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>But well over half of homeless people are addicts Does that mean addicts should live in misery? Addiction is a disease, it requires resources to treat.

nate_meurer 5y ago
Um... no? But there is a significant portion of the indigent population who are so resistant to change that they're effectively not treatable. Anyone who's worked with addicts knows this in their bones. I know there are folks who say out loud that addicts "deserve" their fate, and by that they mean society has a prerogative to ignore or punish them. I'm certainly not one of those, and I appreciate that you're not either, but I also wouldn't say that society is obligated to expend unlimited resources to accommodate people that refuse to take care of themselves.
- omegaworks 5y ago
  Ensuring everyone is adequately housed is not an “expense of unlimited resources” in fact it is cheaper[1] than providing all the piecemeal, deliberately insufficient programs and enforcement schemes they are currently subjected to. 1. https://phys.org/news/2017-03-housing-homeless-cheaper-society.html https://phys.org/news/2017-03-housing-homeless-cheaper-socie...
  - nate_meurer 5y ago
    Just that easy huh? Housing-first programs work well for people who are willing to be housed and treated. But if the housing comes with any rules regarding substance abuse, many of these people will refuse it. Some others will agree but then destroy whatever housing they're given, or they revert to crime. These aren't exceptional cases; like I said before, somewhere around half of homeless people are addicts, and a signifanct proportion have severe mental health issues. We can throw as many resources as we want at trying to treat people who refuse treatment, and house people who continually sabotage themselves, and still end up in a situation where the streets (or prison) remains the end game. I've seen a lot of this first hand. I can see you have strong opinions, but I would encourage you to actually learn a bit about it, maybe volunteer at a shelter or with a treatment and placement organization.
    - omegaworks 5y ago
      Supportive housing reduces even extremely high risk, chronically homeless people's dependence on emergency services[1]. Your characterization of addicts as people inherently prone to crime and destruction and your continued hyperbole about "throwing as many resources as we want" is not grounded in reality. You are carrying a line of thinking "the streets (or prison) remains the end game" that closes off any opportunity for us to actually address the root causes of these problems. Of course interventions will not work in every individual case. What is at issue here is that we live in a system (market-based housing) that is structurally dependent on the existence of homelessness for growing profit. 1. https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/09/418546/study-finds-permanent-supportive-housing-effective-highest-risk-chronically https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/09/418546/study-finds-permane...
      - nate_meurer 5y ago
        Nowhere did I say or imply that homeless people are "inherently" anything, and I never said or implied that a problem "cannot be solved". Quite the opposite, I'll assert that housing-first plus treatment is in fact a permanent solution for many indigent people, and I wholeheartedly support it. In your apparent lack of experience, you're strawmanning any argument that doesn't align with your opinions. And you also apparently forgot to read the study you cited, because it supports exactly what I've been saying: fourteen percent of their participants could not be kept in their intensive housing+treatment program. Fourteen percent is a hell of a lot better than the usual two-thirds, but that's still a whole lot of people that we don't know how to help, no matter how many resources we throw at them. I know people just like that, even if you refuse to acknowledge their existence, and I don't pretend to have the answers. It's a hard, hard problem. How about this: since you seem to have this figured out, write up your proposal for a permanent, humane solution for that fourteen percent. I'm sure the folks who've spent careers trying to figure it out would love to know what you think they're doing wrong. Go get em tiger!
        omegaworks 5y ago
        >In your apparent lack of experience You can and should avoid personal attacks and assumptions about my experience. You have failed to provide evidence to support your ancedotes. >I know people just like that, even if you refuse to acknowledge their existence, and I don't pretend to have the answers. I am not refusing to acknowledge the existence of that cohort. You are moving the goalposts: saying that if we can not find a solution for those people specifically, then we can not address the structural deficiencies that lead to the movement of more people into homelessness. The data shows "the streets (or prison)" is not "the endgame" for the 86% that actually benefit from supportive housing.

nate_meurer 5y ago

Um... no? But there is a significant portion of the indigent population who are so resistant to change that they're effectively not treatable. Anyone who's worked with addicts knows this in their bones. I know there are folks who say out loud that addicts "deserve" their fate, and by that they mean society has a prerogative to ignore or punish them. I'm certainly not one of those, and I appreciate that you're not either, but I also wouldn't say that society is obligated to expend unlimited resources to accommodate people that refuse to take care of themselves.

omegaworks 5y ago
Ensuring everyone is adequately housed is not an “expense of unlimited resources” in fact it is cheaper[1] than providing all the piecemeal, deliberately insufficient programs and enforcement schemes they are currently subjected to. 1. https://phys.org/news/2017-03-housing-homeless-cheaper-society.html https://phys.org/news/2017-03-housing-homeless-cheaper-socie...
- nate_meurer 5y ago
  Just that easy huh? Housing-first programs work well for people who are willing to be housed and treated. But if the housing comes with any rules regarding substance abuse, many of these people will refuse it. Some others will agree but then destroy whatever housing they're given, or they revert to crime. These aren't exceptional cases; like I said before, somewhere around half of homeless people are addicts, and a signifanct proportion have severe mental health issues. We can throw as many resources as we want at trying to treat people who refuse treatment, and house people who continually sabotage themselves, and still end up in a situation where the streets (or prison) remains the end game. I've seen a lot of this first hand. I can see you have strong opinions, but I would encourage you to actually learn a bit about it, maybe volunteer at a shelter or with a treatment and placement organization.
  - omegaworks 5y ago
    Supportive housing reduces even extremely high risk, chronically homeless people's dependence on emergency services[1]. Your characterization of addicts as people inherently prone to crime and destruction and your continued hyperbole about "throwing as many resources as we want" is not grounded in reality. You are carrying a line of thinking "the streets (or prison) remains the end game" that closes off any opportunity for us to actually address the root causes of these problems. Of course interventions will not work in every individual case. What is at issue here is that we live in a system (market-based housing) that is structurally dependent on the existence of homelessness for growing profit. 1. https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/09/418546/study-finds-permanent-supportive-housing-effective-highest-risk-chronically https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/09/418546/study-finds-permane...
    - nate_meurer 5y ago
      Nowhere did I say or imply that homeless people are "inherently" anything, and I never said or implied that a problem "cannot be solved". Quite the opposite, I'll assert that housing-first plus treatment is in fact a permanent solution for many indigent people, and I wholeheartedly support it. In your apparent lack of experience, you're strawmanning any argument that doesn't align with your opinions. And you also apparently forgot to read the study you cited, because it supports exactly what I've been saying: fourteen percent of their participants could not be kept in their intensive housing+treatment program. Fourteen percent is a hell of a lot better than the usual two-thirds, but that's still a whole lot of people that we don't know how to help, no matter how many resources we throw at them. I know people just like that, even if you refuse to acknowledge their existence, and I don't pretend to have the answers. It's a hard, hard problem. How about this: since you seem to have this figured out, write up your proposal for a permanent, humane solution for that fourteen percent. I'm sure the folks who've spent careers trying to figure it out would love to know what you think they're doing wrong. Go get em tiger!
      - omegaworks 5y ago
        >In your apparent lack of experience You can and should avoid personal attacks and assumptions about my experience. You have failed to provide evidence to support your ancedotes. >I know people just like that, even if you refuse to acknowledge their existence, and I don't pretend to have the answers. I am not refusing to acknowledge the existence of that cohort. You are moving the goalposts: saying that if we can not find a solution for those people specifically, then we can not address the structural deficiencies that lead to the movement of more people into homelessness. The data shows "the streets (or prison)" is not "the endgame" for the 86% that actually benefit from supportive housing.