Homeless Veterans... A Hypothesis.

[caerbannogbunny]

One of the anti-recruitment kicking points is the high percentage of homeless people who are veterans. I am of the opinion, they are drawing the wrong conclusion from this correlation. Let me tell you why and ask your opinions on the issue

Comments

[desert_vixen]

For the Vietnam veterans, there seems to be a pretty good chunk of that population who have issues with mental illness/drugs/alcohol that plays into the homeless problem as well.

DV

[rockahulababy]

http://www1.va.gov/homeless/page.cfm?pg=1

[lometa]

A family member takes the Vet's benefits to them on the streets here in Tucson. Overwhelmingly they are from the Vietnam era and when asked why they don't come to the VA to pick them up, many will answer that they do not trust the government and they do not trust the American people. I don't blame them. We did a piss poor job when they came home from cover ups with Agent Orange to allowing civilians to call them baby killers. I hope we are doing a better job at welcoming home the vets from the Middle Eastern war theaters.

[kanickb]

The Vietnam veterans themselves are taking it into their own hands to make sure we're welcomed home properly, even if the people don't. When I got off the plane, we had a line of Vietnam veterans announce to us "We were treated like criminals when we came home, we're making sure you guys aren't"

They even stayed up late into the night to give us a hot meal right as we got off.

[lometa]

aww bless their hearts. That's such a relief to read :)

[nahele_101]

That is awesome.

[caerbannogbunny]

Okay, let's do some "for examples".

Say you have 1000 people and 100 of them are veterans.

NonVeteransVeteransTotal
Population9001001000

Now, you have 20% of them in messed up situations--money, getting beaten up, etc.

NonVeteransVeteransTotal
Population9001001000
Messed up (20%)18020200

Of these 20%, half of the veterans say "Fuck this, the street is better than this." Only 5% of the rest do this.

NonVeteransVeteransTotal
Population9001001000
Messed up (20%)18020200
Hit the streets91019
Percent of homeless:47%53%100%
This is a very simplistic example with made-up numbers... But you can see the principle. The only difference, essentially, is the decision on how bad the street is compared to the messed up situation. I'm saying--for some vets--what they've done and can do makes the street less scary than the messed up situation they are coming from. This--depending on the differences with other people--would totally account for the difference in percentages

[rockahulababy]

I think it's awfully presumptuous of you to make the assumption that service members in non-combat fields couldn't last a week outdoors. I would not want to be homeless by any means, but if I were faced with that situation, I would find a way to deal with it. Add to that, even if I had wanted to be in the combat field, I couldn't because of my gender.

[caerbannogbunny]

Not at all. I'm saying that--if you decided to be homeless--it would be easier for you than Joe Schmoe working at McDonald's and getting laid off. Therefore, if you are in a situation where your choices are: 1) Live in a bad situation in a home, dependent on the government, or stay in a bad situation OR 2) Grab a ruck and go live off the land in an urban environment, you just might choose the street more than the situation you don't want.

Essentially, that a vet is more able to survive in those conditions successfully than the average non-vet.

So, essentially the opposite of what you said: Not a propensity, a capability if you choose to.

The follow on question--if the hypothesis is true--would be "Why do some veterans choose homelessness over compliance with social expectations?".

[lometa]

My hypothesis--given the fact many veterans have endured similar or worse than the homeless lifestyle--is that homeless veterans are more likely homeless out of personal choice than the utter desperation most people assume. This choice may be desperate, but the decision is not easily forced on many. For example, they may be deciding to stay out of a social environment they feel alienated from or they feel better equipped for life out of doors than trying to manage bills-rent-taxes-etc.

What do you think?

I think you need to do more data and factual research to support your hypothesis. A quote off of the VA website ain't gonna cut it. The best you'll get here is anecdotal evidence unless you are interested in stuffing a straw man at our expense.

[caerbannogbunny]

Actually, I'm trying to sound out other people's experience before coming up with an actual candidate research project.

I have a friend in a Masters of Social Work program who's considering a change in project for a thesis and I'm hoping to go to grad school and research things like this.

All I'm after is whether it sounds sane and makes sense along with what other factors would be good to consider.

[iluvrob20]

it most often has to do with a lack of social support, mental health and substance abuse issues, inability to translate their military MOS to a civilian job, or legal or financial issues surrounding their separation from the military or shortly thereafter.

I think it has very little to do with the military propensity to take baby wipe showers during deployments. I think that the survival skills that are learned in the military help them to be fairly self sufficient during their time on the streets more then the average homeless person, but i wouldn't put causation to the correlation.

[caerbannogbunny]

Exactly what I'm talking about!

The correlation isn't the cause and much more so for veterans. I'm suggesting the survival skills/mentality/experience makes the consequences--as seen by some veterans--of homelessness less costly than trying to comply with the social expectations... Whether it's an inability/lack of desire to transition military MOS to civilian job*, legal or financial issues, etc.

* - Something I totally disagree with--in concept--after working with many, many vets and vets not working "in their MOS". Most of them got hired--often by other vets--and kept based on a shared work ethic and discipline. Still, that's only my experience.

[caerbannogbunny]

Um... not to put too fine of a point on it, but are you a homeless veteran or a veteran in a really bad social situation?