Myths and Inconvenient Truths About Children in Poverty
There are many unknown factors when it comes to poverty, especially if you come from a background of the middle and upper classes.
Though we can’t predict the future, we can dispel some myths, and confirm some inconvenient truths, that collectively affect the sense of self worth and behavior of poverty victims, and make escaping poverty far more daunting than most people realize.
This post will explore some of the myths, and inconvenient truths that affect the self-esteem and behaviors of impoverished families and over time gives little incentive for them to make it in the mainstream society.
Though many of these myths have some elements of truth, it can be attributed to a culture of poverty, and not, in most cases, to the individual character of the poverty victim.
In other words, poverty victims live in a style and manner that is dictated by their culture, their surroundings, and the behaviors of others around them.
Most people do not start out in life intending to commit a crime, or to fail for lack of moral values, or to inflict emotional stress on others.
Still the lack of knowledge of those living in a culture of poverty about the mainstream values and behaviors does give credence to the stereotypes of the inhabitants of many poverty neighborhoods.
1. People living in a culture of poverty know that they are part of a poverty culture.
Wrong! A poverty victim has no idea that they live in a culture, no more than a fish knows it lives in water, until it has been taken out of the water.
Although poverty victims are certainly aware that they are poor, they have no clue that they are part of a distinct culture that is causing them, and others like them, to lose a stake in the future, until well after they have learned the language and behaviors of the middle class culture.
Only then, can they look back and see clearly how the culture of poverty has held them and their family members back.
The common practices of dropping out of school, addictions, violence, criminal behavior and teenage pregnancy, or the inability to hold a steady job, are typical behaviors in the culture of poverty.
However, poverty victim do not look at these actions as statistical behavioral patterns of their culture, but rather as the result of the humiliating deprivations of poverty itself and a clear example of the inequities of society.
In other words, there is a resistance to accept personal blame if they behave badly, or if something bad happens to them.
Sadly, other family members who are living in the culture of poverty have sympathy to this type of argument and often reinforce the belief that it is society, and more particularly the greed of the wealthy, who are to blame for their circumstances—not the individual.
The truth is that most poverty victims simply live the only way they know how. If they want to drop out of school or quit their job, this wouldn’t be abnormal in their culture, and it is likely they would not feel any quilt toward this behavior until after the deed had been done.
With the hurdles to economic success being so hard to scale, many victims decide, at a young age, that they want no part of the other life, the middle class, and simply refuse to jump through the hoops to get there.
They feel more comfortable around people who are like them—in other words, people of their own kind. This behavior often leads to rejection of other family members who make it out of poverty
2. Poverty victims choose to live from paycheck to paycheck.
Not knowing the hidden rules of the middle class can cause a person living in a poverty culture to lose a job, ruin a friendship, or even get arrested in mainstream America.
My parents did not have a checking account during all my childhood and adolescent years. My father rarely kept a job longer than a few weeks.
Both my parents dropped out before entering high school. We learned to live with little or no money. To live from paycheck to paycheck assumes that poverty victims have a paycheck in the first place.
The truth is, poverty victims learn to survive using government assistance, family assistance and help from friends.
Maintaining a steady job is rarely a goal. It is a way of life in their culture, and one that is generally accepted by other members of the family or those in the neighborhood. I know because I lived that way of life, I did these things, and so did my friends in the housing projects. We had no idea just how destructive that behavior would be to our future.
3. Poverty victims are untrustworthy and a bad influence on society.
Poverty victims depend upon survival in a random, episodic story structure for memory patterns.
They live in an unpredictable environment, and have not developed the planning skills, or the coping skills to deal with the stress of making it in the middle class environment. Those who try, often fail.
Without a plan, then they cannot predict. If an individual cannot predict, then they cannot identify cause and effect. If an individual cannot identify cause and effect, then they cannot identify consequences, and control impulsivity. If an individual cannot control impulsivity, then there is an increased inclination toward criminal behavior.
It’s not as simpe as connecting the dots. When you live in a constant state of crisis, when you cannot control the events around you, then chances are you will make many bad choices. Remove the child or teen from this environment, give them good role models and they will over time become model, productive members of mainstream society.
So, while it is true that poverty victims are more likely to commit crimes, when you look at the whole picture you see they are locked in a culture that causes them to lose a stake in the future.
