The Wretched of the Earth

Ancient Eastern wisdom had produced a model of enlightenment (spiritual enlightenment) that increased the respect and support of poor people (and particularly homeless people with mental illness) while the more modern Western enlightenment of the age of reason and the industrial revolution produced the opposite attitude to poor people in general and to the homeless in particular. The age of reason saw the dehumanization of madness and poverty which resulted in the incarceration and punishment of poor people, preventing them from asking for help. They were seen as 'idle paupers' who should be liberated from their state of idleness and dependency by exposing them to harsh treatment and starvation. The workhouse was the early symbol of this philosophy while the Holocaust was the ugliest most recent manifestation of this philosophy that reached its height by targeted the weak and poor with not only punishment but also annihilation. Bauman in his book 'Modernity and the Holocaust' suggested that anti-Semitism was caused by 'the universality of Jewish homelessness'. Homelessness is the most evident product of poverty, war, marginalization and economic inequality.

Autorentext

Following completion of a PhD on the needs of homeless people at the University of London, Dr Abdul-Hamid trained at the Maudsley Hospital Institute of Psychiatry in London, where he attained membership of the Royal College of Psychiatrists (MRCPsych). He became a consultant psychiatrist in 2000, and now leads the Priory Wellbeing Centre in Dubai.