The optics were chilling: men in riot gear with AK47s drawn stormed into a home where homeless Black women and their children were seeking shelter in the cold, wet winter months. The images from the scene challenge us to examine how race and gender inequality are embedded in the DNA of our homelessness epidemic.
Tag: Homeless Women
We Heart: Storey Wertheimer’s Verses for the Voiceless
According to this year’s Greater LA Homeless Count, there are more than 4,000 transition-age youths experiencing homelessness on any given night in LA County. Storey Wertheimer decided to do something about it.
Exploring Belonging and Displacement—Globally and Locally
Participants and speakers at the UN Women U.S. National Committee Los Angeles chapter’s General Assembly were asked one question when the event began: When was the first time you felt displaced?
Bold Moves to End Sexual Violence: Doing Better by Survivors at the Intersections of Homelessness and Housing
The intersection of sexual assault, homelessness and housing is multi-layered and complex. Sexual violence can jeopardize a person’s housing—and lack of safe housing and homelessness can increase the risk of sexual assault.
When You’re Homeless and Menstruating
The following is a reprint from the latest issue of Ms. To get the entire magazine in your mailbox or inbox, subscribe now! When you think of survival items a homeless person may need, menstrual- hygiene products probably don’t immediately come to mind. The reality is that pads, tampons and liners often aren’t readily available to women […]
Homelessness Creeps Up on Working Americans
Many cities will begin the New Year with a sad resolution: to make sure the number of homeless families doesn’t grow as much as it did the year before. A new survey of homelessness covering 27 cities, published by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, sheds light on the epidemic. A rise in family homelessness in many […]
A Tale of Three Cities
As assistant director of a soup kitchen in Gulfport, Miss., Lynda Favre has helped serve thousands of meals to people. She has also had to turn away people begging her for a place to spend the night. “I saw so many young people—19, 20 years old—come to that door looking for a place to stay […]
For Women Veterans, the Battle Continues
Today, Veteran’s Day, we Americans will pause for moments of silence, listen to bells tolling and guns firing and remember the deaths of thousands of our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan (let alone wars of the more distant past). It’s a day of meditation and sadness–but it must also be a day for feminism and […]