I can’t understand how this can possibly happen in any society who claim to have a regard for ethics or even human rights:
Many Indigenous people live rough in Alice Springs, where the temperature often drops down to about zero degrees Celsius on winter nights.
They often stash their blankets somewhere during the day.
Alderman Jane Clark says rangers can currently remove the blankets but the new by-laws would let rangers throw them away, rather than return them to an Indigenous organisation.
“People tuck their blankets away during the daytime in Alice Springs because they’re sleeping rough at night,” she said.
“And council wants to be able get those blankets and throw them away.
“And I just think that’s completely the wrong attitude to have towards someone who is very disadvantaged in the community.”
via Plan to strip blankets from Alice homeless – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).
How can it be possible that you can frame the problem of homeless people stashing their blankets somewhere during the day as being a litter issue? How is it possible that our society is OK with destroying the blanket of a homeless person because it’s “litter”? How on earth is the welfare of a homeless person a lower priority than keeping public spaces litter free?
This is just plain sick.
