Should celebrities mock the homeless by dressing like them for a day and posting on Youtube...

[Nightrissa]

I would like to know if it is considered appropriate to dress like a homeless woman. You fake the experience for one day and put it on camera and then on youtube. I do not think that demonstration is experiencing homelessness. Also, watching a movie about a black homeless man and then desiring to know what it is like to live on the streets, so you put on dirty clothes and and dress like a bum doesn't make you homeless or understand homelessness at all. As a matter of fact homeless people do not necessarily look the way you just demonstrated on youtube. They dress just as good as you do on TV and the reason I know is because I work for them.

[Rev. Anthony Luckett]

Very true. Not all homeless people are walking around with dirty clothes on. A shelter that I donate too, many of the people look like you and I. They want to be productive in society, it's just that something along the way caused them to be homeless. These are people who want to work and have their own. I read on the internet a few weeks ago where a woman lost her job because of the deteriation of the housing market. She lost her condo, but now she is working again for less pay. But it's not enough to afford an apartment. So she drives to a lot that has been designated for homeless women and she sleeps and lives out of her car. We really don't know what people go through unless we have been there ourselves.

[Nightrissa]

Thank you for responding. When I saw the clip of this famous model who turned herself into a homeless woman and made it into a show..I sat there with a girl who is homeless. The girl was saying to me, No, she didn't. The girl is a pretty African American that networks and is doing public speaking at various churches. She is still living in a transitional house, but she NEVER looked like how the model portrayed HOMELESS. I know that there are different levels of homelessness, so people have to be very careful with putting on attire and walking the street for a day or two without bathing and then say, I know what it feels like. I don't think you know what it feels like at all because you are only ACTING like you are Homeless when in fact you are rich and famous. I work with homeless women here in the center and I am not going to go outside and sleep in the cold to prove to them that I can do what you did. I empathize and honestly hurt that you literally slept on the benches in the cold, but if I do it when I have a job and a house then it is NOT the same. I believe that it is mocking the homeless and not identifying with them. I think that people should talk to the homeless like regular people and treat them like regular people and then most of all give them food, clothes and find out for them where they can go that is a safe place...like where I work.
Thanks,
Nightrissa

[Earnest Williams (BossBlack)]

If they really want to know they should sell and give away all that they have and become it! Live it and see if they are strong enough to rise back up from it! Other than that they will never know what it's like to live as the homeless live!