Once stigmatized, food stamps find acceptance

[Anguille]

NYT: Food stamps find new acceptance - The New York Times- msnbc.com

Without food stamps during a cold winter when I was 19 I would have had to continue living off the left overs on room service trays at the hotel I worked at.

I chose being stigmatized over being malnourished on stale toast and dregs of orange juice. And possibly losing my job for breaking rules. I got caught once by Chef!! That's when I went for the food stamps.

 

[uscitizen]

I haven't worked for a few years now....and because I do not work anymore, I am able to put a good meal on the table every night, fix matt's breakfast and pack him a solid lunch.

When I did work, it was take out or going out to eat, or delivery, with a home cooked meal just twice a week....we never made breakfast, got something to eat once we got to work, and we never made lunch, always went out together for lunch at a minimum of $20 bucks for the lunch each day including the waitress tip....

that's a little off point....but what I am trying to say, is there IS NO TIME for the working woman to cook and bake as she once did imho.

Yep, but is the trade off worth it when you have a few small children?
many wind up paying most all they make on gas, lunch and childcare.

What is more important to us I guess is the question?

 

[Anguille]

What ever happened to the days when people were embarrassed and dare i say ashamed to be on the dole?

From what I can tell this is still the case with the vast majority of Americans much to the chagrin of the progressive nanny staters that would like to see being a dependent of the state become the "norm".

If I ever find myself in need of food stamps again, I'll take the embarrassment and shame over begging on the streets.

 

[Shogun]

If we gave the poor flour, sugar, potatoes, etc most of them would starve.
Food preparation is a vanishing skill.

We are too lazy to even prepare our own food.

I agree...The poor used to be known for their ability to take basic foodstuffs and turn them into a lowcost meal. Inexpensive cuts of meat, cornmeal, flour, rice could all be cooked into a meal for the family at low cost. Many of the poor today are incapable of cooking a meal that isn't pre-prepared.

But before we put all the blame on the poor.....most middle class and wealthy can no longer cook a basic meal without takeout.

Cooking is a lost art

thats just asinine. Cooking isn't like the lost langauge of some forgotten culture. Look at global cuisines and spare the the bullshit when people in Peru eat guinnea pigs and people in asia are busy eating scorpions.

it's a skill fostered by necessity. I guarentee that you'd learn how to cook SOMETHING if you don't know how if you were starving in a desert with staple food items handy.

 

[AllieBaba]

How many on food stamps have a 32 inch TV? Rims on their car? $80 sneakers? Fancy cell phone?
Sell those things and buy the food.
Many need stamps. Over age 18 with no disabilities= no food stamps. PERIOD.
Get a dam job. Join the military. Pick up cans on the side of the road. Go to the church kitchen pantry.
50% at least folks on food stamp do not have their priorities in order. Do excess cheese and meats and get a can vegetable pantry for the ones that need with community fresh vegetable gardens where these folks can work for their food.
Not my responsibility to be taxed to give folks food if they are adult and healthy. I give it as a donation and work there also at MUST ministries here. No one goes hungry.
Food stamp program is full of fraud.

The food stamp program is small, small potatoes next to medical. FS accounts for a tiny portion of state and federal budgets. It's the medical that is full of fraud.

People who have no money to buy their kids a birthday present but get $700 a month in FS just might be tempted to buy a bakery cake, for Pete's sakes, and what business is it of anyone else's? Heck, they might be tempted to take a friend shopping and buy that friend $100 of food for $50 in cash so they can pay their light bill.

People who fear and hate the poor are beyond me. We've created the system, those people are the product of it, now we get to take care of them. Most of them have issues that go far beyond just being lazy. Far, far beyond.

BTW, able bodied people are required to participate in job skills/search programs. Most of them have barriers. Either they have records which make it hard to find work, they are drug addicted, in abusive relationships, have learning disabilities, are mentally ill...the list goes on and on. I see them every day.

 

[Anguille]

What ever happened to the days when people were embarrassed and dare i say ashamed to be on the dole?

Long gone, my friend.

And that is a shame really. If someone is not ashamed of being on the dole, they have little to no incentive to find their own way in life.

Believe you me, if you've ever had to get food stamps, being on the dole was every incentive to find a way off it. Having food in my stomach made it possible for me to get a second job and not have to quit school. Had I quit school, I'd never had gotten out of the poverty trap. No one is immune to that. No matter were you come from or how well connected you may think you are.

 

[Shogun]

If we gave the poor flour, sugar, potatoes, etc most of them would starve.
Food preparation is a vanishing skill.

