Shaming and blaming doing nothing to address poverty

Adults should not feel ashamed of their poverty or asking for help. PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

As children return to school, the coronavirus-induced rise in those on a social welfare benefit is ever more visible: children with no shoes; children with empty bellies; absent children.

Child poverty and hunger are particularly heart-breaking. Children are, in essence, blameless for their plight, dependent as they are on their adult guardians. But this also leads to the crux of the problem: child poverty exists because adult poverty exists. The two are not disconnected — they exist in unison. Yet, instead of support, the adult is invariably blamed, particularly for their spending habits. Compassion for the child is not shared with the adult.

Of course, no-one is infallible: people overspend or spend money on the “wrong” things. And to claim otherwise robs people of their autonomy to make choices, whether they are deemed as “right” or “wrong”.

But the debate has become skewed. Viewing the problems of hunger and poverty as predominantly personal failings of the adult has not only been blown out of proportion, but it has also hidden the more significant structural and historical barriers at play.

A commonly cited barrier is that adults lack money. Most of the poor in New Zealand are beneficiaries, a point highlighted in the Welfare Expert Advisory Group’s 2019 report, “Whakamana Tangata — Restoring Dignity to Social Security in New Zealand”. A conclusion of the report was that, for people to live lives of dignity — to possess mana — incomes need to be raised. The idea that those living in poverty need to simply budget better is insulting: they are usually the most financially savvy, simply because they have to be. You can only budget with the money you have.

A second barrier is the stigma that adults have to contend with, including race, gender, sexuality, age and socio-economic status. The impacts of such stigmas are also regularly reported on: the consistently poorer socio-economic outcomes of Maori and Pacific Islanders; the pay gap between men and women; the abuse suffered by the LGBTQIA+ community; the humiliation endured by those who are poor when approaching Work and Income New Zealand. Not only do such stigmas lead to adults being excluded from society and systems that should help them, but to people excluding themselves, which contributes to a less obvious barrier: the emotional and mental impacts of being poor. Adults are made to feel ashamed of their poverty and of obtaining help, especially when they believe that they are primarily to blame for their situation. They are therefore not only left to live undignified lives, struggling to get by from day to day, and having to contend with humiliating institutions — Winz, foodbanks — but left feeling that this situation is justified because their poverty is primarily self-inflicted. Invariably, social blame is internalised into shame: shame in having to approach Winz; shame in “begging” at a foodbank; shame in sending their children to school hungry.

Adults thereby become stuck in dire circumstances, not only financially, but socially, mentally and emotionally. They lack the money to live, let alone save; they lack the structural support to better their circumstances; they lack real opportunities to accomplish what they value; they lack recognition as to their needs, their hopes and their dignity. And this situation is, more often than not, intergenerational.

Therefore, as much as it is understandable that an adult feels ashamed to send their child to school hungry, it is not them that should feel the shame, but society and particularly the state. Food and social welfare are human rights and the government has signed numerous United Nations treaties which outline obligations to ensure that these human rights are realised domestically, not through free food, but through a social environment conducive for people to obtain the food themselves. Therefore, the Labour Government's’s latest move to spend $32million on foodbanks and other community food services and continue to ignore calls to increase social welfare benefits is very telling. It is continuing to place the onus on the adult.

The existence of hunger and poverty in New Zealand is not an unfortunate reality of life, but a human rights disgrace; not a tragedy, but a transgression. Adults should not alone be made to feel the indignity of their and their children’s hunger and poverty. We should all feel indignation at the structures and systems keeping them in these dire situations. Making adults feel that they are to blame does not incentivise them to get out of poverty: it traps them — and their children — further, financially, socially, mentally and emotionally. A decent society is one in which everyone is given assistance in the spirit of safeguarding and maintaining dignity. Ultimately, it does not even matter why someone is poor. They have a right to live with dignity and also to recognise that they are worthy of living with dignity.

 - Kitty Cresswell Riol recently handed in her PhD thesis on the indignity of foodbanks as the primary answer to domestic hunger in New Zealand. She is based at the Centre for Sustainability at the University of Otago. She is also the author of The Right to Food Guidelines, Democracy and Citizen Participation: Country Case Studies.