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The Street Kids of San Francisco

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Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#61

Post by il »

jes5199 wrote: post #38
il wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you connect with that crowd? I've noticed a very high overlap between techies and hippies, there doesn't seem to be an easy way to stumble into a group of discordians short of randomly wandering the streets shouting "hail eris!".

In the bay area, there's a constant stream of events that are in the spirit of the Cacophony Society - for example, http://allworldsfair.com/ , or the Lost Horizon Night Market ( http://blog.sfgate.com/inthemission/2010/12/13/guerrilla-nig... ) - and these things are put on by a community of people that's actually fairly small - I'm not sure they'd all self-identify as "Discordian" but, as a Discordian myself, I'll c…

Can you put your email in your profile? Those are exactly the kinds of events/culture I'd like to get more involved with.

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#62

Post by scarmig »

jumby wrote: post #3

Sounds like fun for about 1-2 weeks, and then it would be a sucky life. Gotta have mental stimulation sometime.

Actually, if you planned for this well, I would not be surprised if you ended up with much more mental stimulation than your day job. Have an ereader, download ebooks on everything under the sun. You don't have shit or taxes or property beyond what you carry on you to worry about. Heck, if you saved up $100k or $200k beforehand, you'd probably end up saving/making more money per year than the average American.

Mental stimulation wouldn't be the issue. Risk of violence or disease, however...

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#63

Post by moxie »

eli_awry wrote: post #16

I'm a 23 year old with purple hair, but I'm also a PhD student at a top 10 university for computer science. I've hung out in tons of squats and punk houses, and briefly been a street kid, but I got a 2380 on my SATs. I lived in a non-residential warehouse for months - months when I was taking Physics, Linear Algebra, Computer Science and Sociology 321 - Class and Inequality. I've dug through dozens of dumpsters, and…

Radical punk rock literally saved my life. As someone who's been a part of both of these worlds off and on for 16 years, I couldn't disagree with you more.

I see the aesthetics of the hacker and punk scenes as being extremely similar, where as the underlying motives are currently lightyears apart.

For instance, "hacker houses" and "collective houses" have a similar aesthetic. Both are about people living together, and sometimes the actual form even looks the same. But "hacker houses" fundamentally seem to be about "networking" and "making connections" to other entrepreneurs. Collective houses, on the other hand, are about building relationships -- precisely because it's so difficult to find meaningful connection in a world based on exchange. These two things look similar, but (having experienced both) I believe are radically different.

Another clear example is "hacker spaces" vs "social spaces." Again, the aesthetic is similar -- both are supposed to be "creative" spaces that have a similar logistical form. But what actually happens in both places is radically different. Anarchist "social spaces" are built on a social narrative for what people do there, where as "hacker space" activity (in the US, at least) is largely absent any kind of narrative. "Maker culture" in the US is based mostly on doing things that are "neat," and that's really the end of it. There are obvious exceptions, and the EU hacker culture has more of a narrative to it, but this is has been my experience on the whole.

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#64

Post by moxie »

dewitt wrote: post #40

Like another commenter on this thread, I've lived in the Haight for the past nine years. And while the article is interesting and informative, it doesn't quite paint a full picture (literally—the pictures aren't representative, that girl is not a typical street kid by a long shot, she hasn't slept a day outside in her life. Think camo and combat boots and pit bulls, not peace signs and hacky sacks) of the underside o…

I'm curious to know why you see them as a guest in your home, rather than the other way around?

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#65

Post by dewitt »

moxie wrote: post #64
dewitt wrote: post #40

Like another commenter on this thread, I've lived in the Haight for the past nine years. And while the article is interesting and informative, it doesn't quite paint a full picture (literally—the pictures aren't representative, that girl is not a typical street kid by a long shot, she hasn't slept a day outside in her life. Think camo and combat boots and pit bulls, not peace signs and hacky sacks) of the underside o…

I'm curious to know why you see them as a guest in your home, rather than the other way around?

Are you genuinely curious, or trolling?

I'll answer sincerely if you don't understand.

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#66

Post by wooster »

angersock wrote: post #60
SilasX wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably in the "pearls before swine" sense. Long-time natives just don't appreciate how much the influx of tech folks is improving things, nor how few cities would love to have such a "problem".

Er, would you like to rephrase that? A fast reading would seem to suggest that you are referring to the natives as swine.

It's a biblical reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearls_before_swine

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#68

Post by ajju »

Great post!

I lived right next to the park for the better part of a year. I feel like there are two more aspects to the street kids lives that deserve more attention:

(1) Their pets: Most of these kids have a dog (or sometimes a cat), love their pets and for the most part seem to treat them well. One night, after finding a dog with a collar roaming alone in the park, I helped her find a temporary home. The next day I saw some really worried street kids posting hand written signs with a photo of the dog and reunited them. It was a sight to behold. Homeless with pets are controversial but at least amongst the street kids, the pets seem to have a net positive effect on them.

(2) Mental illness: OP alluded to this, but mentally ill homeless who live in the same area are a huge issue for people who associate them with the street kids. There is no easy fix for this problem and I have always wondered what the street kids think about the mentally ill amongst them and what should be done to help them.

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#69

Post by jes5199 »

il wrote: post #61
jes5199 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the bay area, there's a constant stream of events that are in the spirit of the Cacophony Society - for example, http://allworldsfair.com/ , or the Lost Horizon Night Market ( http://blog.sfgate.com/inthemission/2010/12/13/guerrilla-nig... ) - and these things are put on by a community of people that's actually fairly small - I'm not sure they'd all self-identify as "Discordian" but, as a Discordian myself, I'll c…

Can you put your email in your profile? Those are exactly the kinds of events/culture I'd like to get more involved with.

done. let's talk.

Re: The Street Kids of San Francisco

#70

Post by gyardley »

edmundhuber wrote: post #37
nthitz wrote: post #17

Went for a walk through this area about two weeks ago. As you near the park, lot of dealers pop up. In the park, on every corner of the paths people offered to sell me drugs. Marijuana, LSD, Mushrooms were all offered. I could sense different groups competing for territory in the park. I felt uncomfortable.

If you live here, you have to harden yourself against constant harassment for money and offers of drugs, and you have to get used to stepping around garbage and shit in the street. As much as SF should strive to be tolerant, at a certain point it must be recognized that if you don't want to be taken advantage of, as I believe is the case here for "authentic" residents of Haight-Ashbury, i.e. people who pay local taxe…

San Franciscans in aggregate don't have the political will or desire to do what needs to be done.

What needs to be done is fairly obvious, since it was already done successfully by Giuliani in NYC - strict enforcement of laws plus draconian penalties for violating those laws, applied over a sustained period of time.

Like it or not (and I'm certainly not suggesting everything about it was likeable), it worked wonders for Manhattan.

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