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Dependence on food banks cause for concern

I appreciate the comments directed at me, by Ms. Joyce of 150 Mile.

Editor:

 

I appreciate the comments directed at me, by Ms. Joyce of 150 Mile. One of the philosophies that I live by is, “Don’t expect others to do for you what you can do for yourself.” I guess as a senior that is an age thing. My parents, my grandparents and my great grand parents each before me struggled through periods of impossible economic times.

My second eldest daughter, living in Alberta, a single mother of four children, two in high school, an adopted pre-schooler, and an autistic son. She receives dialysis treatment for a kidney disease three hours a day, three times a week. When asked why she does not use the food bank, says, “I am sure that there are others in far more need than I am.”  With no help from a former husband she works at living within her means.

That is my question, regarding the growing number of people dependent on the food banks, are they doing all they can to help themselves. I recall a National Geographic magazine article about Medellin Columbia, the article discussed how the poor people in tightly packed neighbourhoods of shacks helped provide for their families needs, without gardens, by growing food in pots wherever they could find room to put a pot.

Ms. Joyce compares me to a mean old bear; I recall a very sad case of a very hungry momma bear. Momma bear had been raised for generations on garbage, the garbage dump had been closed and moved several kilometers away, momma bear with two tiny cubs had no food, had not learned to survive on plant life or even how to fish.

I stopped my service truck beside her, I observed that the poor animal was giving her body to provide for her cubs; she was just a bag of bones. How different is that, where the less needy go to the food banks while those in dire need say, “I’ll get by, there may be others more in need than I.”

The growing dependence on food banks is comparable to the people of Greece that have become so dependent on an entitlement society, that like the starving momma bear, just don’t know how to survive.

Living within our means, means that those that truly are in need, can get the help that they need.

Doug Wilson

Williams Lake