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Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

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Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#431

Post by hgomersall »

floor2 wrote: post #350
madeofpalk wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buying a house and purposefully leaving it empty is immoral, sqatting or not.

This is absurd. Is your car sitting in your driveway right now? Someone else could be driving it, it's immoral that you don't leave the keys sitting on the roof. Is your bed or couch empty right now? Someone else could be sleeping there right now. Do you have money in your checking account? Someone else could be buying the things they need with that money, you should put the cash outside for them to take. A house sit…

It's not absurd. Yes, it's immoral that I am as wealthy as I am (relatively, on a global scale), and it's immoral that I get to eat so much better than others in the same society as I am in. It doesn't mean I'm going to do anything about it, it just means on that axis, I am not a particularly moral person.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#432

Post by bluecalm »

I was considering buying a house in Spain to spend half a year in. Okupas was one of the reason I am not doing it. Instead I will be paying professional landlords to rent a house to live in for half a year.

A real win for squatters' "ideology". If it continues the only people who own property will be professionals with private armies and organized security systems.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#433

Post by onlypassingthru »

madeofpalk wrote: post #315
solids wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Squatting is a problem, period. Doesn’t matter if the house is empty or not.

Buying a house and purposefully leaving it empty is immoral, sqatting or not.

Buying a car and purposefully not using it 24 hours a day as an Uber is immoral. I'll take yours when you leave it parked, okay? You can have it back when I'm done with it, probably when it needs major repairs because I'm not putting any money into it. As the owner of record, that's your problem.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#434

Post by TotalCrackpot »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #406
TotalCrackpot wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Squatters fight against private property which is usually protected by law, it's very rare that it goes the other direction. A lot of squatters want to abolish the possibility of someone having to pay rent to another person to have a place to live, considering that relation inherently oppressive and against a self-ownership of the individual.

Refusing to pay for a place to live is simply theft and entitlement. They expect people to build and maintain homes for them while doing nothing in return. If you abolish property rights, your two options are state slavery or anarchy where the strong take whatever they can. These misguided ideologies can only live parasitic ally on the fringe of a otherwise functional society. If they got their way, the society would…

For most of our history humans did not have to pay for a piece of land to put up some yurt or hut and live there.

How is the current system not strong taking whatever they can? Private property is just a legitimized theft, because it leaves some people without access to land or natural resources that is required for survival.

It's not true that without private property you get state slavery or a strongman situation, you may check Zapatistas, they are rebels that created a stateless society of 300 000 in Chiapas, Mexico without private property with structure that is based on decentralized, horizontal, federated institutions.

Anarchism is not a misguided ideology, it's a product of highest levels of freethought that inspired many people to fight for liberation from oppression and for a world where every human can develop the the heights of one's potential.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#435

Post by tiborsaas »

diggan wrote: post #412
tiborsaas wrote: post #351

A friend of mine acquired an investment property in Spain and after a while okupas moved in, lock changed etc. A woman with two children. They were clearly helped with an organized team to get into that place. The sad resolution after lots of headache and thinking was to pay the invaders the 5000EUR they demanded to move out. There was some followup information about what happened after this. She was picked up by a c…

On the other hand of issues like this, is the people forced to move away from their neighborhoods because outsiders keep acquiring "investment properties" and price out the current tenants. We're finally getting more protections from this, but there been a lot of hurt because of this already. Entire neighborhoods in Barcelona (like Barceloneta) had generational families being forced away because of issues like this.…

This is a complex problem, I understand that rent is a sensitive issue. But sustaining a system that criminals actively exploit is probably resulting in the worst possible outcome for everyone.

He did not rent the place out, but preferred to keep it to themselves as a pleasant place to spend a few weeks to months as they are getting old now. But after this incident he sold it quickly.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#436

Post by Wytwwww »

TotalCrackpot wrote: post #409
next_xibalba wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make an interesting point, TotalCrackpot. These “activists” do seem to be captured by the strange illogic of a mind virus.

[flagged]

> A lot of squatters want to abolish the possibility of someone having to pay rent to another person to have a place to live

That's exactly how you end up with no new or maintained housing, utilities and other services. How do you imagine system like that working besides a totalitarian government directly taking over all private property and rationing housing? (I assure the housing situation in Spain is not even remotely as bad as it was in the USSR).

> don't have a logical counter-argument.

Trying to form logical arguments that refute completely absurd and irrational ones is not particularly productive...

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#437

Post by Wytwwww »

next_xibalba wrote: post #428
TotalCrackpot wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Well, let's play it out. A squatter steals an owner's property while they're away on a Summer-long vacation. Later, the squatter spends some temporary time away from the property. During this time, another squatter comes along and steals the property from them. And so on. How does this not just lead to an unending string of lawlessness. Further, why would anyone invest in building and maintaining housing when their p…

> on a Summer-long vacation.

Clearly only the capitalist elite can afford such things so you deserve to be stripped of your private property.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#438

Post by Wytwwww »

diggan wrote: post #407
Aurornis wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's clearly a gap between imaginary noble okupas addressing housing crisis via occupation of unused bank property and reality of weed smoking anarchists and their collaborating deoccupying mafia harassing mostly not-so-rich middle class, who can't afford the security measures the rich can. I had a friend who bought a house that needed a lot of work. Before he could get started on the remodel, someone broke in t…

> I had a friend who bought a house that needed a lot of work. Before he could get started on the remodel, someone broke in to the empty house, changed the locks, and started occupying it. Was this the person's primary residence that they were planning to live in? Or a property that they intended to flip or rent out? Makes a big difference in how the courts would see it. > Even here on HN there are comments trying to…

> Or a property that they intended to flip or rent out? Makes a big difference in how the courts would see it.

Are you implying that there is something morally wrong about purchasing a rundown (apparently barely liveable) property, renovating it and selling or renting it? How do you expect the supply of housing to increase (and prices to go down in turn) if you disincentive such behaviour? Seems rather absurd...

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#439

Post by xchip »

rudnevr wrote: post #264

I live in Spain and own property in Spain. There's clearly a gap between imaginary noble okupas addressing housing crisis via occupation of unused bank property and reality of weed smoking anarchists and their collaborating deoccupying mafia harassing mostly not-so-rich middle class, who can't afford the security measures the rich can. It's not a small problem, there's like 12K cases per year last time I checked. Eve…

Sources?

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#440

Post by piuantiderp »

diggan wrote: post #390
betaby wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Both the legitimate okupas and illegitimate 'professional' okupas do serve the purpose of forcing the real estate owners to actually USE their real estate instead of being able to let them sit empty. Total nonsense, Spanish new recently reported the case when couple went for 3 months trip only to find their apartment squatted. Spain has no property rights for smaller folks.

That's anecdotal though... How many of the current okupas happen in other's primary residence? Would be considered trespassing in those cases and a lot easier to get rid of them, compared to the other cases.

Lmao, that's wishful thinking.

That's why in decent countries you can get them curb-stomped and their teeth kicked-in for invading a property.

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