Something that made me very angry recently was a post on Facebook from someone who doesn't at all understand the realities of food stamps.
The meme they shared was a photo of a MRE, or a meal ready to eat. It said if this was good enough for soldiers, it was good enough for those on food stamps. Honestly. It said that. It literally made me so mad I had to turn off Facebook.
1, soldiers do not survive on MREs except when in the field. It is not their usual everyday food on base. On base, they eat normal food. Also, further note here, that something around 75 percent of military families on are food stamps.
2, would you really want to tell a little kid that he gets to bring a MRE for lunch to school? Would you really ask a toddler to eat a MRE? For that matter, most adults would not want to eat a MRE. They are not usually very good tasting and often are loaded with sodium.
3, I know, I know. People abuse the food stamps. I know this very well because I work in a grocery store and see it all the time. Trust me, you can always tell who actually needs it and who is just using the stamps because they can.
But, just because you genuinely need food stamps doesn't mean you don't deserve a few treats now and again. To be quite frank, I recall a Christmas that if candy hadn't been included on food stamps there'd have been very little for my siblings to find in their stockings. I've actually seen it said that people on food stamps should only be allowed to buy things like Kool aid and Ramen. Seriously?!?! You know why people buy that crap? It's cheap. They don't know better.
If, instead of blaming people for abusing the system we instead chose to help them, perhaps we'd be in a better place with less abuse of the system. Teach people how to properly cook, about nutrition, and then raise up a generation who can change the system for the better. It will never change if it stays the same cycle.
