THE DIGNITY PROJECT — 15 YEARS LATER 🧡

 THE DIGNITY PROJECT — 15 YEARS LATER 🧡

I wrote this in March 2011.

I found this old post today and honestly, it broke my heart.

Fifteen years ago, I was asking a very simple question:

Do you really believe people choose to be poor?

I wrote about single mothers struggling to survive.
People falling through the cracks.
People living on the streets.
Young people escaping abuse.
People struggling with addiction and mental illness.
Seniors who couldn't afford to live.
People living in poverty who were treated as though their circumstances were somehow their fault.

I wrote about food banks, housing, dignity, community gardens, art, empathy and the importance of simply seeing people as human beings.

I wrote:

“These people do not choose this life. They do not choose to be poor.”

That was 2011.

Now it is 2026.

And I wish I could say we solved these problems.

We didn't.

In fact, in many ways, things have become dramatically harder.

Housing costs have exploded.
Homelessness is everywhere.
Food is expensive.
People are struggling to survive.
And B.C. has now lost roughly 18,000 people to toxic drugs since the public-health emergency began in 2016.

Think about that number.

18,000 human beings.

Not statistics.

Someone's child.
Someone's brother or sister.
Someone's mother or father.
Someone's friend.
Someone who was once somebody's beautiful little baby.

And still, we hear:

“They chose it.”

Did they?

Did the abused child choose trauma?

Did the teenager who aged out of care choose homelessness?

Did the person who lost their job choose poverty?

Did the person who became sick choose illness?

Did the person who became addicted choose a toxic drug supply?

Did the senior who can no longer afford their rent choose this?

Sometimes people make choices that hurt themselves or others. Of course they do.

But a human being's worst moment should not become their identity.

And when people fall through enough cracks, eventually those cracks become a chasm.

That is what I was trying to talk about in 2011.

Dignity.

Not pity.

Not judgment.

Not pretending difficult problems don't exist.

Dignity.

Seeing the person before the problem.

Seeing the human being before the label.

And asking:

“What happened to you?”

instead of immediately asking:

“What's wrong with you?”

I still believe there is hope.

I still believe in community.

I still believe gardens can bring people together.

I still believe art can heal.

I still believe children can learn empathy.

I still believe ordinary people can create extraordinary change.

And I still believe we have to stop looking away.

Because this isn't somebody else's problem.

It is our community.
It is our province.
It is our country.
It is our humanity.

Fifteen years ago I ended my post with:

“We must be Changemakers.”

I still believe that.

Maybe now, more than ever.

🧡

Tina Winterlik aka Zipolita
Dignity Project — originally written March 1, 2011