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> and shame everyone who dares to complain. And then watch at they turn on you by quietly voting for your opponents in greater and greater numbers as the probl

> and shame everyone who dares to complain. And then watch at they turn on you by quietly voting for your opponents in greater and greater numbers as the problem worsens.

AlexTWithBeard 7y ago
... or fleeing to suburbs...
- coryrc 7y ago
  That's a big problem for those of us still here that would prefer enforcement; our fellow-minded voters have (probably rightly) chosen defect and left the city, rather than stay to vote for change. Suburb living also has twice the greenhouse gas impact as well.
  - ndarwincorn 7y ago
    Those of us still here that prefer empathy would rather you follow your 'fellow-minded' folks and just leave. Seattle's had this tension between the left and the liberals for a century. Traditionally you lived on the outskirts. You're welcome to go back if the city offends your sensibilities.
    - stochastastic 7y ago
      Does there need to be a line drawn here? I don’t think there is a contradiction between empathy and enforcement. For example, I would really like an end to the bike and package theft and I think it is reasonable to enforce laws against it. Do you disagree?
      - ndarwincorn 7y ago
        In a perfect world, no. In the world we live in, yes I disagree. Our criminal justice system further entrenches these problems. Before you claim that these petty crimes don't apply, the majority of folks in jail and prison are there on probation/parole violations, and these petty crimes are all jailable/revokable offenses for folks on paper. In America, we put the already marginalized in jail and prison which only further entrenches their marginalization. Empathy means breaking that cycle. Fear-based rhetoric around crime is not empathy. In fact, it's the exact opposite. And it's rampant in this thread.
        homonculus1 7y ago
        >the majority of folks in jail and prison are there on probation/parole violations This is a funny way of saying they're back in prison for more serious original crimes after failing to rehabilitate during the second chance they were already given in the form of probation/parole. Repeatedly letting criminals free to walk the streets and commit more crimes is not empathy, it is folly. Empathy is protecting the neighborhoods which aren't rich enough to be insulated from these bad actors.
        ndarwincorn 7y ago
        > Repeatedly letting criminals free to walk the streets That's a funny way of implying that everyone that the justice system imprisons are criminals in a world where we imprison 22% of the global incarcerated population despite accounting for 4% of the global total population[1]. Fear-based rhetoric around crime and the people who commit crimes* is not empathy. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_ra...
        homonculus1 7y ago
        My empathy is reserved for victims. I don't see how siding with antisocial actors and taking a permissive stance on crime is supposed to improve society. I literally can't understand the mindset of such a belief other by applying hipster contrarianism to morality.
        ndarwincorn 7y ago
        My empathy is reserved for victims of the prison industrial complex (that includes your concept of victims, btw). I do see how your sort of hardline dehumanization of undesirables...sorry, 'tough on crime'...approach in the latter half of the 20th century has resulted in many of the problems being discussed in this thread. I'm a felon that committed a crime and violated my probation a year after my original sentencing (I've since discharged my sentence). My crime was almost killing my passengers and myself in a drunken single-vehicle collision when I was 19. My violation was being a drunk passenger on my 21st birthday, after the designated driver was pulled over for simple lane violations (right/left turns into far lanes). They were let go with a warning, and I was taken to jail. If I didn't come from the privileged background I do, I could very well still be in prison today. I'm a contrarian hipster, don't get me wrong, but I come by this empathy honestly. I empathize with your fear too, but I'm telling you to get over it because it only makes the problems you fear worse.
    - ALittleLight 7y ago
      Is it empathy that leaves the mentally unwell and drug addicted to rot in the street, harass and endanger passersby, and commit petty crimes with impunity?
    - shados 7y ago
      "Empathy" is unfortunately becoming code word for "caring to a specific group of people but not others". It's almost never used for "the ability to understand and care about the feelings of people in general". The people who aren't living in the street but are victims of these petty crimes or have their own quality of life drastically reduced because of all this still matter. And I don't think the solution is to bring everyone down to the lowest common denominator. Especially since even the reasonably well off (dare I say, what's left of the "middle class") frequently has it worse in the US than random people do in other first world countries.
    - malandrew 7y ago
      Time and time again, empathy leads to bad counterproductive policies with good intentions. Compassion is a much better path.
      - ndarwincorn 7y ago
        I didn't think empathy had much to do with the tough on crime policies that are bearing this fruit today, or the dehumanizing rhetoric rampant in this thread that justifies doubling down on those failed policies. Time and time again, fear leads to bad counterproductive policies with debateably good intentions. I'm ignoring the meaningless/unspoken distinction between compassion and empathy in your comment.
