I Used to Be Homeless

This may work when the concentration is low. I’d estimate 15-20 homeless people on the daily walk between my front door in SOMA and the Muni Metro. Often in relatively dense tent encampments. I’d feel pretty weird giving to one and not the others on the same block. Especially since it’s probably the same people day in and day out. It’d take some serious preparation before going out the door to pack enough for everyone, and then stop every few feet to deliver it. At an even lower level than compassion fatigue, it’s logistics.

If only there were some sort of professional, centralized entity to collect some of our money and distribute it equitably.

> If there isn't a big event downtown, or it's a slow bar/restaurant night, you'll notice there's considerably fewer of them. If the weather is harsh, you'll notice there's considerably fewer of them.

You observe this and the conclusion you make is that, 'many of the 'homeless' people are absolutely not homeless and simply know they can make much easier money off of people coming/going from bars and restaurants.'

or maybe they are homeless and know that their best bet of survival is going to the places with the most people willing to help them out.

or maybe harsh weather means that they aren't capable of being out in the open exposed to the elements, and are instead hunkered down somewhere where they can at least get minimal shelter.

I think the point of the article is that your surface conclusions from simple observations are probably not entirely accurate, and more likely a false assumption made by someone who has never experience homelessness and can't possibly know the motives or circumstances of that population.

Holy smoke, talk about reinforcing stereotypes about Indiana

> Homeless people are not going to kill you

I understand a lot of the insight this person has provided us about homelessness, but I beg to differ on this point, and I'm sure it's location dependent.

I currently live in Santa Monica, and the vast majority of the homeless here clearly either have substance abuse problems or mental illness(I'm sure it's often both at once). I've had countless instances where a homeless person will step in front of my car, blocking my way into an intersection or parking lot, and try to intimidate me by shouting obscenities. The other day, I had to tell off a homeless man who was standing at an outdoor cafe and rambling on about how "women are whores" and other wisdom in front of women and children(not that men should be exposed to that either). Yesterday I witnessed a homeless man urinating in the middle of the street in broad daylight.

When I was living in Pasadena earlier this year, I worked next to a homeless shelter. For the most part it was safe, but there were days where we were warned to be on the lookout for certain characters who were harassing people on their way to work. There was the occasional rape and the occasional stab, although it was almost always homeless-on-homeless. Down the street there was a vacant restaurant where a homeless couple sneaked in and lived for some time, until it turned into a murder/suicide and they had to put up extra fencing to prevent such incidents from happening again.

One of the biggest reasons that people drive instead of take the train in LA, besides the fact that our civic planning has a history of sucking, is the fact that the homeless make many train rides very unpleasant. I don't have enough fingers on my hands to count the number of times I witnessed homeless individuals, sometimes barely clothed, out right screaming and threatening random passengers. In my experience, this sort of thing happened at least a few times a week. It happened enough that there came times where I thought "fuck this shit" and decided to start driving to work again.

The homeless aren't viewed as dangerous for no reason. Even if they aren't technically dangerous, many of them are legitimately scary. There are places where the homeless are mostly people down on their luck or living that way by choice; I grew up in a town where the homeless are that sort of benign. But in cities like LA, the word "homeless" has an almost completely different definition.

Sorry, but I'm not about to throw out my pepper spray.

ADDENDUM: The reason I bring up relatively harmless behavior like the public urination is that when the average person sees that, they're going to think in the back of their minds that "If he's going to do that so brazenly, what else is he capable of?" Add to that the perception that the police are ineffective against the homeless, which they are, and even small misdemeanors can seem as signs of danger to the non-homeless.

This assumes you're healthy and have no other responsibilities. A minor health problem would lead to ruin with this lifestyle, and it's just not possible if you have to care for family members.