  Spiritual
This week: A Modern-day Witch-hunt Edited by: Kit of House Lannister  
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Be the best you can be. That is the message of the Olympics. However, for some people, the best they can be is someone who manages to get through the day, one day at a time.
This week's Spiritual Newsletter is about people with disabilities and health issues, and the unjustified blame placed on them by society.
kittiara |
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We've just had the Olympics here in Britain. I've watched a bit of it, and tuned in for the rather surreal opening and closing ceremonies. The Paralympics are still to come, and both events remind us of what can be achieved when you have a goal, work hard, and push yourself to be the best you can be.
Except, there are people with goals, who have worked hard and pushed themselves, who have ended up in awful situations through no fault of their own. I don't fully know what it is like elsewhere, but here there is an increasing tendency to label those people as "scroungers", "work-shy", and "leeches" of the system. The media stirs up bad feelings towards them. Certain politicians target them. Lies are spread about them, and all along their situation gets increasingly hopeless.
If the media were to be believed, these people live a life of luxury. They live in posh houses, own a couple of cars, go on fancy holidays, and laze about watching their big televisions and playing with gadgets most taxpayers cannot afford. The reality is rather different. These are people with disabilities and severe health issues, who can just about manage to get through the day. The benefits they receive are hardly enough to cover bills and food, let alone anything else. In the winter, many of them have to make a choice between food and heating.
A few years ago the government hired a company at a cost of 100 million pounds a year to assess the people in receipt of incapacity benefit. The people in receipt of that benefit were already assessed on a regular basis, but incapacity benefit was to change to two different benefits, the employment and support allowance support group, and the work related activity group. The former would receive unconditional support, the latter would have meetings to see what could be done to ease them back into work in the future.
This system turned out to be a shambles. One person passed away at the center where he was examined, only for his parents to receive a letter afterwards to say that he was fit for work. People with terminal illnesses have been declared fit for work. When someone has been declared fit for work, they have a couple of options - they can apply for job seekers allowance, for which they have to state that they are indeed capable of work, or they can appeal the decision. Both options can take a while to sort out, leaving the person involved with no money whatsoever.
Appeals can take nine months to a year. Currently tribunals are being held for appeals that were filed in July 2011. Some forty to seventy percent (depending on legal assistance available) of those who appeal have the initial decision overturned. This victory is short-lived - a few weeks afterwards they will receive the forms for their next assessment, and the process will start all over again.
During the wait for the tribunal, people have to live on such a small amount of money, about £70 a week, that it is a struggle to survive. Some have ended up homeless. Some have, due to all the stress involved, given up. Plenty of those who were placed onto ESA face the assessment every three months, and the anxiety and uncertainty about their fate has worsened their condition.
One of my friends has just been declared fit for work, and is currently left with no money. It took me seven pages to outline his medical conditions in the appeal, and at his last tribunal it was stated that he would be a danger to himself and others if he were to return to work.
My friend is someone who has worked hard all his life. He's worked 16 hour shifts of hard, manual labour. He is not work-shy. He has paid his taxes. And now he is amongst those who are called leeches of the honest, hardworking taxpayers.
Why am I telling you all this, and using the Spiritual Newsletter as a platform to express my views on this issue? The reason is simple. When times are hard - and times are hard in many countries - it is easy to target the vulnerable. This has happened in the past, and it is happening now. It is not exclusive to my country. I have heard people in my country of birth comment on people with disabilities and health problems, and I have heard similar opinions expressed elsewhere.
Yes, a very small minority of people are "putting it on". This percentage is tiny - in official government reports the percentage of fraud for incapacity benefit in the UK was put at 0.3 percent.
There is a lot more suspicion about people with disabilities than is justified. If someone is seen doing some gardening, or out shopping in the supermarket, it is thought that they must be cheating the system. If someone's not showing any physical impairment, they must be committing fraud. However, some disabilities, health conditions and impairments aren't visible. And that person doing the gardening may be having a rare good day, or a mental health problem, and it could be helpful for them to spend some time outside.
Please be kind to others. That is all I ask. Kindness and consideration go a long way. Do not judge, if you do not know what a person is going through. Do not blindly believe the media stories and avoid outrage against people who already lead a tough life.
The vulnerable people of this world are not to blame for the state of the economy. They are, however, being turned into scapegoats. They are being told that they are lazy, when unemployment is so high that even if they could do some work, with adaptations, no employer will hire them when there are hundreds, sometimes thousands of healthy applicants for a single position, for whom no adaptations have to be made.
Instead, the focus should be on how to help. Many people with disabilities do want to take an active part in society. They have dreams, they have goals, they have aspirations. Unfortunately, most work places can't, or won't, accommodate their needs. And those with crippling illnesses, who cannot undertake any employment, should be allowed to maintain their dignity, instead of being subjected to more stress.
