2y ago

Utah Makes Welfare So Hard to Get, Some Feel They Must Join the LDS Church to Get Aid

www.propublica.org

politics @lemmy.world

tintory @lemm.ee

2y ago

Utah Makes Welfare So Hard to Get, Some Feel They Must Join the LDS Church to Get Aid

www.propublica.org /article/utahs-social-safety-net-is-the-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints-what-does-that-mean-if-youre-not-one

17 comments

If people need to rely on the church for food, the state has failed.
"That's not a bug it's a feature." -- LDS
- Utah and LDS
  Pam: they're the same picture
- "now give us 10% of your income."
If you think that isn't by design, you're a fool.
I don't have an issue with the fact that the church decides whom they help.
But that the state has so little in the way of social security that they instead have to forward people to a church instead, that's crazy.
3rd world country.
- The LDS essentially owns the state of Utah, this issue is by design
  
  Agreed - working as intended, and it's not just LDS. I'm in FL and churches here have been opposing publicly funded safety nets for my whole life, in favor of voluntary, often church-led, donations.
- They appear to have set it up that way on purpose.
  A single mother of one here is eligible for $399 a month in state assistance, and only if she has a net income of $456 a month or less.
  Utah doesn’t do more for those in need in part because a contingent of its lawmakers, the overwhelming majority of whom are Latter-day Saints themselves, assume the church is handling the poverty issue; they also are loath to raise taxes to do the state’s share, a review of Utah’s legislative history demonstrates.
  
  us$10k/year
  I doubt there is anywhere in the US where that is an adequate amount to pay for food and shelter. That is monstrous.
There was a time in my life where I got one meal a day for a few cents from charities.
On the weekends we had to sit through a religious sermon before they let us eat, and I will never forget how it made me feel to sit there for a full hour listening to this smug arrogant man lording it over us and telling us how he was so powerful he could materialise his body on other planets but he chooses not to because he is more enlightened than we are.
So the system is working as intended.
Did they make that church as evil looking as possible on purpose? Looks like the legion of fucking doom.
- Religious people try to do good
  ... And you took that personally.
  
  Utah’s safety net for the poor is so intertwined with the LDS Church that individual bishops often decide who receives assistance. Some deny help unless a person goes to services or gets baptized.
  Soinds like coercion

17 comments