Homelessness In Canada Essay

When mentioning about the word “homeless”, the images of children and youth rarely appear in people’s mind. However, in real life, when walking in downtown, we always see some young people who are wearing layers of clothing with a cup or a small box, trying to solicit money; also, at night, some individual sit or sleep out the cold in front of a store or a bank. They attempted their best to survive each and/or every day. Did you ever think of the reasons why or what had happened that make them choose to live in the street? There are many different reasons that may contribute to this problem, including poverty. Therefore, in order to reduce youth homelessness in Canada, government and community need to put more effort to address the issue of

Another research by Stephen Gaetz shows that “there is extensive research in Canada and the United States that demonstrates that a significant percentage of homeless youth – between 60 and 70 percent – leave family environments where they have experienced interpersonal violence, including physical, sexual and/or emotional abuse” (Introduction 4). Poverty is not the direct make young people be suffered from violence or abuse in their family; however, economic stresses provoke violence. Having stress may lead to the loss of patience of adults, as well as the alcohol addiction and abuse, which make them hardly control their actions. And at the moment that adults lose their consciousness, they are prone to releasing their angriness while they are sober by using violence. If children live in a house with many disagreements and traumas such as emotional, physical, or sexual abuse, they may attempt to run away from their house; and if they can not find a place to live, they may be willing to live on the street. A young girl cannot continue to stay at her home after having been physically and even sexually abused by her father. At first, she can stay at her friend’s house for few days, but she can not stay there forever; therefore, living in the street will be her decision since she has nowhere else to