We are too lazy to even prepare our own food.

I agree...The poor used to be known for their ability to take basic foodstuffs and turn them into a lowcost meal. Inexpensive cuts of meat, cornmeal, flour, rice could all be cooked into a meal for the family at low cost. Many of the poor today are incapable of cooking a meal that isn't pre-prepared.

But before we put all the blame on the poor.....most middle class and wealthy can no longer cook a basic meal without takeout.

Cooking is a lost art

Yep and many even raised gardens if only very small ones.
Another nearly lost art, even in rural KY where I live.

so much of our economy over the last few decades has been built on laziness and waste.
Production got more efficient and consumers got more inefficient.

yea... people sure don't have GARDENS anymore.




seriously. this thread is reminding me of every dark spot that stains liberal politics despite my own identity with it.

 

[uscitizen]

Or pay for crack or booze with food stamps?


the debit card approach has reduced a lot fo fraud in food stamps, but it still exists.

The debit card approach also routed food stamp money to banks.

all private businesses want all the tax dollars they can get.

 

[Shogun]

I disagree....the poor are very good at making something out of nothing when it comes to food....I have witnessed such with relatives on my husband's side that were part of the working poor.

And there are MANY out there just like them.

Quick and easy cooking comes from the middle class, with both parents working.

When the woman was not required to work in order for the family unit to have enough to scrape by, she was at home...and had the time to take flour and make biscuits or pies and cakes or dumplings or pasta....or the daily bread.....or a 3 hour stew made out of nothing but the meat on the bones...and left overs.

Care I see what the people using "food Stamps" buy. Little of it is food that requires preparation.
Now there is a difference in the elderly on food stamps and the younger ones. The elderly buy basics to prepare. The younger ones do not.

My generation prepared food, the succeding ones not so much.

if it is food that requires little preperation it's only because of it's convenient availability. No shit someone is going to buy fries instead of pealable potatoes while on food stamps. But, do you REALLY think that someone who wants fries and are given potatoes won't figure out how to cut them and deep fry them? come on.

 

[AllieBaba]

People don't live where they can grow gardens. We're not allowed to sell off our land in less than 160 acre parcels out here in God's country, people are forced to live on tiny lots, surrounded by millions of acres of land....people who happen to buy a little chunk can't "improve" it so you have people living in barns, literally, because of the restrictions on building codes.

But I have to say....fs can be used to purchase seeds and seedlings. Trippy, huh?

 

[Skull Pilot]

I agree...The poor used to be known for their ability to take basic foodstuffs and turn them into a lowcost meal. Inexpensive cuts of meat, cornmeal, flour, rice could all be cooked into a meal for the family at low cost. Many of the poor today are incapable of cooking a meal that isn't pre-prepared.

But before we put all the blame on the poor.....most middle class and wealthy can no longer cook a basic meal without takeout.

Cooking is a lost art

Yep and many even raised gardens if only very small ones.
Another nearly lost art, even in rural KY where I live.

so much of our economy over the last few decades has been built on laziness and waste.
Production got more efficient and consumers got more inefficient.

yea... people sure don't have GARDENS anymore.




seriously. this thread is reminding me of every dark spot that stains liberal politics despite my own identity with it.

Grow $700 of Food in 100 Square Feet!

you don't need a big garden either

and for the home made bread people

Five Minutes a Day for Fresh-Baked Bread

 

[Paulie]

Yep and many even raised gardens if only very small ones.
Another nearly lost art, even in rural KY where I live.

so much of our economy over the last few decades has been built on laziness and waste.
Production got more efficient and consumers got more inefficient.

yea... people sure don't have GARDENS anymore.




seriously. this thread is reminding me of every dark spot that stains liberal politics despite my own identity with it.

Grow $700 of Food in 100 Square Feet!

you don't need a big garden either

and for the home made bread people

Five Minutes a Day for Fresh-Baked Bread

I grew a 100 sqaure foot garden 2 years ago and had more cucumbers, green beans, peas, and watermelon than I knew what to do with. I was GIVING shit away.

 

[uscitizen]

People don't live where they can grow gardens. We're not allowed to sell off our land in less than 160 acre parcels out here in God's country, people are forced to live on tiny lots, surrounded by millions of acres of land....people who happen to buy a little chunk can't "improve" it so you have people living in barns, literally, because of the restrictions on building codes.

But I have to say....fs can be used to purchase seeds and seedlings. Trippy, huh?

