YOUR OWN FUCKING FAULT addict with syringe, the homeless

via +YOU COULDN`T MAKE IT UP

Every 5 Dane: People in need are lazy

Every five Danes believe, according to a new study that people at the bottom of society are lazy and without willpower. Experts suggest that the political debate affect public support for vulnerable people. Joachim B. Olsen (LA) believe there is too much money to people who are not needy.
Halmtorvet
Photo: Magnus Holm / Polfoto
YOUR OWN FUCKING FAULT addict with syringe, the homeless who sleep in front of a store or the mentally ill man who goes greasy around the street and talking into the air, are to blame for their situation.

The mean one-fifth, according to a survey of attitudes which Epinion made to the Council for Socially Marginalised among 1,011 representatively selected Danes.

Overall, the match 71 percent of Danes that social vulnerability is a problem in Denmark, and a majority think that the area is not given sufficient priority when public money is allocated.

But the question of why people are in need in Denmark, corresponding 20 percent, it is because they are 'laziness and lack of willpower'.

Ivan Christensen, Manager of men in Copenhagen - a day center for vulnerable citizens - believe that Danes are unaware of why some people end up on the street.

"I do not feel these people as lazy at all. They may have difficulty functioning from the conditions that society in general is put together for. But not lazy or indolent, "he says:

"A large part of the people we work with have been able to choose between getting beaten with belts or brace. Where we have had to choose between having blue or red tennis shoes, this group of people often had different options, "says Ivan Christensen.

The President of the Council for Socially Marginalised, Sjursen, indicate that especially the debates on the poor-Carina and Lazy Robert has affected people's views on vulnerable people. At worst, the attitude weaken support for the welfare state, he fears:

"It can lead to a lack of support for socially vulnerable, so they do not get the help they need," assesses Sjursen.

Vulnerability has had only a few choices
Ninna Hoegh, secretariat director of Project Outside in Copenhagen, working with people living on the street, also believe that Danes are unaware of the reasons why some people end up sleeping on benches and in basements.

Her experience is that homeless and vulnerable people really do not have many options. Often they are forced to choose between one or two options - which can even be full or so-so, she says.

"If you are homeless and abuse of alcohol, so one is left with perhaps a choice to either be on the street or in a natvarmestue," she says and continues:

"If you then the same has a mental illness, it can be difficult to choose the sensible people to go inside and get some heat. So take perhaps the bad choice because you can not manage to be indoors, because you do not want to be in an abusive environment, or because you can not manage to be in a place where there are many people. "

The story of Mette
Ninna Hoegh talks about Mette, a former street prostitute, she has encountered in his work in Project Outside:

Mette's mother was a prostitute and drug addict. Mette also had an older sister. One day they were in the woods, but Mette's sister drowned in the forest lake. The mother was subsequently depressed and died later. So Mette ended up on the street because she had seen her mother solve her problems with drugs and prostitution.

"So from a young girl who can not do this, take Mette some choices where I'll say, 'Wow!' But she has after all managed to survive. And actually it's rather odd that it has not gone worse, "says Ninna Hoegh:

"These are a great many stories about these people that I think that there are so many life circumstances, we do not get along when we think, 'This is fucking their own fault'," says Ninna Hoegh.

Young people and men are most
The study by the Council for Socially Marginalised also draw a picture of who who think that the risk is lazy and spineless.

31 percent of young people between 18 and 34 years old consider particularly this. Among middle-aged and older is 16 and 15 percent.
26 percent of Danish men believe that the risk is lazy. It's only 10 percent of women.
25 percent of voters who vote for parties in blue block, believes it is laziness that send people on the street. It believes only 10 percent of red bloc voters.
Jørgen Elm Larsen from the University of Copenhagen has for years researched the poor and vulnerable groups. According to him, it is natural that young judge postponed harder than middle-aged and older people.

"The young are raised in home and school to think that if only they get their act together and do what you have, so everyone has a fair chance to become something in life. And when someone did not do so well, it must be because they do not get their act together, laziness and lack of willpower, "he says.

