Ventia’s Beanies to Black Tie Ball for Vinnies WA with Speech Transcript
Last Friday night, I had the honour of speaking at Ventia’s inaugural Beanie to Black Tie Ball. With nearly 300 guests, I was humbled to share my experiences and insights into homelessness. It’s something I don’t take for granted.
Thank you, Ventia for giving me the platform to share my experiences, and challenge the perspectives of homelessness. Thank you to your leadership team and staff that I met during the night.
Thank you, Vinnies WA, for all the work that you do. A dedication and care that I’m always grateful that exists.
And last but not least, thank you to those in attendance on the night, who listened and trusted me enough to challenge their perspectives of success.
Please see below for a transcript of my speech.
Matt Vapor speaking at Ventia's Beanies to Black Tie Ball for Vinnies WA
Matt Vapor’s Transcript From Ventia’s Beanies to Black Tie Ball for Vinnies WA
Thank you Tim for that wonderful introduction.
It’s great to be here speaking to you about my experiences. Thank you to Ventia, Dean Banks and all the staff that collaborated on this event.
Also, thank you to Vinnies WA, David Kennedy, Susan Rooney, Council Members and all the staff and volunteers.
When I first heard about the Beanies to Black Ties Ball, I was so excited, because it’s an excellent way to highlight the contrast that exists in our society. It's a contrast that I personally struggle with everyday, especially tonight. For the record, this is the first black tie event I’ve ever been to, thank you for this opportunity, and I’m going to get accustomed to a certain standard of partying.
For those of you who dont know me, I’m Matt Vapor, my business is Beneath the Surface, my main objective, in business and in life, is to educate and inform about my experiences. I do this by running talks, workshops and write about my experiences about domestic abuse, domestic violence and youth homelessness and how its impacts still reverberate through my life today.
Contrast is such a powerful way to demonstrate the disparity that exists within our society, and tonight, I’m going to use this contrast as an opportunity for you to reflect on some personal aspects of your success. It’s going to get uncomfortable, but I’m going to ask you to trust me, and learn from me. As my psychologist says, uncomfortable good, it has an ability for us to learn and reflect. I will be using examples of my experiences, I’ll incorporate brief trigger warnings throughout so you can prepare yourself and/or step out if you need to. I’ll also be available all night for hugs and debriefs too.
How do you measure success in your life? How do you measure success in your career? How do you measure your success within the economy? The truth in all these questions is we know they’re linked.
If they’re linked, let me ask you this, How do you measure failure in life? How do you measure failure within your career? And how do you measure failure within the economy? Is it starting to make you feel uncomfortable?
We can believe we’re enlightened, and informed, socially conscious even… however the simple fact is poverty and homelessness is still the ugly poster child of failure in life. It’s where none of you want to be. It’s where I don’t want to be ever again. That’s the irony, we’re all here to elevate the very thing that’s told to us is a failure, is that demonisation, if you don’t succeed at what you do, you’ll end up in poverty and without a home. It’s so engrained in the way we view success, it’s so ingrained that it’s the same way I view success… it makes me equally angry and guilty.
When we measure success, we don’t measure it in luck. Of course it’s skill, instincts and talent that get you where you are today. So conversely, it must be lack of skill, instincts and talent that lead to poverty and homelessness? There’s that uncomfortable feeling again.
That’s the reality. It is uncomfortable. I mean, if you start acknowledging the amounts of luck in where we are today, maybe everything we’ve been taught is based on uncomfortable falsehood.
The thing about homelessness is, for me it’s the silver lining, it makes you see the world for what it is. It forces a different lens into your eyes. You know life is down to a roll of a dice, it’s happenstance, it’s opportunities at appropriate times, and tragedies in others. It’s based entirely on chance.
Trigger warning, I’m going to talk about domestic violence.
