giving them jack f***ing chit in the first place. There was a common term for it.. not being beholden to anybody. Of course you would probably just call it foolish pride.

Your parents didn’t work as hard as mine.

I never realized your parents worked in a mine.

[Typical Lax Dad]

https://ij.org/report/fighting-crime-or ... g-revenue/

[jhu72]

Looks like criminal justice reform was a winner during the election.

[kramerica.inc]

Md and Gov Hogan excited about new appointment:

Out of more than 40 applicants, an AA woman, Amal Awad named Chief of Police on Anne Arundel County, MD.

[jhu72]

Latest FBI Hate Crime Report, says 2019 (the year reported) saw the most hate crimes in more than a decade.