Exodus Place ad is not only ignorant of Constitutional Rights, it demonstrates their ideological commitment to Capitalism

Over the past several days, the Grand Rapids-based Christian group known as Exodus Place, has been running an ad on social media (seen here on the right), with a cruel and reactionary message. The text for the ad reads:

The ACLU’s opposition to proposed amendments targeting Panhandling and Loitering in the Grand Rapids City Code is misguided.

“…..allowing people to panhandle & loiter removed the motivation to find a lasting solution.”   Exodus Place President and CEO Robb Munger

Ironically, the Exodus Place ad has a Donate Now button at the bottom, which means they are hypocrites, since they too are asking for money for their programing, which is charity based.

The President and CEO of Exodus Place, Rob Munger, founded the organization in 2009. Prior to founding the Exodus Place, Munger was the interim Executive Director at Guiding Light Mission, but before that he was a broker for 20 years.

Like many people who work with programs that try to deal with those who are unhoused, Munger has no lived experience of what it means to not have a place to live and he believes that jog training and entrepreneurism are the path to fighting homelessness. This makes the Exodus Place part of what GRIID has identified as the Homelessness Industrial Complex, which consists of primarily faith-based non-profits that rarely address the root causes of people ending up on the street, plus they tend to practice a form of saviorism. Saviorism consists of people with privilege thinking they know what those most affected need. On top of that, Saviorism avoids addressing systemic or structural injustices, like poverty and racism.

Deconstructing the Ad

As I stated earlier, the ad run by the Exodus Place is cruel and reactionary. I believe it is cruel because it fails to acknowledge and empathize with people who are asking for money. 

The ad is reactionary, because it attempts to call out the ACLU. However, if the Exodus Place people bothered to read the 9 page letter from the ACLU, they would know that the ACLU is not encouraging panhandling and loitering, they are merely pointing out the unconstitutional nature of passing laws or ordinances that prevent people from asking for money or from being in public spaces.

In addition, the comment in the ad that says, “allowing people to panhandle & loiter removed the motivation to find a lasting solution.” First, apparently the CEO of Exodus Place doesn’t understand that if people are hurting, there is nothing wrong with providing some immediate relief, like food, water, shelter, and health care. Second, what Exodus Place does is not a lasting solution. Sure, there might be some people who go through their program, are able to find work that pays enough to support themselves and their families, but such notions of “pulling oneself up by their bootstraps” is part of the mythology of American rugged individualism. (See the book, Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream, by Alissa Quart) Most people are poor because so few are so damn wealthy. Those who are wealthy became rich because they exploited workers and communities, often demanding subsidies and tax breaks. 

Lastly, it is worth mentioning that in 2011, when the Occupy Wall Street movement was in full swing across the US and in Grand Rapids, there was a pro-Capitalism rally held in December of 2011, a rally that was a direct response to the Occupy Wall Street Movement in Grand Rapids. The call was designed to promote free market capitalism and that is where I met several men who were staying at Exodus Place, because the CEO brought them there to indoctrinate them to lie of Capitalism.

The Exodus Place ad makes complete since, especially since the CEO is a firm ideological believe in Capitalism, and anything that challenges or threats this ideology is seen as an evil that must be squashed.