By Makani Themba Nixon

A recent Cornell University study finds that half of all US children and 90 percent of black children will eat food paid for by food stamps at some point in their childhoods. You, like the good folk at Cornell, may think this is dire and even shocking news. And for good reason, as the co-authors of the study write in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine that food stamp use is an important indicator of poverty and food insecurity.

These conclusions are pretty obvious as you have to prove you have low income and need food stamps in order to qualify for the program. What is disconcerting is how the study lapses into the cliché analysis that subtly connects black, single mothers and child pathology.

In all fairness, the thrust of the study is to get pediatricians to consider hunger and poverty in how they approach patient care. That is a good thing. To frame food stamp use as if it is caused by being in a household headed by a woman—especially a black woman—provides an inaccurate picture of the problem and reinforces stereotypes and victim blaming. Stripped of the social context, it’s like watching someone roll down the stairs not knowing that a flight further up, they were pushed. The rampant racism and sexism that fundamentally shape the quality of life for black families are rendered invisible.

Imagine if these studies took that crucial additional step to integrate the ample research on education discrimination and inequity, employment and housing discrimination to explain why so many black children are poor and stay poor into adulthood. Pulling the lens back even further, we might even ask why so many families go hungry in this country? We might even examine the relationship of commercial food production and our dependence on markets for food distribution (so that most food outlets are located in places where retailers believe they can make significant profit versus where outlets are most needed).

Another important factor in food insecurity is that the so-called safety net is full of holes. More than half of all bankruptcies are caused by catastrophic medical bills. Even people with health insurance risk losing everything if they get sick the wrong way. Lose your housing? You’d better hope you have some friend or relative to crash with, because shelters and housing vouchers are slim indeed. Welfare benefits do not begin to cover basic needs, and food stamps come with their own special drama.

Only about 60 percent of those eligible for food stamps apply for them and it does not take much research to know why. Applications, which vary from state to state, are often cumbersome. Some states require re-certification, meaning that you have to keep reapplying in order to keep your benefits. Even if you jump through all of the hoops, get the bus down to the office, fill out the paper work and spend the requisite half day (at least) going from window to window to complete the process, you still have to face the stigma of actually using food stamps.

As a former welfare and food stamp recipient, the feeling of stigma is a body memory. It feels as fresh today as it was 18 years ago, when I spent a year dodging the judgmental glances each time I whipped out my food stamps in the checkout line.

One thing being on food stamps teaches you is that America is angry with poor people, especially if they are women of color. I’ve had people roll up on me asking why I had ice cream in my basket when I was on food stamps. I have had to deal with the clerks, annoyed at the prospect of handling a food stamp transaction, make that exasperated call over the store PA system, “Manager to check stand 5, I need food stamp change at check stand 5…” And I’ve had to make that long walk through the store afterward when it seemed as if all eyes were on me and my babies.

If you have ever had to explain to a three-year-old why the people were not “nice to us,” you probably understand why two out of five families would rather skip food stamps and take their chances. Yet, it just isn’t right. Being poor should not be a badge of dishonor. And we, as a nation, should operate at a deeper level of compassion. We need to tap into the old traditions of solidarity rooted in the understanding that any one of us could be next. It was what my grandmother meant when she would put what little change she had in each beggar’s cup sighing, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.”

Our lack of compassion for the poor, for those down for now, is rooted in our lack of understanding of how the economy works. Few of us are taught that the economy is an interactive system of policies and people’s actions that require large numbers of people to be poor and unemployed. It is an old tradeoff: Companies get to have low wages and a “competitive” labor market (read large pool of workers seeking work), and we are supposed to get profitable companies that create jobs and cheaper “stuff” for us to buy. Our part of the deal, the New Deal actually, was that we would pool some of our tax money to ensure that those who ended up on the wrong side of the job “lottery” (or didn’t have a ticket to enter at all) would not starve.

For most of us, the economy is more like a meteorological phenomenon. It seems that, for no apparent reason, some folk get a hurricane while others get a breezy day. If you’re smart and entrepreneurial, so prevailing wisdom goes, you can make it. Even in the midst of the most severe economic dislocation since the Depression, there are plenty of stories and media advice on how layoffs are an “opportunity” for the savvy. Policies and people that drive the economy are invisible. So, if you don’t thrive it’s your own fault.

Studies like this recent one from Cornell only reinforce these notions because they disconnect people and their problems from their context; from the “why” behind their poverty. And when we don’t understand the real reason why, we revert to what we think we know. All too often, that means blaming the victim. Good research helps us connect the dots to reveal the often complex social context in our communities. This is not only good science, it is also a strong foundation for good policy.

Makani Themba-Nixon is executive director of The Praxis Project, a nonprofit based in Washington, DC supporting community-based media and policy advocacy nationwide.