From a standpoint of communication, messaging, and cultural expression of how we respect the humanity of the poor (and even that phrase is problematic, like “we” are doing “them” a favor), there is critical subtext in the entire notion of applying tiny house/alternative housing solutions to housing instability problems, and that subtext is being ignored to our great detriment and expense.
As someone who has struggled with poverty and housing insecurity all my life, here’s what the “on the streets” ear in my head hears every time I hear someone going on about how wonderful it is to create “tiny house communities” where the homeless can be:
“We’d love to help you out, but we can’t find a way to do it that both treats you as an equal among dignified free people and allows the gigantic kajillionaire conglomerates and the handful of people who own them to profit from you, so we’re going to train you instead to be so incredibly desperate that you’ll take ANYTHING, even a palette in an empty warehouse, and be glad to have it.
Then we’ll come up with something that we can sell to the kind-hearted as a philanthropic initiative to ‘address homelessness,’ sequester you in boxes that none of us would want to live in outside of a few minimalists and a whole lot of people making specious hypothetical arguments they don’t actually believe in on the internet because they don’t want to ‘lose’ The Battle Of The Comment Section. You still get to be separate, less than, beneath dignity, and lacking in basic resources but we can tell ourselves we ‘did something.’ Sorry. I mean, we feel bad and all but if there’s no money to be made on putting you in a dignified living situation, you’re not going to be in one. But here’s a token attempt exploiting the good will and sincere earnest positive intent of a whole bunch of folks in between you and us, to make sure if you are paying attention enough to say any of this out loud it will hurt feelings and people won’t want to hear it.
So, sorry Poors, you can have a tiny little imitation of a home and tell yourself how brave and strong you are for making the best of it to help distract you from the fact that your country doesn’t think you deserve a real place to live, and you’d probably better appreciate it and not complain or you won’t even have that.
Suddenly when you’re hearing that message, the whole “isn’t this a good and noble thing we’re doing” narrative doesn’t play so well to your good intentions and kind heart.
I’m sorry for that – genuinely, I’m not writing this to hurt anyone or make them feel like they’ve wasted their time or even hurt people by accident – but we’re not going to get moving on real solutions until we stop allowing ourselves to be sold on the idea that “good enough for them” constitutes human decency and the fulfillment of our immutable obligation to the ultimate morality of human life, i.e. the survival and propagation of the species.
There is another reason why the whole “tiny house” thing infuriates me to a degree that, at first glance, most reasonable people would think unwarranted by the situation. We’ll have to get into some hard data and stuff to fully understand that, so let’s do that now.
First of all it is not just to satisfy “fascists” to be compensated when one’s property bought with private money is confiscated by the government- it is right and fair and the very least that should be done, you know unless you are communist scum. There, we got the mutual name calling out of the way. Now 2 inconvenient truths for you – First what makes you think the government (under either/any D or R administration) will take the unused inventory from big bad corporate unused housing inventory? They will take it away from middle class landlords, for whom this is a business and livelihood. This same segment of landlords is still hurting from the Covid era that prevented them from evicting tenants who did not pay rent (and was taken advantage terribly by the way). But let the unit stay unoccupied “too long” and let the government take it, uh NO. You trust a government that taxes the hell out of the middle class but has loopholes for elites and corporations? This would be the same. The 2nd inconvenient truth is whether it be streets, tents, tiny homes, or nice enough pretty confiscated houses- it won’t solve the underlying issue of homelessness- which is not actually homelessness at all – but the underlying issues of addiction and mental illness. Put these addicts and untreated mentally ill into neighborhoods and drugs, crime, and death follow. Middle class folk don’t want that either – shocker I know, insert more name calling here I suppose. How about we get honest about that though – the WHY are people homeless—and stop the hyperbole of which type of socialist housing can solve this problem.