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> until residents in SF start voting different The author here confesses his disconnect with the majority of people in San Francisco. This assessment is corre

> until residents in SF start voting different The author here confesses his disconnect with the majority of people in San Francisco. This assessment is correct - the author and his views are disconnected from those of the majority of working people in San Francisco. The magnitude of the wealth disparity in San Francisco is almost hard to comprehend. Many in this thread have advocated militarizing the city, and cleaning it out of poor people so that it can be some kind of elite utopia for tech bros and VCs. The people of San Francisco do not share this view. That they do not share this view is not in my opinion (although it is) - but in the opinion of the parent poster. As those from more equitable European cities have said in this thread - Europeans don't have these kinds of problems where they live.

NeutralCrane 4y ago
European nations can be even more inequitable than the US without the same issues. The Netherlands have even more wealth disparity, and is much safer without these kinds of problems. I have no doubt wealth inequality can exacerbate the issue, but I don’t think it’s the cause. It’s ultimately one of culture, and American culture is violent and borderline sociopathic, certainly more so than that of many of the European and Asian nations people point to as examples to emulate. Those countries also don’t have issues prosecuting people who commit crime for fear of being prejudicial.
- Convolutional 4y ago
  > Those countries also don’t have issues prosecuting people who commit crime for fear of being prejudicial. The US already has one and a half million people incarcerated, which does not count all those on probation or parole. It has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, although I think Rwanda has more, no large or industrialized country has a higher incarceration rate. Not sure increasing the incarceration rate even more is the solution.
  - biggoodwolf 4y ago
    Then you could say it has the highest % of criminals in society as compared to the rest of the world.
    - maratbn 4y ago
      Indeed. A massive country open to everybody and with civil freedoms not even comprehensible in most other countries is going to be a magnet for bad people no matter what. 500k incarcerated is actually not that much in this scenario. Name another country just as free and open with fewer incarcerated. Not Switzerland for sure.
      - Convolutional 4y ago
        I don't even know how to respond to someone talking about how the US has one of the highest rates of incarcerating its people by saying how it is one of the most free countries in the world. Also the incarcerated population is 1500k not 500k.
        maratbn 4y ago
        By saying that US is one of the most free countries I meant in terms of freedom of expression and relatively better opportunities to pursue different careers and lifestyles, freedom to have almost any kind of hobby, freedom to not be bound by traditional cultural norms and freedom to go to and join any kind of party. Most prisoners in US are not in there for "insulting a government official", "insulting a royal subject", "blasphemy", "membership in an undesirable organization", being an Uighur, and so on. You take those 1500k and put them into some other country and have them do the same thing they did that got them incarcerated in US prison, and unless they are friends with somebody important in the government there they'll get incarcerated there too. Furthermore, in lots of countries selling / smuggling drugs is an executable offense. Furthermore, many of these 1500k would not even be admitted to enter many Euro countries with the low incarceration rates that you envy.
cashsterling 4y ago
The magnitude of wealth disparity is high throughout the country... it is not just the Bay Area. High wealth disparity doesn't justify, nor should it explain violent crime, or any crime for that matter. Umm... European cities do have high wealth disparity. Checkout an ethnic ghetto the next time you're in Manchester or Paris, for example... there are areas of these cities that get scary AF after dark. Homelessness is not a crime... but the homeless and drug addicted commit a lot of crimes. And they (particularly the drug addicted) frequently have very little to lose and very severe motivators to rob, mug, etc. As others have said, not policing crime is recipe for disaster, chaos, and tragedy. And it is a human tragedy: for the people who are suffering homelessness, drug addiction; the people within those domains who are victims of violent crime, and for society at large. A lot of homeless people in CA were not born in CA... and a lot of them didn't hit the street in CA... they migrated to the west coast. Drug addicted homeless people flock to SF and LA because (1) the weather is better than many places in the country, (2) the extremely lax policing, (3) availability of drugs, and (4) the social support system: food, shelter, clothes, money. Indulging depravity is not a solution. SF needs to double/triple police presence, prosecute crime, and significantly increase drug and mental health services. I was born in SF, lived there off and on for many years, and have family who still live in the Bay Area... parts of SF are just disgusting now (human feces and trash all over place)... parts of Oakland and Berkeley are no better. Parts of Oakland have so much broken safety glass on the street it's a glass/gravel road. I used walk around SF late at night as little as 10 years ago; now, there are so many places in SF that I would not walk around in after dark unless I had no other choice. This is coming from a white dude who used to play basketball at playgrounds in South Central LA on saturday nights in the late 90's (because the pick-up basketball was that good). Until you live somewhere else, you may not understand just how bad and crazy the situation in SF, Oakland, Berkeley, Los Angeles really is. Where I live now, I can leave thousands of dollars of stuff in my car in pain sight and nothing gets stolen... ever. My neighbors' kids leave their bikes on their front lawn overnight and they are still there days later. I once saw a person break into a Telsa on Piedmont Ave. in Oakland at 2pm on Saturday in front of about 50 people to snatch a backpack. WTF?
- maratbn 4y ago
  Re Tesla, now that I think about it, I think I witnessed a very mean nasty dude stealing a bike near Mission & 3rd. He did it so leisurely that I assumed he was just taking his own bike.
ejb999 3y ago
nobody is advocating getting rid of poor people - the chief complaint is about crime going unpunished, and even rewarded. Lots of places have poverty, not all of them have the level of crime that SF has

