3 ms·

kind of a strawman. Maybe one could also find better ways to give shelter to homeless. And for the bad kid there are other ways than using tickets for that.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
closeparen 8y ago
Laws are kind of a non sequitor. Maybe one could also find better ways to motivate people to treat each other decently. But I’m going to continue funding homicide investigations. “Don’t make things livable in small and practical ways, just hold out for total structural revolution and the solution to multigenerational and intractable social problems” is an infuriating line that unfortunately guides much of San Francisco policymaking.
- hopler 8y ago
  Are you saying that depriving people of places to sleep makes the city more livable.
  - closeparen 8y ago
    It only takes one person reeking of urine to make a whole train car a vile place to spend any time. So yes.
    - alehander42 8y ago
      if there are so many people with problems that this happens often, your city has much more important problems to solve(helping those people) than "nice transit" (my city & most cities have to do this as well tho .. i am probably hypocritical in this)
      - closeparen 8y ago
        We are not going to solve the problem of democratic governance by a majority-homeowner electorate. To the extent that a homeowner electorate would ever allow homelessness to be solved: - Can't solve homelessness without mass affordability. - Can't have mass affordability without density. - Can't have density when voters are worried about congestion and parking impacts of development. - Can't stop worrying about congestion and parking impacts of development when you drive everywhere. - Won't stop driving everywhere until transit is attractive. Homelesness and repulsive transit are a feedback loop. We have to break it somewhere. Fare enforcement is a lever we actually have.
  - chroma 8y ago
    I avoid BART as much as possible because of the filth and crazy people. Often the escalators are broken because they're clogged with human feces.[1] And that's just with homeless people sleeping outside the stations or on the cars while BART is operating. It would be far worse if they slept in the stations overnight. So yes, I'm willing to tell some homeless people to go to a shelter (of which there are plenty in the city) rather than ruin a transit system used by half a million commuters. 1. https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-down-BART-escalators-3735981.php https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-dow...
- arcticbull 8y ago
  (1) Its not homicide vs. housing. Both are fundable without impacting the other, that's a straw man. (2) You live in a society and pretending that you don't and funding nothing isn't going to make the problem go away, it's going to be there getting worse. This is the dark side to America's individualism. Everyone looks out for themselves and pretends nobody else's problems should matter to them, then look around at the crap pile that leaves behind and wonders whose responsibility it should be -- not theirs to be sure.
  - closeparen 8y ago
    Forcing transit riders in particular to empathize with the depths of human misery as their punishment for wanting to get around in an unjust world doesn’t cause the overthrow of capitalism. It just repels transit riders.
    - arcticbull 8y ago
      I'm a transit rider, and I empathize with the less fortunate. It's hardly a punishment for getting around town. I don't want to overthrow capitalism, it's definitely got it's advantages, which is why I'm for democratic socialist reform. I've seen great transit, and awful transit. SF juts happens to have the latter, and no amount of throwing our hands up and ignoring it is going to solve it.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

closeparen 8y ago

Laws are kind of a non sequitor. Maybe one could also find better ways to motivate people to treat each other decently. But I’m going to continue funding homicide investigations. “Don’t make things livable in small and practical ways, just hold out for total structural revolution and the solution to multigenerational and intractable social problems” is an infuriating line that unfortunately guides much of San Francisco policymaking.

hopler 8y ago
Are you saying that depriving people of places to sleep makes the city more livable.
- closeparen 8y ago
  It only takes one person reeking of urine to make a whole train car a vile place to spend any time. So yes.
  - alehander42 8y ago
    if there are so many people with problems that this happens often, your city has much more important problems to solve(helping those people) than "nice transit" (my city & most cities have to do this as well tho .. i am probably hypocritical in this)
    - closeparen 8y ago
      We are not going to solve the problem of democratic governance by a majority-homeowner electorate. To the extent that a homeowner electorate would ever allow homelessness to be solved: - Can't solve homelessness without mass affordability. - Can't have mass affordability without density. - Can't have density when voters are worried about congestion and parking impacts of development. - Can't stop worrying about congestion and parking impacts of development when you drive everywhere. - Won't stop driving everywhere until transit is attractive. Homelesness and repulsive transit are a feedback loop. We have to break it somewhere. Fare enforcement is a lever we actually have.
- chroma 8y ago
  I avoid BART as much as possible because of the filth and crazy people. Often the escalators are broken because they're clogged with human feces.[1] And that's just with homeless people sleeping outside the stations or on the cars while BART is operating. It would be far worse if they slept in the stations overnight. So yes, I'm willing to tell some homeless people to go to a shelter (of which there are plenty in the city) rather than ruin a transit system used by half a million commuters. 1. https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-down-BART-escalators-3735981.php https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-dow...
arcticbull 8y ago
(1) Its not homicide vs. housing. Both are fundable without impacting the other, that's a straw man. (2) You live in a society and pretending that you don't and funding nothing isn't going to make the problem go away, it's going to be there getting worse. This is the dark side to America's individualism. Everyone looks out for themselves and pretends nobody else's problems should matter to them, then look around at the crap pile that leaves behind and wonders whose responsibility it should be -- not theirs to be sure.
- closeparen 8y ago
  Forcing transit riders in particular to empathize with the depths of human misery as their punishment for wanting to get around in an unjust world doesn’t cause the overthrow of capitalism. It just repels transit riders.
  - arcticbull 8y ago
    I'm a transit rider, and I empathize with the less fortunate. It's hardly a punishment for getting around town. I don't want to overthrow capitalism, it's definitely got it's advantages, which is why I'm for democratic socialist reform. I've seen great transit, and awful transit. SF juts happens to have the latter, and no amount of throwing our hands up and ignoring it is going to solve it.