In her book, Exposing the Home Point of View, Katie Cannon offers a vivid description of women struggles in African-American societal settings. Deep rooted in social ethics, she analyzes perspectives of sex, race, and class in the African-American context. She provides details of various historical developments that forge the consciousness of different black feminists. Cannon deploys the terms ‘home point of view’ to refer to such developments that are founded on cultural traditions and oral-aural contexts. These issues shaped women’s understanding of the right and wrong or their ethical traditions. In the sense that Katie Cannon uses the phrase ‘home point of view’ in her essay, my ‘home point of view’ is that all people need to have equal participation in the national agenda and access to public goods and utilities, irrespective of their diversity differences. Therefore, they are expected to participate in enhancing the wellbeing of all other people, especially the vulnerable groups such as the homeless, poor, and disabled.
My ‘home point of view’ is helpful when deliberating on issues of poverty and homelessness. In a system where people are equal, especially the vulnerable groups, the problem of homelessness can be eliminated or resolved whenever it occurs. By addressing poverty, homelessness is also addressed since the problem relates to people’s socio-economic status (Hafetz 1223). Therefore, from my ‘home point of view’, the church has the role of identifying, developing policies, and distributing aid to the poor or engaging in erecting homes for the homeless people. My ‘home point of view’ is problematic in capitalistic systems where people aim at becoming richer at the expense of vulnerable groups.
People experience challenges of homelessness in case they do not possess peaceful dwelling or living places that have dignity and good security. People who are considered homelessness include those who sleep in vehicles, those who live with their friends on temporary shelters, refugees, and persons who live in houses that do not have security of tenure. The debate on homelessness can be established based on empirical data that documents the number of refugees, people living in squats, those sleeping in vehicles, or any other place that fits the definition of homelessness.
Gustafson’s essay, Relationship of Empirical Science to Moral Thought has an implication on data that is used in the discussion of the problem of homelessness and the contribution of the church in dealing with it. Gustafson asserts that moralists have the power to deploy experimental studies to gain insights into the personality of people and society (164). To this extent, one can question the empirical data that is used in deliberating the problem of homelessness with reference to the moral nature of human beings. Should a region or a country have homeless people? If yes, then how many? If no, what should various stakeholders do to ensure that no one lives homeless?
It is ethically right for all people to ensure that every other person enjoys descent living places (houses). Hence, empirical studies are appropriate in dealing with homelessness since they help in determining how far one has gone in dealing with the challenge. The role of the church in eradicating or resolving the problem can then be determined based on the number of people it successfully removes from the refugee camps, vehicles, squat shelters, or any other place of living that is considered inappropriate for human occupation by putting them under sheltered conditions.
Works Cited
Gustafson, James. Relationship of Empirical Science to Moral Thought, 2012. Web.
Hafetz, Johnston. “Homeless Legal Advocacy: New Challenges and Directions for the Future.” Fordham Urban Law Journal 12.5(2009): 1222-1229. Print.