The stigmatisation of benefit recipients, which this government, and previous ones, have promoted, was reflected in George Osborne’s comments about ‘hard-working families’ getting up to go to work on a dark morning only to see their neighbour’s curtains still drawn, because they have chosen a life on benefits as a ‘lifestyle choice’. Read the ‘red-tops’ and you will find stories about individuals which are said to be typical of benefits recipients who have made this ‘lifestyle choice’. Read the discussion on news websites and you would imagine that it is a given that people on housing benefit are mostly work-shy ‘skivers’.
What those who cheerfully join in this stigmatisation never do is to actually look at government statistics to try to make an objective assessment. Prejudice never bothers with examining the evidence. Read the rest of this entry »
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