        malandrew 7y ago
        re: compassion vs empathy google is your friend here since you don't know the difference: https://www.google.com/search?q=compassion+vs+empathy https://www.google.com/search?q=compassion+vs+empathy
    - thedaemon 7y ago
      Isn't a liberal left sided? I'm confused by your statement.
      - ndarwincorn 7y ago
        Though it's changed recently (and even more recently is swinging back to historical usage), historically the word liberals referred to folks that are generally corporate/free-trade friendly (Reagan famously claimed something to the effect of, 'I'm a liberal, an 18th century liberal'). They also pay lip service to personal freedoms, but that tends to be through the lens of white men being the only people deserving of those, and they're generally against freedom of migration. Or rather that they care about free-trade more than free-migration because it advantages them more, despite the societal benefits of one relying on the other. In Seattle, the leftists are the AnSyn folks at the unsanctioned May Day celebration, or the WTO protesters two decades back. Further back, they're the folks organizing the general strike[1]. The liberals are the folks that put their No Re-zoning sign next to their BLM sign in the window of their Ballard home. Or more charitably, the folks that see Gates and Bezos as shining examples of what our city is capable of. In case you need it in song form, this is a song written by a leftist[2]. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_General_Strike https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_General_Strike [2]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nFvhhCulaw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nFvhhCulaw
  - rdtwo 7y ago
    I think the latest city council election is going to show that Seattle sadly wants more of the same problems and people like us are unwelcome
    - jyrkesh 7y ago
      I don't know, Sawant got way less than was expected in the primaries (36.7% [1]), and I think a lot of folks are in the Sawant or anti-Sawant camp whereby all on the non-Sawant primary votes will consolidate to Orion. Or people blew off the primaries sure that she'd take the general. ️ [1] https://ballotpedia.org/City_elections_in_Seattle,_Washington_(2019)#District_3 https://ballotpedia.org/City_elections_in_Seattle,_Washingto...
      - rdtwo 7y ago
        She actually did pretty well considering many thought she would get primaried out. All the other incumbents look pretty secure as well
    - munificent 7y ago
      At least Mike O'Brien is out. His replacement may end up being more of the same, but at least it's some kind of change.
- m0zg 7y ago
  Not to worry: WA senator Manka Dhingra has been promising to bring injection sites to the suburbs as well.
- rdtwo 7y ago
  Gonna be honest thinking of doing just that. All the neighboring cities use Seattle as a dumping ground for addicts so they are nice and clean.
- derefr 7y ago
  Vancouver's homeless have largely fled to the suburbs too! (Maple Ridge, mostly.) I guess the cost of living is so high here that even those who aren't paying rent still can't afford it.
- Fellshard 7y ago
  I heard from a lot of folks in Spokane who moved out because of the city's increasingly boggling policies. They were often quite vocal about the fact that they moved and their reasons for moving; they seemed to care for their old home, but simply could not live there any longer.
asdfgasd 7y ago
Why don't you offer an alternative solution then? Throwing the homeless people in jail is ineffective and immoral. If your solution is drug treatment programs, great, but then don't argue against raising taxes to pay for them.
- UnpossibleJim 7y ago
  Seattle loves to pass new taxes that are "supposed" to go towards certain things (and do for a year or two), but then end up in a general fund. Just like the tobacco tax, the alcohol tax and the marijuana tax. These were all supposed to go towards roads and schools, at one point and, yet didn't.
  - derefr 7y ago
    Is there even a legal structure allowing a government to pass a tax with a particular outflow, in a way that prevents said government from later deciding to redirect the tax's revenue to a different outflow? Like how a trust works for private citizens, but at an organizational level?
    - UnpossibleJim 7y ago
      You can earmark tax dollars for particular spending, but Seattle has a habit of only doing said earmarks for 2 to 3 years before going into the general fund. I'm not sure if you can make those earmarks indefinite, to be honest.
- paggle 7y ago
  We need low cost low security jails for people who commit property crimes. Basically just wall off a few square miles and throw them in there left to their own devices.
  - allana 7y ago
    Arizona's attempt at this worked poorly: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/aug/21/arizona-phoenix-concentration-camp-tent-city-jail-joe-arpaio-immigration https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/aug/21/arizona-phoen...
scottlegrand2 7y ago
That's pretty much Santa Cruz California and it hasn't happened yet.
shados 7y ago
People are downvoting this, but the person has a point. That's exactly how Trump got elected (followed by millions of people wondering how the hell it could happen). Shame everyone who disagrees with you, cancel them, ban them on your online forums, and then it's like they don't exist. You win! Except they can still vote, and you're no longer in a situation where you can influence them.

