Public servant advises woman facing homelessness to 'use witchcraft' or 'manifest' home

schizoidman@lemmy.ml to Not The Onion@lemmy.world – 390 points –
Public servant advises woman facing homelessness to 'use witchcraft' or 'manifest' home
abc.net.au
29

This makes my blood boil.

It'd be bad enough if it was just any random person, but being disabled myself, I know far too well how difficult, to practically impossible, it can be to find a place that isn't only suitable to live in, but where the landlords will even consider you in the first place instead of instantly putting your application in the reject pile because you or someone in your household is disabled (both of which result in a high rate of homelessness among disabled people).

There are so many different and equally distressing levels of heinous to this bullshit, from misogyny to ableism, to classism, to just plain old wilful ignorance and cruelty.

People like this civil servant should spend their time being eternally grateful to not be in such a position as this mother is, since they wouldn't survive a fucking hour in her shoes.

FUCK

I'm so sorry. Landlords are absolute lowest of the low, bastards among bastards.

Not all of them. Unfortunately my only property isn't adaptable for disabled people beside what we already installed for my grandmother (handlebars, things like that). It was built in the 50s πŸ˜….

Lemmy users just downvote any landlord on sight.

I did expect that, I was kinda giving the stick to beat me. But I'd have liked if those who downvoted me could give me pointers on how to improve myself as a landlord.

Put in the effort to make it more accessible, maybe charge more on the deposit if you absolutely have to financially; but eating the cost would be preferable because people dont choose to be disabled. Oh, and have a real job, so your living isnt just leeching off tenants.

So being a Dev isn't a real job? I suppose a lot of people here would feel insulted.
What I earn from my grandmother home goes to a special account used for the apartment repairs, improvement, and taxes.
Actually, as we upgraded it a lot those last years (redid the all the electricity, paint, windows and the south side isolation), I'm actually still 70k+ in debt, which will take me arround 10 years to resorb.

But sure, I'm leeching off my tenant, if you say so.

You asked for advice, I gave general advice. Im not gonna assume those because thats not most landlords. Good for you on being an exception ig

Terrible advice. This just increases the cost of the dwelling for everyone including those that don't really need disabled access.

supposedly, the only acceptable answer on Lemmy is "give your house away for free". Not even joking a little.

Everyone should be able to own their own house for free, and renting shouldn't exist. Apparently.

This is not a site/network for nuance or discussion. It's a place for autists to scream communism and linux at each other. πŸ€·β€β™‚οΈ Or something like that.

As for pointers - you're probably fine as long as the roof isn't leaking.

There are a lot more to it than just a roof without leaks. Add to that a decent isolation, water and electrical installations that are conform to an ever evolving norm, basic equipments (and some facultative ones) in working order.
Honestly when I hear some horror stories about some of the worst rental houses, I'm as angry as anyone here. But I find unfortunate that some of my fellow leftist prefer to caricature instead of trying to understand that not every landlord is a money hungry bastard πŸ˜….
My house was my grandma house, I just happened to be the next one in charge of keeping it in a decent state.

re:roof

"in charge of keeping it in a decent state"

that is exactly, literally what I meant, with less joking. And there's the autism in Lemmy coming through again.

4 more...

Isn’t it funny how the public servant basically manifested the home for her because she probably has a great lawsuit now?

Sure, if she finds a lawyer who will work pro bono.

Even then, she and her son will be homeless for a long time before winning anything.

"There were a lot of links that were emailed to me about manifesting a house and using witchcraft … I think it was 17 links in total all about positive manifestations," she said.

I suspect this public servant is just a hapless idiot. It's obviously not the housing authority's policy to recommend witchcraft. This person probably had good intentions.

That doesn't make it "ok", nor make the system any less broken, it just explains what's happened.

As an aside, in Australia you can't evict a tenant if they have no where to go. There isn't a bailiff in Australia that would put this woman and her son on the street.

I wish America were that enpathetic. Here we actively scorn those sorts of people as "losers" who deserve it

17 seems like overkill. If it worked, surely 1 would be enough.

Visualizing an opportunity is fine, but you better add in "recognizing" and "engaging with" to that list.