Sure, it may indeed be their fault, and it can be said they are the author of their own destiny, however the flip side of that argument is that the chances of anyone breaking through the class barriers imposed by the culture of poverty are very close to zero.
As far as I know, there are only two ways out, especially for generational poverty victims—God and/or Role Models. Of the two options, role models usually eventually give up because they lose patience with the child or teen, who needs exposure to the role model for three or four years in order to adapt to a new culture–the middle class.
On the other hand, God is always successful, if the poverty victim has the faith to stick with the values and teachings of the church. I’m not preaching a sermon here. I simply stating the truth.
Regardless of a person’s belief in God, it has been proven time and time again that the basic tenets of faith in a Higher Power does cause an individual to make better life choices.
4. Poverty victims never save their money.
The mindset of the poverty culture is that one rarely escapes poverty. That’s because there is always an emergency such as the family car breaking down, a family member in urgent need, or pressing legal problems.
Most poverty victims earn income at or below the poverty line, so there is never enough money to take care of 100% of their family needs. To save money, the poverty victim would have to deny aiding a family member in need. That’s a hard and painful lesson to accept in the poverty culture.
Also, in the culture of poverty, the general thinking is that money is to be spent, not saved. If one does manage to earn a lot of money, then they are expected by other family members to share the extra money and share it equally. If they refuse to do that, then the next time that person is in need they will be left out in the cold.
In poverty, people are possessions and people rely upon each other for survival. During all my childhood and adolescent years, there was never enough money to take care of all our needs.
It’s not that poverty victims never save money, but rather they never have money left over to save.
5. Poverty victims have no class and behave poorly in public.
Public behavior is about discipline, penance and forgiveness, not about change in behavior. The mother is the most powerful figure in the culture of poverty; at least that was the way it was in my family, as well as other families who lived in our neighborhoods. Not only does she control the limited resources, she is also the keeper of the soul. She dispenses penance and forgiveness.
A typical pattern in poverty as it relates to dealing with discipline is to verbally chastise the child, then forgive and feed the child.
The hidden rule about food is that food is equated with love. In the final analysis, all you have are people. How do you show people that you love them? You give them food so they can continue to live.
The culture of poverty is a different world from mainstream society. The humor is different. The behavior is different. The language is different. The punishment for bad behavior is different. Once the mother forgives the child or teen, the issue is resolved and forgotten.
That doesn’t mean poverty victims do not have pride, or that they have no class. Think of it as a way of life that is different from mainstream society. Within their culture, poverty victims have thier own way of measuring and defining what constitutes class.
One of the mistakes of outsiders looking into poverty issues is in the role of punishment in poverty. Punishment is rarely, if ever, about a change in behavior. The mother deals out punishment and her forgiveness trumps everything. Forgiveness by the mother is never conditioned upon a change in behavior.
Therefore, to expect changed behavior after a parent-teacher conference is, in most cases, a false hope. Here again the public perception is far different than the perception of the poverty victim.
6. Poverty victims are rude and have a tendency to become violent.
It is true that gangs are a type of support system for children in poverty neighborhoods. Gangs provide virtually all of the resources needed for survival and a sense of security and self-worth.
Fighting and physical violence are an integral part of the survival techniques among rival gang members in the poverty neighborhoods. I fought most every day during my childhood and adolescent years, even though I was never a member of a gang.
The truth is that the need to be able to defend against violence and criminal behavior is necessary for survival. If one can’t defend themselves then they need someone to be their protector. Gangs are more than capable of fulfilling that role.
Middle class members use space to deal with conflict and disagreement, i.e. they go to a different room and cool off, or they purchase enough land so they are not encroached upon; they live in neighborhoods where people keep their distance.
But in poverty neighborhoods, separation is not an option. The only way to defend turf is to do so physically. Also, individuals in poverty are seldom going to call the police, for two primary reasons: First, the police are likely looking for them or someone in their family or circle of friends; secondly, the police are going to be slow to respond. So why bother calling?
I would consider the survival mentality in poverty neighborhoods a normal reaction, especially given the fact that they have limited support systems available to them. If they come across as rude or prone to violence, it is because that is the normal behavior in their neighborhoods.