> and shame everyone who dares to complain. And then watch at they turn on you by quietly voting for your opponents in greater and greater numbers as the problem worsens.

AlexTWithBeard 7y ago

... or fleeing to suburbs...

coryrc 7y ago
That's a big problem for those of us still here that would prefer enforcement; our fellow-minded voters have (probably rightly) chosen defect and left the city, rather than stay to vote for change. Suburb living also has twice the greenhouse gas impact as well.
- ndarwincorn 7y ago
  Those of us still here that prefer empathy would rather you follow your 'fellow-minded' folks and just leave. Seattle's had this tension between the left and the liberals for a century. Traditionally you lived on the outskirts. You're welcome to go back if the city offends your sensibilities.
  - stochastastic 7y ago
    Does there need to be a line drawn here? I don’t think there is a contradiction between empathy and enforcement. For example, I would really like an end to the bike and package theft and I think it is reasonable to enforce laws against it. Do you disagree?
    - ndarwincorn 7y ago
      In a perfect world, no. In the world we live in, yes I disagree. Our criminal justice system further entrenches these problems. Before you claim that these petty crimes don't apply, the majority of folks in jail and prison are there on probation/parole violations, and these petty crimes are all jailable/revokable offenses for folks on paper. In America, we put the already marginalized in jail and prison which only further entrenches their marginalization. Empathy means breaking that cycle. Fear-based rhetoric around crime is not empathy. In fact, it's the exact opposite. And it's rampant in this thread.
      - homonculus1 7y ago
        >the majority of folks in jail and prison are there on probation/parole violations This is a funny way of saying they're back in prison for more serious original crimes after failing to rehabilitate during the second chance they were already given in the form of probation/parole. Repeatedly letting criminals free to walk the streets and commit more crimes is not empathy, it is folly. Empathy is protecting the neighborhoods which aren't rich enough to be insulated from these bad actors.
        ndarwincorn 7y ago
        > Repeatedly letting criminals free to walk the streets That's a funny way of implying that everyone that the justice system imprisons are criminals in a world where we imprison 22% of the global incarcerated population despite accounting for 4% of the global total population[1]. Fear-based rhetoric around crime and the people who commit crimes* is not empathy. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_ra...
        homonculus1 7y ago
        My empathy is reserved for victims. I don't see how siding with antisocial actors and taking a permissive stance on crime is supposed to improve society. I literally can't understand the mindset of such a belief other by applying hipster contrarianism to morality.
        ndarwincorn 7y ago
        My empathy is reserved for victims of the prison industrial complex (that includes your concept of victims, btw). I do see how your sort of hardline dehumanization of undesirables...sorry, 'tough on crime'...approach in the latter half of the 20th century has resulted in many of the problems being discussed in this thread. I'm a felon that committed a crime and violated my probation a year after my original sentencing (I've since discharged my sentence). My crime was almost killing my passengers and myself in a drunken single-vehicle collision when I was 19. My violation was being a drunk passenger on my 21st birthday, after the designated driver was pulled over for simple lane violations (right/left turns into far lanes). They were let go with a warning, and I was taken to jail. If I didn't come from the privileged background I do, I could very well still be in prison today. I'm a contrarian hipster, don't get me wrong, but I come by this empathy honestly. I empathize with your fear too, but I'm telling you to get over it because it only makes the problems you fear worse.
  - ALittleLight 7y ago
    Is it empathy that leaves the mentally unwell and drug addicted to rot in the street, harass and endanger passersby, and commit petty crimes with impunity?
  - shados 7y ago
    "Empathy" is unfortunately becoming code word for "caring to a specific group of people but not others". It's almost never used for "the ability to understand and care about the feelings of people in general". The people who aren't living in the street but are victims of these petty crimes or have their own quality of life drastically reduced because of all this still matter. And I don't think the solution is to bring everyone down to the lowest common denominator. Especially since even the reasonably well off (dare I say, what's left of the "middle class") frequently has it worse in the US than random people do in other first world countries.
  - malandrew 7y ago
    Time and time again, empathy leads to bad counterproductive policies with good intentions. Compassion is a much better path.
    - ndarwincorn 7y ago
      I didn't think empathy had much to do with the tough on crime policies that are bearing this fruit today, or the dehumanizing rhetoric rampant in this thread that justifies doubling down on those failed policies. Time and time again, fear leads to bad counterproductive policies with debateably good intentions. I'm ignoring the meaningless/unspoken distinction between compassion and empathy in your comment.
      - malandrew 7y ago
        re: compassion vs empathy google is your friend here since you don't know the difference: https://www.google.com/search?q=compassion+vs+empathy https://www.google.com/search?q=compassion+vs+empathy
  - thedaemon 7y ago
    Isn't a liberal left sided? I'm confused by your statement.
    - ndarwincorn 7y ago
      Though it's changed recently (and even more recently is swinging back to historical usage), historically the word liberals referred to folks that are generally corporate/free-trade friendly (Reagan famously claimed something to the effect of, 'I'm a liberal, an 18th century liberal'). They also pay lip service to personal freedoms, but that tends to be through the lens of white men being the only people deserving of those, and they're generally against freedom of migration. Or rather that they care about free-trade more than free-migration because it advantages them more, despite the societal benefits of one relying on the other. In Seattle, the leftists are the AnSyn folks at the unsanctioned May Day celebration, or the WTO protesters two decades back. Further back, they're the folks organizing the general strike[1]. The liberals are the folks that put their No Re-zoning sign next to their BLM sign in the window of their Ballard home. Or more charitably, the folks that see Gates and Bezos as shining examples of what our city is capable of. In case you need it in song form, this is a song written by a leftist[2]. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_General_Strike https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_General_Strike [2]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nFvhhCulaw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nFvhhCulaw
- rdtwo 7y ago
  I think the latest city council election is going to show that Seattle sadly wants more of the same problems and people like us are unwelcome
  - jyrkesh 7y ago
    I don't know, Sawant got way less than was expected in the primaries (36.7% [1]), and I think a lot of folks are in the Sawant or anti-Sawant camp whereby all on the non-Sawant primary votes will consolidate to Orion. Or people blew off the primaries sure that she'd take the general. ️ [1] https://ballotpedia.org/City_elections_in_Seattle,_Washington_(2019)#District_3 https://ballotpedia.org/City_elections_in_Seattle,_Washingto...
    - rdtwo 7y ago
      She actually did pretty well considering many thought she would get primaried out. All the other incumbents look pretty secure as well
  - munificent 7y ago
    At least Mike O'Brien is out. His replacement may end up being more of the same, but at least it's some kind of change.
m0zg 7y ago
Not to worry: WA senator Manka Dhingra has been promising to bring injection sites to the suburbs as well.
rdtwo 7y ago
Gonna be honest thinking of doing just that. All the neighboring cities use Seattle as a dumping ground for addicts so they are nice and clean.
derefr 7y ago
Vancouver's homeless have largely fled to the suburbs too! (Maple Ridge, mostly.) I guess the cost of living is so high here that even those who aren't paying rent still can't afford it.
Fellshard 7y ago
I heard from a lot of folks in Spokane who moved out because of the city's increasingly boggling policies. They were often quite vocal about the fact that they moved and their reasons for moving; they seemed to care for their old home, but simply could not live there any longer.

