“But for a couple of bad breaks, especially visited upon vulnerable people, the outcome of life would be so different.”
This is a sentence Slate’s Mike Pesca said a couple of months ago on his podcast, The Gist, during an interview.
I wrote the sentence down immediately, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.
Mike is right. As someone who has suffered a couple of bad breaks while in a vulnerable position, I can assure you it doesn’t take much to send a life reeling into desperate, uncharted, potentially life-changing waters.
It’s so easy to judge the circumstances of others if you enjoy a proverbial glass floor: a familial support system that will prevent you from ever falling too far.
I’ve seen it more times than I can count.
- Legal troubles eliminated thanks to exceptionally skilled professionals paid for by parents
- College tuition, mortgage down payment, automobiles, and infusions of cash offered by parents in desperate times
- Family-owned businesses, legacy employment, nepotism, and second, third, and fourth chances given to someone thanks to the influence of a parent
If you’re fortunate to be blessed with a glass floor, please don’t forget how devastating a bad break can be for someone who isn’t as blessed, and how incredibly stressful life can be for someone who is living without any safety net whatsoever.
Think about this: According to a recent New York Fed study, one-third of Americans would be unable to come up with $2,000 to deal with an emergency like an urgent home repair, medical crisis, or car accident.
This means they not only couldn’t raise $2,000 themselves, but they also had no parent or family member capable of raising the money on their behalf.
For many people, this situation would be unimaginable. But for almost a decade, I lived that reality, not because of bad decisions on my part or an unwillingness to work, but simply because of bad breaks. A cycle of poverty. A lack of support systems. The victim of a violent crime. An arrest for a crime I didn’t commit. Homelessness.
And I was lucky. I was physically and mentally healthy. Fairly intelligent. Capable of working 80 hours a week when necessary. I lived in a state with a strong social safety net. I had friends who put a roof over my head in a time of need. I wasn’t the victim of racial discrimination.
Still, I almost didn’t make it.
Imagine what life could have been had my bad breaks been coupled with mental illness. A physical disability. Addiction. Imagine if I had been unjustly convicted of that crime. Imagine how my life might be different had I been African American or female or any other marginalized member of society.
It’s so easy to see someone down on their luck, spiraling, and assume they are to blame, when so many of us suffer similar breaks but are saved by support systems many don’t have.
“But for a couple of bad breaks, especially visited upon vulnerable people, the outcome of life would be so different.”
It’s so true.
