Helplessness, Hopelessness, and Despair – “The Big Three” – Revisited

Ted Folkert

July 25, 2017

The examples of helplessness, hopelessness, and despair seem to never cease. We see it by the thousands in Los Angeles each day as we drive by the outdoor encampments, which continuously multiply. They tell us that there are 50,000 or more people who have nowhere indoors to sleep now. It seems that we could count that many just around the downtown area as we drive by nearly every side street all over the downtown area and most all the underpasses.

These are the visible and invisible people, we see them but we don’t see them. We just drive on by. What else can we do? So, it seems.

But, as we know, “the big three” are not isolated in Los Angeles. No, they are visible and invisible everywhere we choose to go, worldwide.

Another new episode appears today about those seeking escape from the big three. Quoting from the article by Jenny Jarvie and Kate Lithicum in the Los Angeles Times:

“A group of people had waited for about a week at a hotel on the U.S./Mexico border before smugglers helped them cross the Rio Grande. ‘These human smugglers crammed more than 100 people into a tractor trailer in the stifling Texas summer heat,’ Thomas Homan, acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said in a statement. ‘Human smugglers have repeatedly demonstrated that they have absolutely no regard for human life.”’

“By the time they climbed up into the pitch-black truck, they had already crossed the Rio Grande on rafts and walked all night through wild brush land.”

“The air was hot inside the 18-wheeler, and there was no food or water. A few hours later, the truck driver told a federal agent, he opened the door to find ‘bodies just lying on the floor like meat.”’

“Thirty-nine people were discovered in and around the truck early Sunday after a disoriented man approached an employee for water in a Wal-Mart parking lot just off Interstate 35, about 150 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border.”

“Eight men were pronounced dead at the scene Sunday morning and are believed to have suffered from heat exposure and asphyxiation.”

“Seventeen of the vehicle’s occupants were rushed to hospitals with serious or critical injuries. An additional 13 had non-life-threatening injuries. Two men have since died at hospitals, according to the U.S. attorney’s office.”

Just another sad story of a case of smuggling struggling people gone bad.

This is not an implication that we should not have immigration laws or rules about sleeping on sidewalks. But it is an implication that we should revisit our attitude toward those in need of assistance.

And it is an implication that we should acknowledge the fact that our planet is becoming crowded and that the resources for sustaining life must be shared amongst all the population of the planet regardless of where they reside and what their needs are. And it is an implication that we are attracting immigrants because we have figured out how to capture and enjoy these limited resources better than most.

And it is an implication that we should reeducate ourselves about discrimination based on religion and national origin, and that wealth should be added to that list. Of course, this is in direct opposition to the desire and direction of our much-maligned president, the president who has been called more derogatory names than perhaps all our other presidents combined, and only in six months. Stay tuned, more to come.

Think about it!