Lassaiz Faire Supports

I feel like I complain too much in this blog which no one reads. Certainly, there are so many good things that happen, yet in our field maybe any field there are those that will criticize and I take that stuff personally. I take it home and chew on it, mash it around till it sticks to my ribs and disturbs my sleep like an undigested big meal.
The critics who annoy me the most and I mean the most are the one I call the Lassiz Faire school of supports. In short they believe that paid should be few and when necessary do as little as before. Their thinking comes in response to the fact that paid staff and unpaid staff often do come in between people making connections with others. It also comes in response to the abuses that paid staff have often inflicted on people. It's all true.
Of course the reason that paid supports came into existence was that people with disabilities were often treated unkindly or worse, so a system evolved that removed them from their communities to protect them from those cruelties. These isolated institutions soon evolved into terrible places. In response the trend has been towards keeping people in their community and not keeping them isolated from the rest of the public. So Lassiiz Faire supporters take it to the extreme all paid staff are bad. Of course its also the school of the very lazy. Many of its supporters would leave people in unsafe conditions, and then would argue that was the person's choice.
My moderate position is that it's an imperfect world you have to the best you can, and there needs to be balance. Like so many discussions, though, a moderate position is rarely heard.
In my own agency I supervise some group homes and hate it. i see that living with other people not always people you're on the best of terms with doesn't do anyone any good. I'd like to see people able to live on their own, make their own decisions. In the meantime though I try to make their lives as pleasant as possible. It's an impossible situation one I have little control over, but one we should try to make the best of. The back biting holier than thou critics don't help though.