On November 20, 2012, PBS aired an episode of Frontline entitled “Poor Kids,” a documentary directed by Jezza Neumann and produced by Jezza Neumann and Lauren Mucciolo. The documentary follows the lives and families of three young girls living in poverty, three girls who are just a fraction of a fraction of an astonishing sixteen million impoverished children across the United States. It explores the deepest hopes and dreams of these girls, their siblings, and their parents, establishing them not as homeless lowlives but rather as human beings who have taken a wrong turn, or who have simply ran out of luck. Each of the three girls expresses her wishes for food, for clothing and toys, to fit in with the other people at school . . . Each girl
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Parents work hard to scrounge up work to maybe be able to feed their families for another week. Bills start to stack up; money simply doesn’t arrive fast enough, and they’re plunged into darkness, or cold, or starvation. Food stamps and odd jobs provide for a meager, temporary solution, but for the problem of poverty, there must be a drastic change in order to make a difference. Work is scarce, gas prices rise. Homes are lost, and motels become too expensive. Food stamps and coupons sometimes simply are not enough. Children, such as the three girls, are forced to discover ways to pretend they are not hungry, or to ignore the craving for fast food or for vegetables or simply for a full meal. Often times, healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables are simply too expensive, and families must opt for the item that yields the most for the least amount of money, no matter how unhealthy it is. If they can buy five pizzas for ten dollars or three peaches for the same price, they choose the pizzas. It’s the decision a parent has to make; they must forego the nutrition and instead settle for what will feed the most. A life of poverty means a life of selflessness; the individual must think first and foremost of the whole before himself or
Parents work hard to scrounge up work to maybe be able to feed their families for another week. Bills start to stack up; money simply doesn’t arrive fast enough, and they’re plunged into darkness, or cold, or starvation. Food stamps and odd jobs provide for a meager, temporary solution, but for the problem of poverty, there must be a drastic change in order to make a difference. Work is scarce, gas prices rise. Homes are lost, and motels become too expensive. Food stamps and coupons sometimes simply are not enough. Children, such as the three girls, are forced to discover ways to pretend they are not hungry, or to ignore the craving for fast food or for vegetables or simply for a full meal. Often times, healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables are simply too expensive, and families must opt for the item that yields the most for the least amount of money, no matter how unhealthy it is. If they can buy five pizzas for ten dollars or three peaches for the same price, they choose the pizzas. It’s the decision a parent has to make; they must forego the nutrition and instead settle for what will feed the most. A life of poverty means a life of selflessness; the individual must think first and foremost of the whole before himself or