Part of seeking spiritual improvement, at least for me, is the journey towards being the best person I can be. I'm a long way off still, but I do know that I should treat people as I want to be treated, and that to trample all over the needs of others does not do me any good. If I want to be a person worthy of respect, I should be respectful in turn.
I won't join this modern-day witch-hunt, and I hope you won't, either.
Thank you.
kittiara
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The Spiritual Newsletter Team welcomes any and all questions, suggestions, thoughts and feedback, so please don't hesitate to write in! 
polarsurfski - That is the most beautiful and true pease of art I have ever read
Awww thank you  .
~~~
johnny1209 - I enjoyed the letter from the editor. Last year, my children and I visited Ireland, the land of my birth. It was fun and I met some 'distant' relatives who welcomed me, but soon ,my kids and I longed for home, Virginia U.S.A.
As for hell, there are quite a few scriptures about hell, sheol, hades and eternal punishment, depending on the translation. Calling the scripture 'witchcraft' is offensive to me, but one has a right to free speech except maybe for some Christians. As always, an interesting newsletter. - John
Thank you very much, John! It is nice to read that someone understands.
And I would never call the scripture 'witchcraft'. I wouldn't agree with it either, if someone did.
~~~
ANN Counselor, Lesbian & Happy  - Thank you for reminding us about a person's home. Your definition is so correct. it is where heart, soul, mind, define the sense of place. Even within the same country, our 'home' can change either because we move geographically or philosophically to a new 'home'. I hope your birth country finds ways to improve and that you can become fully established as a citizen where you know is 'home'. God bless. ann
Thank you so much for your kind words, Ann. I appreciate them .
~~~
G. B. Williams  - I totally relate to your intro regarding your visit home. I am a native of Georgia. I have lived in MD longer than I've lived there, and when I go home to visit, I feel out of place or as you say like a tourist. I see familiar places, people, and things. I recognize my birth place and remember all of the wornderful things that happened to me there, but it is no longer home.
Home, I've learned, is where the heart is, and it appears that it is not necessarily a place. I'm at home when I am with my children and grandchildren and great grand. I am at home when we are together.
It is wonderful to visit, but it's equally as wonderful to return home to MD. Thank you so much for sharing your feelings and your visit to your hometown. You are blessed to still have a Mother there to visit. That must have helped a lot on one hand, and made you sad on the other. Mixed emotions, but good emotions. AND, I bet they all went away the moment to walked inside of your home. Welcome home.
Thank you so very much for your kind and insightful words, and for your understanding. Yes, I am very blessed to have a mother still to visit! She is coming over for a visit next month, and I hope I will be able to make her feel at home here .
~~~
Steve adding writing to ntbk. - Reviewed a number of your highlighted items. Let them know they came from this excellent place.
Bless you and later on the www.
Copenator out!
Thank you so much, Copenator! You rock  .
~~~
Mira  - Hi! K I enjoyed reading your piece, looking forward to reading your next.
Thank you so very much! I hope you'll enjoy this one, too. .
~~~
Chanon  - Very interesting read on the soul. The Ascended Masters have spoken through me to tell us the definition of the soul. Of course, we in human form can never understand completely, but this they have told me ...
We were created as a spirit, identical to God/creator. Those of us who chose to reincarnate, and experience the evolution of the soul back to our perfect self, which is spirit were given 'the still small voice within'.
The human body and mind cannot communicate directly with our true creator, therefore we were each given a unique communicator, which we call the soul. The soul communicates from our perfect self to our human self. Identical twins also have unique and individual souls and soul lessons.
You can red more of the Ascended Masters words in my weekly blog "My Little Candle" in my portfolio.
Thanks for the opportunity to read your thoughts on this topic.
Thanks so much! That sounds really interesting! I will definitely check out your blog .
~~~
7agesaint - Hmmmm it is good topic which is you, and we need to think beyond you that is the main string which is near to complete composition... we have an individual character that separate us from others but the think that is very that word YOU is like poison which is killing you gradually so we have to surrender from this word YOU... there is no a great impurity of EGO in YOU which is indirectly connected to dark energy and I am sure it affect our daily & spiritual life.. so there is a way of SUFI's which reveal on us to follow your 3rd eye and search for inner peace... we all have a great connection with each other, we are inter connected in LOVE... Thanks and regards
Thanks so much for writing in! Wow, the newsletter you responded to was from August last year! It was interesting to re-read my thoughts at the time. Thank you for sharing your thoughts, and I do agree, we are interconnected through love!
~~~
Wishing you a week filled with inspiration,
the Spiritual Newsletter Team
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Spiritual: August 15, 2012 Issue [#5211]
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