“Much of what was said did not matter, and that much of what mattered could not be said.”
While talking with the people of Annawadi, Boo learned that words are insufficient. They talked with her but more for the sake of saying words than for her edification. What they truly needed to say, no words could effectively communicate. What can someone say about what the experience of living in poverty is truly like?
“What was unfolding in Mumbai was unfolding elsewhere, too. In the age of global market capitalism, hopes and grievances were narrowly conceived, which blunted a sense of common predicament. Poor people didn't unite; they competed ferociously amongst themselves for gains as slender as they were provisional. And this undercity strife created only the faintest ripple in the fabric of the society at large. The gates of the rich, occasionally rattled, remained unbreached. The politicians held forth on the middle class. The poor took down one another, and the world's great, unequal cities soldiered on in relative peace.”
Boo's observations of Annawadi led her to compare the rest of Mumbai to the slums. Poverty doesn't unite people; it divides them. This cutthroat sort of existence remains relatively unknown to the upper and middle class except for rare, slight ripples of violence. As if these people don't matter at all, the conflict and chaos of their lives progresses without even touching the more privileged lives of the rest of the city. They could all die without the others even noticing.
“In places where government priorities and market imperatives create a world so capricious that to help a neighbor is to risk your ability to feed your family, and sometimes even your own liberty, the idea of the mutually supportive poor community is demolished. The poor blame one another for the choices of governments and markets, and we who are not poor are ready to blame the poor just as harshly.”
In places like Annawadi, the people don't trust one another. If they help each other out, they risk seriously hurting their own families because the need is so great for everyone. When rich people speak, they often advocate for community support, but the truth is that this sort of platitude means less than nothing to the people who actually need help. So the rich blame the poor for not helping one another, and the poor blame each other for their own misfortunes.