asdfgasd 7y ago

Why don't you offer an alternative solution then? Throwing the homeless people in jail is ineffective and immoral. If your solution is drug treatment programs, great, but then don't argue against raising taxes to pay for them.

UnpossibleJim 7y ago
Seattle loves to pass new taxes that are "supposed" to go towards certain things (and do for a year or two), but then end up in a general fund. Just like the tobacco tax, the alcohol tax and the marijuana tax. These were all supposed to go towards roads and schools, at one point and, yet didn't.
- derefr 7y ago
  Is there even a legal structure allowing a government to pass a tax with a particular outflow, in a way that prevents said government from later deciding to redirect the tax's revenue to a different outflow? Like how a trust works for private citizens, but at an organizational level?
  - UnpossibleJim 7y ago
    You can earmark tax dollars for particular spending, but Seattle has a habit of only doing said earmarks for 2 to 3 years before going into the general fund. I'm not sure if you can make those earmarks indefinite, to be honest.
paggle 7y ago
We need low cost low security jails for people who commit property crimes. Basically just wall off a few square miles and throw them in there left to their own devices.
- allana 7y ago
  Arizona's attempt at this worked poorly: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/aug/21/arizona-phoenix-concentration-camp-tent-city-jail-joe-arpaio-immigration https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/aug/21/arizona-phoen...

scottlegrand2 7y ago

That's pretty much Santa Cruz California and it hasn't happened yet.

shados 7y ago

People are downvoting this, but the person has a point. That's exactly how Trump got elected (followed by millions of people wondering how the hell it could happen). Shame everyone who disagrees with you, cancel them, ban them on your online forums, and then it's like they don't exist. You win! Except they can still vote, and you're no longer in a situation where you can influence them.