Summary: Sympathy For Homelessness

Today there is a lot of sympathy for the homeless, which is a good thing, but we should also have sympathy for the serfs who had it even worse, because they had not learned what was healthy and they had no rights and no one who wanted to stand up for them. This is the opposite of what homeless people get today. Presently, the homeless have changes in clothes, a balanced meal offered, shelters for them and lawyers and police that can help them get the legal help they need.

For the homeless, being safe can be hard. According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, 199 attacks on the homeless happened between the summer of 2014 and the summer of 2015 in the U.S. NPR interviewed David Pirtle, a homeless man who claimed that homeless shelters were scary, that drugs and dealers were common. However, Pirtle admitted there were many nice shelters. Contrary to nice shelters with cots, were the serfs, whose

houses were so feeble that robbers and other unwanted people could dig their way in. Sometimes, the people who were supposed to protect them, knights, beat them, raped them and stole from them. If a peasant complained, it might go to court. As serfs were at the bottom of the ladder, trials could be quite biased. If a farmer was accused of something, he could be thrown into a barrel of water. If he drowned, he was guilty, if the serf survived he was innocent, or a witch and then put to death. Either way, he would get wet, which would be pain, seeing that serfs usually had one outfit.
The outfit of male Medieval peasant consisted of a robe with a belt around the middle. All serf clothing were made out rough, homespun wool, it was too expensive to buy nice cloth. If it was cold, they might wear a woollen cloth. Anyone could see this and tell that they were a serf, headdress’ showed what social class they were in. In today’s world there are services that clothe the homeless in clothes that are decent, not rags. In Oregon there is a hospital that gives out warm clothes to the homeless during the winter. Homeless people receive enough donations to have a change of clothes. Many a high school project is devoted to donating clothes, but donating food.
Donating food is great because you do not always need to be homeless to go hungry.

In Idaho alone, according to Move For Hunger, there are over 240,000 that are food insecure. Thankfully, there are programs that feed the insecure and homeless, because of this, only 11% of homeless people in 2016 needed emergency food assistance. In New York City over 80% of children get free breakfast and lunch at school. The Holy Apostles organization serve 1,200 lunches a day, lunches that are nutritionally balanced, all year round. Unlike these destitute, the serfs had fruits and vegetables when they were in season. Winter was a time of starvation, for there were no crops. Protein was needed especially by serfs, who performed back-breaking work daily, however they were only able to pull this nutrient from beans, lentils and peas. Each meal was very bland, spices were too expensive. They hunted only squirrels and rabbits because they could not even hunt deer, which were saved for nobles. Cooking meat was troublesome because there was no ventilation system in their mud

house.
A serf ‘house’ in the Middle Ages was made of mud, a wooden frame, and a thatched roof. Windows were small and glass was too expensive. Livestock was also expensive, so every night the family would bring in the animals to keep them safe and warm. Each hut had an average of 8 people living in it, now, just add animals. It could not be a very comfortable place to live. Today, part of the reason that people are homeless is because the average rent for a two -bedroom apartment is more money than the full-time minimum wage paycheck. However, there are shelters for the homeless and people trying to help.
Each group had and has struggles, whether it being if they would eat that night or if they could could squeeze out another day in their clothes. The homeless have it better, it may not be by much but it is something. Thankfully, people have the homeless backs. Something the serfs, unfortunately, never had.