7 ms·

Homelessness. Theft. Human poop everywhere, safety.

lordnacho 3y ago
It wouldn't surprise me if this were the real reason. It really jumps out at you as a visitor. I mean literally last time I was there, a dude pooped in front of me. Another person ran into a restaurant to grab my leftovers. Numerous people were cursing at their imaginary enemy. All in areas of town where visitors might be quite common. It's really quite bad and it's an impression someone ought to do something about.
- stanford_labrat 3y ago
  I found used condoms on and around my car not once but twice, and that was enough for me…
  - alephnerd 3y ago
    Just make sure not to wear a technicolor dreamcoat and remember they won't refund your deposit.
- stubybubs 3y ago
  West Coast city stuff then. It's everywhere. I'm convinced there isn't any kind of immediate solution to these problems. Not that we should give up on mental health and addictions treatment. I just think the solution is way broader. Reduce income inequality, improve schools, keep up the drug treatment so the children of people with drug problems stand a chance, better research about when opiate prescriptions are appropriate (like 24 hours post surgery at most then just acetaminophen), universal healthcare and childcare to stop people falling into poverty... Then wait a good 20 years for those things to ripple through society. I know HN loves solutioning and grand projects, but at least consider that this isn't always the way. Consider the article from a couple of days ago about letting ACL tears heal on their own rather than doing surgery. You cannot engineer your way out of everything and often it makes things worse.
  - User23 3y ago
    This approach sounds a lot like treating a heart attack with diet and exercise. Sure diet and exercise are great, but they’re not what’s indicated while you’re keeling over. First fix the acute problem and then look work on reducing recurrence afterwards. And of course there is an immediate solution: remove the people violating the social contract from society at large. It’s up to the people of San Francisco to either find a politically palatable way to do that or continue to live in a kind of fecal anarchy. Edit: in case it’s not clear I’m not euphemistically suggesting incarceration as the only option, although it is one. Some kind of supervised halfway house SRO type thing would be another option among many. Drug rehabilitation also.
    - stubybubs 3y ago
      That's just it, I don't think you can do that. The equivalent of acute treatment for an MI in homelessness would be coralling them elsewhere or removing them from the city and replacing them with known good humans harvested from elsewhere. Probably how NYC recovered from the 70s and 80s is instructive, or the decades long overall decline in violent crime in major cities. SF for all the crap it gets is still near an all time low in violent crime. Was it acute treatments, or did general conditions just change?
    - CydeWeys 3y ago
      San Francisco also needs to make housing a lot cheaper by building way more of it, including marginal options like SROs. So much of the disorder you see on streets of wouldn't be happening in public if housing wasn't insanely expensive to the point of people needing a good steady job lest they become homeless.
    - dehrmann 3y ago
      Not heart attacks, but the issue with CPR is that outcomes after it are really bad. You can do interventions, but the five-year outlook isn't good for ~90% of people needing CPR. In other words, it's a lot of work to get the a homeless addict to be a net-neutral for society, if that's even possible.
  - heartjudytenuta 3y ago

It wouldn't surprise me if this were the real reason. It really jumps out at you as a visitor. I mean literally last time I was there, a dude pooped in front of me. Another person ran into a restaurant to grab my leftovers. Numerous people were cursing at their imaginary enemy. All in areas of town where visitors might be quite common. It's really quite bad and it's an impression someone ought to do something about.

stanford_labrat 3y ago
I found used condoms on and around my car not once but twice, and that was enough for me…
- alephnerd 3y ago
  Just make sure not to wear a technicolor dreamcoat and remember they won't refund your deposit.
stubybubs 3y ago
West Coast city stuff then. It's everywhere. I'm convinced there isn't any kind of immediate solution to these problems. Not that we should give up on mental health and addictions treatment. I just think the solution is way broader. Reduce income inequality, improve schools, keep up the drug treatment so the children of people with drug problems stand a chance, better research about when opiate prescriptions are appropriate (like 24 hours post surgery at most then just acetaminophen), universal healthcare and childcare to stop people falling into poverty... Then wait a good 20 years for those things to ripple through society. I know HN loves solutioning and grand projects, but at least consider that this isn't always the way. Consider the article from a couple of days ago about letting ACL tears heal on their own rather than doing surgery. You cannot engineer your way out of everything and often it makes things worse.
- User23 3y ago
  This approach sounds a lot like treating a heart attack with diet and exercise. Sure diet and exercise are great, but they’re not what’s indicated while you’re keeling over. First fix the acute problem and then look work on reducing recurrence afterwards. And of course there is an immediate solution: remove the people violating the social contract from society at large. It’s up to the people of San Francisco to either find a politically palatable way to do that or continue to live in a kind of fecal anarchy. Edit: in case it’s not clear I’m not euphemistically suggesting incarceration as the only option, although it is one. Some kind of supervised halfway house SRO type thing would be another option among many. Drug rehabilitation also.
  - stubybubs 3y ago
    That's just it, I don't think you can do that. The equivalent of acute treatment for an MI in homelessness would be coralling them elsewhere or removing them from the city and replacing them with known good humans harvested from elsewhere. Probably how NYC recovered from the 70s and 80s is instructive, or the decades long overall decline in violent crime in major cities. SF for all the crap it gets is still near an all time low in violent crime. Was it acute treatments, or did general conditions just change?
  - CydeWeys 3y ago
    San Francisco also needs to make housing a lot cheaper by building way more of it, including marginal options like SROs. So much of the disorder you see on streets of wouldn't be happening in public if housing wasn't insanely expensive to the point of people needing a good steady job lest they become homeless.
  - dehrmann 3y ago
    Not heart attacks, but the issue with CPR is that outcomes after it are really bad. You can do interventions, but the five-year outlook isn't good for ~90% of people needing CPR. In other words, it's a lot of work to get the a homeless addict to be a net-neutral for society, if that's even possible.
- heartjudytenuta 3y ago