"When you get older, you know very well that those you know who gets into problems, neither lazy or lack willpower," says Jørgen Elm Larsen.

Many causes
The President of the Council for Socially Marginalised, Sjursen, points out that there are many reasons why people end up on the street.

"It may be the economy, one can have an abuse that cost the box. It can also be mental illness and in fact a combination of many things, "says Sjursen. He believes that vulnerable people are being judged more harshly today than in the past.

"It is my feeling that the debate is getting tougher and tougher. And I think that it affects people's attitudes - especially the part of the debate that MPs stand for, "says Sjursen.

'It is Joachim's sake'
The Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Social Affairs, Anne Baastrup (SF), believes that the attitude towards vulnerable citizens is characterized by an extreme polarized debate in which some parties - including the Liberal Alliance - argue that there is economic poverty in Denmark.

In addition, ten years of Liberal government left its mark on the Danes, she says.

"We have up through the 00s had a general narrative that is his own fortune, and that you should just pull themselves together. It affects mainly young, and therefore I think the young people especially believe that one has to get its act together, "says Anne Baastrup.

She is worried about the prospect, if more and more considered homeless as someone who can just get their act together.

"We have an even more polarized society and the welfare state can be eroded because there is no knowledge of what's important. One can even risk countries. If you get sick, what happens to you? "Asks Anne Baastrup rhetorically.

Associate Professor Morten Ejrnæs, which for years has been dealing with poverty and vulnerable human factors point out also, that every time a Dane believes that vulnerable people are lazy, it finds four Danes who do not believe this.

"The Danes by generally well that when things go wrong for people, it's not just because they are lazy and do not bother taking a job - the economic crisis, but coincidences can lead to poverty and distress," says Morten Ejrnæs.

'Many are not needy'
Liberal Alliance Joachim B. Olsen is known for having a tough line against people on benefits.

He stresses that attitudes to socially vulnerable are hard to identify in a survey. But basically, he believes that most people at some point even recognize that a destructive behavior has negative consequences for them, while others never reach the realization.

"Therefore, there may be people who think, 'So are you that you have not prepared." And how could I understand, "said Joachim B. Olsen. He also stresses that the welfare state is under pressure in these years.

The Danes would in fact like to pay for a welfare state that helps 'needy', but we see many who are not needy, says Joachim B. Olsen:

"If more and more thinking about some people who get money from the public, 'No, it is damn not working', then destroys the desire to help to finance the welfare state. The support will disappear if too many get a share of the awards, "says Joachim B. Olsen.

Drug addicts are most repulsive
The study shows that Danes are taking more distance from drug users than from drunks, prostitutes and homeless people - at least when we meet them in public places.

26 percent of Danes feel disgusted when they see a drug addict on the street.
Among young people aged between 18 and 34 years, the 42 percent who are repelled by drug addicts. Only 31 percent of the group feel that way about alcoholics.
"Drug users have mostly been at the bottom of the hierarchy of socially disadvantaged. It has something with the way they behave: they are assumed to steal, and their needles are very many places, "explains Professor Jørgen Elm Larsen.

For both Ninna Hoegh, Project Outside, and the director of Men's Home, Ivan Christensen, the difference in the perception of socially vulnerable absurd.

"I think we think too much worthy or unworthy needy, and that worries me. People will not always either drug addicts, homeless or otherwise. Sometimes they are the whole effort at once. '

Ivan Christensen, Men's Home, agrees:

"There may be a view that people who are addicted to substances are more to blame for their own accident than people living homeless or prostitutes. And the more unworthy needy one perceived as the more repulsive experienced you probably like, "he said.

Associate Professor Morten Ejrnæs is partly agree, but also have another explanation.

"Drug addiction is, after all, far distant for most of us than alcohol abuse. Substance abuse provokes so stronger feelings than alcohol abuse, but also stronger feelings than homelessness, he says:

"Homelessness can awaken compassion, and there are actually more than you'd think, with experience of homelessness."