You may not have noticed it, but the language of reportage is a fundamental contributor to why there are less nominally 'poor' people in Europe than in Africa, for instance. You can't afford food in Africa? You're poor. You can't afford food in Europe? The cost of living is unaffordable. You're not poor; you're simply struggling to afford the cost of staying alive. Notice the difference? The language they use often minimizes deprivation in the Global North while amplifying its stigma in the Global South. And there's another subtle distinction: being unable to afford "groceries"s doesn't sound nearly as damning as being unable to afford food. One describes a financial inconvenience. The other describes deprivation at its most fundamental. Same struggle. Different framing. Different dignity. Don't get me wrong, we do have a poverty problem in Africa, but the language that reports it framed it as our identity, while reporting the same circumstances as an inconvenience for others. But we will rise. We will take control of both our destiny and the narrative.