My first experience with luck, in terms of survival, came when I was 10 years old, when one of my parents attempted to take my life. I managed to escape to my room in time, slamming my door shut while having the wherewithal to lean against the door with all my might so that my parent couldn’t enter. That night I slept (or attempted to sleep) up against the door. The next day, at school, my luck would continue with the best opportunity primary school ever gave me. The opportunity to steal a door stop that I could use to wedge my door closed so I could sleep.
My luck, turned into survival. I had the tenacity to act on that luck. A tenacity that made my life that much better. A tenaciousness that is not dissimilar to some of yours, I’m sure.
I fled this abusive environment at the age of 16, I seized on an opportunity to confront my father, which lead to one of the proudest moments in my life, at the same time it was also one of the most tragic. I’d soon find myself in a situation where I had no income and no means to generate one. I was sleeping rough trapped in a world of brutality, eternal hunger, and up against an ever increasing hostility from society and a weaponised economy, just for wanting to exist.
I learned how survive in this new world of hostility and hopelessness. There was no support that I was aware of, I was denied welfare payments, I was also denied the opportunity to continue my education. I adapted, again, a skill not that dissimilar to corporate success.
My homelessness would last around 12 months, I’d adapted so easily and quickly to my new life that I’d never considered reaching out to anyone. Something I regret today, but this is the nature of homelessness, it destroys you while alienating you. I was conditioned not to trust; believing no one cared.
Trigger warning, I’m going to mention a physical and sexual assault.
My homelessness ceased on an evening where I was deceived, I was brutally assaulted physically and sexually, and left for dead in a park. I had paramedics that attended to me, who chose to leave me in the park still needing medical attention, a decision that still leaves me with conflicted feelings.
I knew my chances of survival were coming to end, and this forced me to reach out. I was petrified that those that attacked me would come back, at the best they’d subject me to more violence, at worst they’d end my life. I reached out for help, primarily to get the medical attention I needed.
They family I reached out to took me in, they cared for me, they looked after me, they set me up in an apartment, helped me get ID documents, welfare, and a Tafe enrollment. Opportunities that are not given to everyone in my situation… Opportunities that undeniably come from incredible luck.
I seized the opportunities I was given, much like most have you have seized on opportunities given to you. I pursued education aggressively, eventually getting into University and completing a Masters degree.
When I look at my life compared to yours, I see contrast, but I see elements that bring us closer together rather than separating us. Seizing opportunities, tenacity, adapting. So let me ask you, why are those that live in poverty, that are at risk of homelessness or those that experience homelessness, seen as the examples of failure within our economy? The things that have made you successful in your career are the same things that each and every person that sleeps rough also possess. Adaptability and tenacity…
I’m often told that I’m one of the “good ones” I turned my life around and made something of myself. Given the theme I will contrast this view briefly. When you’re at the very bottom rung of society, the most amazing and enlightening thing happens, you actually see society and the economy for what it is, it’s an awareness, an understanding, that everything we have is built on such a fragile foundation, that can be toppled by a roll of the dice.
We live in a system that blames its failures on those that have fallen through it’s cracks, while at the same time motivating the rest to continue by using those that have fallen as examples of failure. Some of us fight like hell to get back to what the system deems as normal, while others, and maybe rightfully so, opt out of it all together.
How did I fail? I didn’t, the thing that was against me was luck, circumstance and happenstance. The family that I was born into, the conditions in which I was raised. The fact I had to flee from my parents to save my life into a world that doesn’t understand, that doesn’t want to understand, that is brutally unaccepting, and is quicker to blame me for the circumstances I found myself in than to look within itself and change.
It’s infuriating and frustrating, knowing that this is how the system treats myself, and others. The only thing separating us from you, is luck. We have the same skills, the same skills that society entrenches as the keys to success. However, it’s somehow different because the opportunities to utilise those same skills don’t inherently generate wealth, so they’re of no worth for those at risk of or experiencing homelessness. We’re still demonised.
We all share the same skills, adaptability, seizing opportunity, tenacity… the only difference is the roll of the dice that determines the environment and conditions where we’re able to apply them.
We aren’t the failures we’re portrayed as… I’m the same as you.
Thank you.