7. Poverty Victims do not have Pride.
People who live in a poverty culture do indeed have immense pride, and a deep resentment toward anyone who assaults their sense of self-worth or engages in put-downs. It could be referred to as a chip on the shoulder.
But, it would be a big mistake to assume that poverty victims do not have pride. It is perhaps the most important thing they hold onto and they will fight to defend it.
However, I have sometimes thought it is a bit of irony that poverty victims honestly believe they have very close family relationships.
I learned while growing up in poverty, that when victims speak about family they often qualify thier loyalties with “buts” that reflect their attention to individual needs of survival. For example, I know you earned that money, but we need to borrow it to pay our utlity bills or fix the car, or to pay the rent, etc.
The constant lack of money does not affect the individual pride. It only makes the poverty victim more aware of their vulnerability and therefore much more sensitive to put-downs.
No matter how much one family member helps another, it is never enough. And, the very moment a family members fails or refuses to help out another family member, a feud erupts, though never really longlasting.
8. The Poor Look Down Upon Each Other.
Poverty victims may feud and fight with each other, but that has more to do with the crowded living conditions that anything else. Make no mistake about it, an insult from another member of the poverty culture is not nearly as insulting as an insult from a member of the middle or upper class.
In the poverty culture the tendency is to believe that members of the middle and upper classes shun them and look down upon them. Any slight comment that could be perceived as a putdown is met with fierce resistance.
Poverty victims rarely put down other poverty victims because of their poverty status. From the mindset of the poverty victim, they are hard-working people and most everryone in the neighborhood accepts that their neighbors are in the same boat as it relates to the lack of money.
Poverty victims generally consider themselves fun to be around, not like those high and mighty uppity folks who think they are better than everyone else. They are generally helpful to others who are less fortunate than their own family. They cover each other backs when threatened. As a general rule, they know they are outsiders, not because of their culture but because rich folks are too selfish and self-centered to share the wealth.
While I was growing up in generational poverty, I remember many fights breaking out in our neighborhood. But, I never had another poverty victim poke fun at my own poverty status, or in any way look down upon me in that regard. It is largely a myth that poverty victims look down upon themselves or others within their community because of their poverty status.
9. Poverty Victims use slang and informal language.
Well, yes, but this is their language, and what is slang to one social class is not necessarily slang to another social class.
In fact the language of the upper class is very different from the language of the middle class. The upper class will often reject members of the middle class, just as members of the middle class will reject members of the poverty class.
That is just the way things are. It doesn’t make the behavior or language of one class more or less wrong than any of the other classes.
I didn’t learn the formal use of language until well into my twenties and even then, it took years to change from the language of the culture of poverty to the more formal language of the middle class.
To put poverty victims down because of their language is just another form of discrimination, which serves to isolate them from the mainstream society.
Many problems at school, for children in poverty, are caused by the fact that they they lack the knowledge of formal language skills.
Language can be casual or it can be formal. Conversations can be abbreviated, laced with slang and profanity, or they can be more consultative with a greater emphasis on proper word use and expanded vocabulary. Discourse patterns can similarly be casual or formal. The language used by a culture should not be a discriminator.
In a casual conversation poverty victims are dependent upon non-verbal assists, such as use of hands and facial expressions. This is the way they communicate. Sentence syntax is often incomplete and use of slang is frequent.
Children born into generational poverty do not have access to the language of the middle class at home, and besides, they are comfortable with their language.
Still, most will be rejected by the middle class at various stages of their lives, from the first day of entering school as children, to the first day of entering the work force as adults, because of their language.
10. Poverty doesn’t always allow its victims to be good.
It is simply a fact that children whose memories are storehouses of deprivation, neglect or violence lack the ability to cope with the present or to envision a future bright enough to justify postponing immediate gratification. Their only guide to behavior is what they learn at home and in their neighborhoods.
A childhood that never gave them the chance to make consistent connections between cause and effect leaves them feeling powerless to influence the course of their lives—a sense of defeat that keeps them without hope and without goals—stuck at the very bottom of our society. Under the circumstances, poverty does not always allow the child to be good.
I’m not suggesting this is an excuse for bad or criminal behavior. However, if we as a society, are to win the war on poverty, we have to spend our available resources on dealing with the cause of the problems as opposed to unconditionally handing out money in the form of entitlement checks.
