Moralizing is not a solution

This is an unpublished letter to the editor sent to the Winnipeg Free Press.


I was disappointed to read that Stephen Fletcher indicated housing projects for homeless people should be dry because “a majority of Canadians would agree that homeless people should be clean before they're given somewhere to live" (Booze battle over Bell Hotel, Apr. 23).

Whether or not public opinion is as Mr. Fletcher contends, it clear from his statement the federal government is morally opposed to allowing homeless drunks to live off the public dime.

I have a problem with this because real evidence suggests that giving addicts a home can, in many cases, help them turn their lives around. The ancient practice of moralizing, on the other hand, has never done anything but fill the streets with more despair. I realize that there is a very sizable segment of sanctimonious people out there who don’t care a whit for the drunks that populate Winnipeg’s downtown, but it saddens me to know that a federal representative would endorse their ill-founded righteousness so publically while committing funds to this initiative.