By Kendall Worth!
We just got through celebrating the main Christmas holidays, and, In just a few days time, we will be bringing in 2024. On January 31st, people who are part of the financially better off community celebrate bringing in the new year. However, the concept of New Year’s Eve is not the same for people living in poverty. I have in the past, written about how much more depressing New Years can be, for someone living in poverty in Nova Scotia. In 2020, 2021 and 2022, many may have avoided celebrating New Year,’s Eve, due to COVID. Even in 2022 New Years fell at the time when when we were in a re-adjustment period to a more normal life, after COVID.
Looking back at 2023, you could say that this year was a learning experience for many of us, including myself. Examples include:
With out of control inflation happening throughout 2023 the community of people living in poverty got to experience living a worse-off life. I say this considering that even working poor and middle class people, in 2023, started experiencing and suffering from some of the effects of poverty.
Since this article in 2015, where we are have all learned about the history of how and why I started advocating for the population of people living in poverty in Halifax. The learning experience I am pointing out here, is that in 2023, we learned that things can always can get worse. The sad reality is, in 2023, things did get worse, with out of control inflation, and the increasing homeless population.
I learned this year, expressed in this post, that that the YMCA of Greater Halifax/Dartmouth offers more then just a fitness centre. It promotes a sense of belonging in your community no matter what your income level or living circumstances.
in 2023, learned that advocating for solutions, also includes solutions to causes of social isolation, esp disability inclusion. This BLOG post points out that ending poverty, disability inclusion, and finding solutions to social isolation, must go hand in hand.
Also in 2023, I learned that people need to be better educated around issues of ableism. The seven stories I wrote about the case of Carrie-Ann Bugden, shows why, if people in society were better educated on ableism, we would see less stigma from able bodied people toward the disability community. Also this story demonstrates that people with disabilities need to be treated like they have the same rights as able bodied people do. By the way, here is another BLOG post from 2023 that shows an example of what both disability inclusion and the need for people to be better educated around issues of ableism could look like.
And last but not least, as this BLOG post points out I have learned that we cannot call the current Mitigating Social Isolation Project Social Prescribing… and as time went on it became the All Together Link project. We cannot call the program Social Prescriptions or Social Prescribing because, if we did, we would have to get the Medical Community involved with the project. You can read the explanation here.
So, considering all the above bullet points, I have learned a lot in 2023!
Now to talk about how I my see my BLOG in the New Year: 2024!
In 2024, my blog will continue to advocate for those who are living and sleeping rough here in Halifax. I will also continue to advocate for better solutions for social isolation, poverty and mental health. However, considering my learning and achievements in 2023, have some new ideas for my BLOG, including:
Maybe writing about Students Living in poverty who are attending our local Universities. Re-hashing whether or not they should be better financially supported while attending University.
Maybe do some articles researching more about ableism and how to better educate people on related issues. How do we promote disability inclusion in post secondary education?
While many Income Assistance recipients know they will very likely be on income assistance for the rest of their lives, many believe it is temporary, and that they can get themselves off the system. I would like to write about how can we make this happen. I wrote about the way that the community and businesses can work together to reduce poverty in this article from back in my Media Coop days. Maybe I will look at getting back into writing about this topic for my BLOG moving forward.
Also in the New year I Plan to talk to the YMCA of Halifax/Dartmouth People to see how they feel about me writing about/promoting their programs.
Those are just a few examples of new ideas.
In conclusion I want to thank readers for supporting my writing. I hope to continue having your support in the New Year. The reality is there is no one else out there covering the poverty and mental health related issues, that I cover for my BLOG, from the perspective of First Voice. Even if I do get into expanding on new topics, I keep doing the brand of journalism I have been doing since day #1.
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