She sounded heart-stricken writing of the failure of government to pick up the slack. She said that the problems are far too great to b e dealt with piecemeal by well-meaning volunteers. Mosle writes that mentoring, as with any other volunteer work, demands full time attention. But just as many of our education problems would be lessened by having more teachers and fewer students per teacher, our social systems would work better if there were more full time people in place. Even our prison system would work better if we had more probation officers keeping track of ex-cons.
Charity is good.
Volunteerism is great. But we have to stop deluding ourselves that the problems go away if we have well-meaning volunteers. Many of those well-meaning folks also believe in less government, which also means fewer paid people working in socially needy settings. They contradict themselves. I know there are many like me who get cynical at this time of year, when so many of us fairly ooze compassion and concern, which tends to evaporate under the hard press of reality after the Christmas decorations come down and the last of the turkey leftovers is groaningly devoured.