On Monday, I went to an event at the United Christian Church focusing on solving hunger. It sounded like a great idea. How can you go wrong with a title like “Beyond Charity: solving the problem of food insecurity and hunger in Bucks County”?
The answer is far more easily than I expected.
I’m not a liberal by any account. I hate the idea of a huge federal government. I voted for Bob Barr. But I do care about my community. Brian and I give to several non-profits every year, even if that means we go without when it comes time to buy new clothes for work or skip date night. We believe in community as a means to better the world we live in.
With that being said, I wasn’t surprised when I got to this event and it was filled with social workers and advocates. But I was surprised when the first person spoke, Robin Stelly of Penn Action, mentioned how difficult it was to find a location for the event. She talked about churches and community centers not wanting to host the event because of political concerns.
I was confused. How are there political concerns with solving hunger in Bucks County? Hunger seems like a pretty straight forward issue: we weren’t going to be discussing gay marriage or abortion or stem cell research.
And then Joel Berg got up. Berg is a national leader in the field hunger and food security and recently published a book “All You Can Eat: How Hungry Is America?” He started his talk/book reading with a rehashing of his recent visit to Alaska and how he “battled” Sarah Palin. Then he started referring to Palin as the “Alaskan Bear” and how he made her back down.
This struck me as odd. And inappropriate. While I may not agree with Sarah Palin’s political beliefs, I do believe that we have the right to free speech and she has the right to run for office. We do not need to compare our fellow man to an animal when our fellow man has a different opinion. We also do not need to “battle” over ideas – this is not Gladiators. Whatever happened to having a calm, rational discussion of ideas?
Next Berg moved onto slurs against Libertarians. Later he told us that even if the conservatives are lying, liberals do not need to stoop to their levels. He ranted against individuals who disagreed with or had concerns over the Obama budget.
The message I got from Berg was that if you did not agree with his extreme liberal ideology, you were heartless.
It was hard to pick out solutions for hunger from Berg’s talk that were separate from his pro-government perspective.
The last straw for me was when Berg made fun of bloggers for asking questions about bailout money and the use of welfare and food programs. While only a passing snarky moment for him, it stuck with me. Here was a man in front of us who was not interested in having a discussion about solutions. He was only interested in being right. He was not interested in real questions.
But I do need to mention how impressed I was with Joseph Quattrocchi of Pennsylvania Hunger Action Center and Jonathan Na of the Bucks County Opportunity Council. These men were able to provide a realistic and startling look at what hunger means in Pennsylvania as well as discuss what is being done already and how we, as a community, can contribute to solve the hunger problem.
“Food Insecurity” does not mean much to a woman who doesn’t know how she will feed her kids today. To her, she is starving. Not in the trite way we lament an hour before dinner but actually starving. She will choose to continue her hunger to feed her children. She might not be aware of food programs that are available at her children’s school or she may be too embarrassed to ask for help. She may not have transportation to get to a food bank.
“Food Insecurity” is just one of those terms we slap on a problem to make it sound nicer, maybe not so bad. For 12% of the US in 2007, it meant something very different.
Todd said...
1Well written Dorie. I appreciate how you interacted with this event. Seems very fair and very balanced. If nothing else, it gives me a good picture of the kinds of event we don’t want to run. Or rather, maybe I should say, the kind of people we don’t need at an event like this. Conservative or liberal or anywhere in between, i want to have conversations where we can have a good old fashion debate/conversation about what really is best (not just about why I am right and you are wrong). Anyways, glad you went…
04/30/09 8:19 AM | Comment Link
eRobin said...
2Hi Dorie. Thanks for coming to the forum on 4/27. It’s fairly impossible to leave politics out of the campaign to end hunger and food insecurity. Again, I recommend Joel’s book, All You Can Eat: How Hungry is America, to you. It explains the battles that have been going on around anti-hunger programs for decades in America. It also shows how those programs worked – until they were derailed. It discusses Welfare Reform, which makes for a very interesting chapter, and it describes solutions for today.
05/1/09 2:21 PM | Comment Link
Sunanda said...
3Well, Dorie, I was at the lecture also and we heard completely different things. What i heard was an incisive commentary on the history of hunger in America. Joel Berg used historical references to explain how government CAN step in and eradicate hunger just as in the past government stepped in and eradicated, for example, cholera. The lecture also explored the demographic face of hunger and societal implications. In contrast to the other two speakers that you enjoyed, Berg had a very different speaking style – he was a fascinating and very dynamic speaker. Perhaps you found his speaking style or opening comments off-putting and subsequently lost the import of his lecture?
It is difficult to find places to hold these sorts of events. The event was held at United Christian Church because they have a food pantry there – the Emergency Relief Association.
05/1/09 5:29 PM | Comment Link