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Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#11
Here is one database on homelessness in the U.S.:

https://www.usich.gov/tools-for-action/map/

At least with this database, homelessness appears to have decreased over the last ten years.

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Posting this because it isn't clear whether the "changing face of homelessness" is such that current methods for calculating homelessness are problematic or not.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#12
post #8

What is the problem with people living in tents? Why are they forced to dismantle and kicked out by cops? It makes no sense. How can Americans be so cruel to the most vulnerable, most helpless people in our society that they won't even let them live in tents and insist on disrupting their lives constantly? What kind of sick society does this? Is it just so rich assholes don't have to look at them and be reminded that…

We hate the constant reminder that we're two missed paychecks away from joining them. So get'em outta here!

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#14
post #8

What is the problem with people living in tents? Why are they forced to dismantle and kicked out by cops? It makes no sense. How can Americans be so cruel to the most vulnerable, most helpless people in our society that they won't even let them live in tents and insist on disrupting their lives constantly? What kind of sick society does this? Is it just so rich assholes don't have to look at them and be reminded that…

Not all homeless people are alike. The left only seems to see victims and the right only sees cheaters looking for a free ride. The truth IMO is a continuous distribution between those two extremes. And as long as the proposed solutions only target one tail or another, no progress will be made because of the other tail being ignored. This should be a solvable problem in my opinion we are a rich country and we can aff…

> This should be a solvable problem in my opinion we are a rich country and we can afford to feed and shelter everyone.

The problem is figuring out what to do about the homeless people who refuse to accept shelter and other forms of government assistance.

What are you going to do, arrest them? That's been tried in San Francisco and it went badly. If you force them to move they will set up camp somewhere else, so that doesn't really solve anything.

A few years ago in San Jose there was a very large tent encampment called "The Jungle" with over 1000 people in it, and many of them were there by choice. They preferred the independence of living in the camp versus living in a shelter. In the camp they were free to own pets, smoke, consume alcohol, and do a bunch of other stuff that is not allowed in shelters but that most of us do in our homes on a regular basis.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#15
post #7

KOMO TV in Seattle recently (last Sunday) did a big report on this called "Seattle is Dying." Down south in Portland, it's the same thing. Down in San Francisco...same thing. Down further, same thing. This is spreading quite quickly, all over in the big cities. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b53uiRFq4Ds

FWIW KOMO is now owned by Sinclair, and is increasingly rabidly right-wing. What to do about the homeless situation in Seattle is a big topic of discussion currently; we had an attempt to tax big companies to get some money to deal with this get shouted down by all the folks in Amazon's pockets.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#16
post #7

KOMO TV in Seattle recently (last Sunday) did a big report on this called "Seattle is Dying." Down south in Portland, it's the same thing. Down in San Francisco...same thing. Down further, same thing. This is spreading quite quickly, all over in the big cities. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b53uiRFq4Ds

Yeah, of course. We sold out the last vestiges of small-town America but are not socially prepared for a world where the entire economy is focused around a select few cities.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#17
post #7

KOMO TV in Seattle recently (last Sunday) did a big report on this called "Seattle is Dying." Down south in Portland, it's the same thing. Down in San Francisco...same thing. Down further, same thing. This is spreading quite quickly, all over in the big cities. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b53uiRFq4Ds

FWIW KOMO is now owned by Sinclair, and is increasingly rabidly right-wing. What to do about the homeless situation in Seattle is a big topic of discussion currently; we had an attempt to tax big companies to get some money to deal with this get shouted down by all the folks in Amazon's pockets.

The solutions proposed by the Seattle City Council are to aid and abet addictive habits, and to pursue 'more of the same' for every policy that put things where they are today. No amount of tax money they would receive would fix the problem, because they have shown they cannot spend it competently.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#18
post #8

What is the problem with people living in tents? Why are they forced to dismantle and kicked out by cops? It makes no sense. How can Americans be so cruel to the most vulnerable, most helpless people in our society that they won't even let them live in tents and insist on disrupting their lives constantly? What kind of sick society does this? Is it just so rich assholes don't have to look at them and be reminded that…

Among other factors, disease:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/medieval-diseases...

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all homeless people are alike. The left only seems to see victims and the right only sees cheaters looking for a free ride. The truth IMO is a continuous distribution between those two extremes. And as long as the proposed solutions only target one tail or another, no progress will be made because of the other tail being ignored. This should be a solvable problem in my opinion we are a rich country and we can aff…

> This should be a solvable problem in my opinion we are a rich country and we can afford to feed and shelter everyone. The problem is figuring out what to do about the homeless people who refuse to accept shelter and other forms of government assistance. What are you going to do, arrest them? That's been tried in San Francisco and it went badly. If you force them to move they will set up camp somewhere else, so that…

> The problem is figuring out what to do about the homeless people who refuse to accept shelter and other forms of government assistance.

Does San Francisco have shelter beds that are sitting empty? We just don't have that problem yet. The people refusing shelter are refusing to throw away all of their remaining possessions for the promise of a few nights inside and then getting kicked out.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#20
post #8

What is the problem with people living in tents? Why are they forced to dismantle and kicked out by cops? It makes no sense. How can Americans be so cruel to the most vulnerable, most helpless people in our society that they won't even let them live in tents and insist on disrupting their lives constantly? What kind of sick society does this? Is it just so rich assholes don't have to look at them and be reminded that…

It's not just rich assholes, a surprising majority of the population want all evidence of poverty out of sight in their lives. Santa Cruz made it illegal just to sleep visibly in public in an attempt to criminalize homelessness so they could hide the problem.

We should not hide the problem, and we also should not elevate it to 'a valid lifestyle'. Surely we can try to find other options between those two.
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