NeutralCrane 4y ago

European nations can be even more inequitable than the US without the same issues. The Netherlands have even more wealth disparity, and is much safer without these kinds of problems. I have no doubt wealth inequality can exacerbate the issue, but I don’t think it’s the cause. It’s ultimately one of culture, and American culture is violent and borderline sociopathic, certainly more so than that of many of the European and Asian nations people point to as examples to emulate. Those countries also don’t have issues prosecuting people who commit crime for fear of being prejudicial.

Convolutional 4y ago
> Those countries also don’t have issues prosecuting people who commit crime for fear of being prejudicial. The US already has one and a half million people incarcerated, which does not count all those on probation or parole. It has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, although I think Rwanda has more, no large or industrialized country has a higher incarceration rate. Not sure increasing the incarceration rate even more is the solution.
- biggoodwolf 4y ago
  Then you could say it has the highest % of criminals in society as compared to the rest of the world.
  - maratbn 4y ago
    Indeed. A massive country open to everybody and with civil freedoms not even comprehensible in most other countries is going to be a magnet for bad people no matter what. 500k incarcerated is actually not that much in this scenario. Name another country just as free and open with fewer incarcerated. Not Switzerland for sure.
    - Convolutional 4y ago
      I don't even know how to respond to someone talking about how the US has one of the highest rates of incarcerating its people by saying how it is one of the most free countries in the world. Also the incarcerated population is 1500k not 500k.
      - maratbn 4y ago
        By saying that US is one of the most free countries I meant in terms of freedom of expression and relatively better opportunities to pursue different careers and lifestyles, freedom to have almost any kind of hobby, freedom to not be bound by traditional cultural norms and freedom to go to and join any kind of party. Most prisoners in US are not in there for "insulting a government official", "insulting a royal subject", "blasphemy", "membership in an undesirable organization", being an Uighur, and so on. You take those 1500k and put them into some other country and have them do the same thing they did that got them incarcerated in US prison, and unless they are friends with somebody important in the government there they'll get incarcerated there too. Furthermore, in lots of countries selling / smuggling drugs is an executable offense. Furthermore, many of these 1500k would not even be admitted to enter many Euro countries with the low incarceration rates that you envy.

cashsterling 4y ago

The magnitude of wealth disparity is high throughout the country... it is not just the Bay Area. High wealth disparity doesn't justify, nor should it explain violent crime, or any crime for that matter. Umm... European cities do have high wealth disparity. Checkout an ethnic ghetto the next time you're in Manchester or Paris, for example... there are areas of these cities that get scary AF after dark. Homelessness is not a crime... but the homeless and drug addicted commit a lot of crimes. And they (particularly the drug addicted) frequently have very little to lose and very severe motivators to rob, mug, etc. As others have said, not policing crime is recipe for disaster, chaos, and tragedy. And it is a human tragedy: for the people who are suffering homelessness, drug addiction; the people within those domains who are victims of violent crime, and for society at large. A lot of homeless people in CA were not born in CA... and a lot of them didn't hit the street in CA... they migrated to the west coast. Drug addicted homeless people flock to SF and LA because (1) the weather is better than many places in the country, (2) the extremely lax policing, (3) availability of drugs, and (4) the social support system: food, shelter, clothes, money. Indulging depravity is not a solution. SF needs to double/triple police presence, prosecute crime, and significantly increase drug and mental health services. I was born in SF, lived there off and on for many years, and have family who still live in the Bay Area... parts of SF are just disgusting now (human feces and trash all over place)... parts of Oakland and Berkeley are no better. Parts of Oakland have so much broken safety glass on the street it's a glass/gravel road. I used walk around SF late at night as little as 10 years ago; now, there are so many places in SF that I would not walk around in after dark unless I had no other choice. This is coming from a white dude who used to play basketball at playgrounds in South Central LA on saturday nights in the late 90's (because the pick-up basketball was that good). Until you live somewhere else, you may not understand just how bad and crazy the situation in SF, Oakland, Berkeley, Los Angeles really is. Where I live now, I can leave thousands of dollars of stuff in my car in pain sight and nothing gets stolen... ever. My neighbors' kids leave their bikes on their front lawn overnight and they are still there days later. I once saw a person break into a Telsa on Piedmont Ave. in Oakland at 2pm on Saturday in front of about 50 people to snatch a backpack. WTF?

maratbn 4y ago
Re Tesla, now that I think about it, I think I witnessed a very mean nasty dude stealing a bike near Mission & 3rd. He did it so leisurely that I assumed he was just taking his own bike.

ejb999 3y ago

nobody is advocating getting rid of poor people - the chief complaint is about crime going unpunished, and even rewarded. Lots of places have poverty, not all of them have the level of crime that SF has