I have had at least a tiny garden in all the places I have lived that had any yard at all.

I live in rural as heck KY.
I have noticed that the latest 30 something generation does not garden at all.
And most of the older ones have stopped gardening.

Out of my closest 150 or so households only 4 of us grow a garden.

 

[Anguille]

I understand what you're saying but personally I still believe that the vast majority of Americans are still self-reliant and want to earn their own keep, maybe I'm just naive on this point but I find it hard to accept that the American Spirit of Self-Reliance is dead.

I don't think you are naive, I think you are just a better observer than Skunk Pilot. It's no where near dead.

 

[rightwinger]

I disagree....the poor are very good at making something out of nothing when it comes to food....I have witnessed such with relatives on my husband's side that were part of the working poor.

And there are MANY out there just like them.

Quick and easy cooking comes from the middle class, with both parents working.

When the woman was not required to work in order for the family unit to have enough to scrape by, she was at home...and had the time to take flour and make biscuits or pies and cakes or dumplings or pasta....or the daily bread.....or a 3 hour stew made out of nothing but the meat on the bones...and left overs.

Care I see what the people using "food Stamps" buy. Little of it is food that requires preparation.
Now there is a difference in the elderly on food stamps and the younger ones. The elderly buy basics to prepare. The younger ones do not.

My generation prepared food, the succeding ones not so much.

I think we have lost many of the mother to daughter cooking skills that used to be passed down through the generations.
Most are unaware you can bake your own bread, that pancakes do not come from a box, that soup does not come from a can..

 

[Skull Pilot]

People don't live where they can grow gardens. We're not allowed to sell off our land in less than 160 acre parcels out here in God's country, people are forced to live on tiny lots, surrounded by millions of acres of land....people who happen to buy a little chunk can't "improve" it so you have people living in barns, literally, because of the restrictions on building codes.

But I have to say....fs can be used to purchase seeds and seedlings. Trippy, huh?

I have had at least a tiny garden in all the places I have lived that had any yard at all.

I live in rural as heck KY.
I have noticed that the latest 30 something generation does not garden at all.
And most of the older ones have stopped gardening.

Out of my closest 150 or so households only 4 of us grow a garden.

funny how the sheep are programmed to think fresh fruit and vegetables come from the store.

 

[Shogun]

I disagree....the poor are very good at making something out of nothing when it comes to food....I have witnessed such with relatives on my husband's side that were part of the working poor.

And there are MANY out there just like them.

Quick and easy cooking comes from the middle class, with both parents working.

When the woman was not required to work in order for the family unit to have enough to scrape by, she was at home...and had the time to take flour and make biscuits or pies and cakes or dumplings or pasta....or the daily bread.....or a 3 hour stew made out of nothing but the meat on the bones...and left overs.

Care I see what the people using "food Stamps" buy. Little of it is food that requires preparation.
Now there is a difference in the elderly on food stamps and the younger ones. The elderly buy basics to prepare. The younger ones do not.

My generation prepared food, the succeding ones not so much.

if it is food that requires little preperation it's only because of it's convenient availability. No shit someone is going to buy fries instead of pealable potatoes while on food stamps. But, do you REALLY think that someone who wants fries and are given potatoes won't figure out how to cut them and deep fry them? come on.

 

[Anguille]

What ever happened to the days when people were embarrassed and dare i say ashamed to be on the dole?

Ahh they sort of went away when it was discovered that many of our military people qualified for food stamps.

 

[uscitizen]

People don't live where they can grow gardens. We're not allowed to sell off our land in less than 160 acre parcels out here in God's country, people are forced to live on tiny lots, surrounded by millions of acres of land....people who happen to buy a little chunk can't "improve" it so you have people living in barns, literally, because of the restrictions on building codes.

But I have to say....fs can be used to purchase seeds and seedlings. Trippy, huh?

I have had at least a tiny garden in all the places I have lived that had any yard at all.

I live in rural as heck KY.
I have noticed that the latest 30 something generation does not garden at all.
And most of the older ones have stopped gardening.

Out of my closest 150 or so households only 4 of us grow a garden.

funny how the sheep are programmed to think fresh fruit and vegetables come from the store.

Uggh, yeah cardboard tomatoes.

 

[Shogun]

Or pay for crack or booze with food stamps?


the debit card approach has reduced a lot fo fraud in food stamps, but it still exists.

The debit card approach also routed food stamp money to banks.

all private businesses want all the tax dollars they can get.

indeed. and I support extracting them from the tit of the American tax payer.