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This may sound dismissive but at some level the homeless people need to figure out where they should go. A overarching truth off all attempts to give people ai

This may sound dismissive but at some level the homeless people need to figure out where they should go. A overarching truth off all attempts to give people aid is that you can't make people change when they don't want to. Therapy doesn't help people who aren't invested in it. Rehab doesn't help people who like using drugs. Anger management courses don't help people who find threats of violence give them what they want. Our society gets to make laws and I think laws that prevent people from turning a public space into their permanent camp site aren't unreasonable. My problem is I want to use my library and I'm going to try to solve that problem. I don't know how to solve their problem - but I'm not going to accept that I need to solve it before I get my library back. So far as I can tell a lot of the homeless are not dumb.

8f2ab37a-ed6c 2y ago
My thesis is that part of the issue is the ruinous empathy that is given to people who ultimately have no plans of getting better, or those who can't take care of themselves and need society to step in with a loving but firm hand. It's the constant giving without expecting anything in return, only exacerbating the free-rider problem that many will take advantage of, in the name of empathy.
- nineplay 2y ago
  I agree and I think a lot of 'solutions' are going to fail until the people involved acknowledge that kindness and empathy aren't enough. By most accounts there are a lot of homeless people who are living pretty comfortably as far as they're concerned. If I want my library back ( I do ) than I need to find a way to make living in front of it less comfortable for them.
- Gibbon1 2y ago
  I think it's the opposite, the ruinous callousness that sees able bodied homeless sleeping on the street and thinking they're a problem that needs to be eliminated. Instead of thinking why is an able bodied man or woman not be able to afford to sleep indoors. https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/permit-home-building-code-19369323.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/permit-home-building-...
  - 8f2ab37a-ed6c 2y ago
    That's because everybody has given up on ever seeing SF allow more construction. It'll be easier for Elon to setup a colony on Mars and ship people there than to get SF politicians and NIMBYs to loosen their grip.
    - Gibbon1 2y ago
      SF is it's own special. Having lived their for a large portion of my life it's big issue is the lack of mass transit. That's due to Federal car centric infrastructure policies, prop 13 that causes muni's to favor commercial development over residential, and a incompetent short sighted politicians. Problem is housing is a problem all over. Which is more due to the international cabal of capitalist slumlords that run things. Those guys love using the financial system to bid up prices of existing real estate vs building new stuff.

8f2ab37a-ed6c 2y ago

My thesis is that part of the issue is the ruinous empathy that is given to people who ultimately have no plans of getting better, or those who can't take care of themselves and need society to step in with a loving but firm hand. It's the constant giving without expecting anything in return, only exacerbating the free-rider problem that many will take advantage of, in the name of empathy.

nineplay 2y ago
I agree and I think a lot of 'solutions' are going to fail until the people involved acknowledge that kindness and empathy aren't enough. By most accounts there are a lot of homeless people who are living pretty comfortably as far as they're concerned. If I want my library back ( I do ) than I need to find a way to make living in front of it less comfortable for them.
Gibbon1 2y ago
I think it's the opposite, the ruinous callousness that sees able bodied homeless sleeping on the street and thinking they're a problem that needs to be eliminated. Instead of thinking why is an able bodied man or woman not be able to afford to sleep indoors. https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/permit-home-building-code-19369323.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/permit-home-building-...
- 8f2ab37a-ed6c 2y ago
  That's because everybody has given up on ever seeing SF allow more construction. It'll be easier for Elon to setup a colony on Mars and ship people there than to get SF politicians and NIMBYs to loosen their grip.
  - Gibbon1 2y ago
    SF is it's own special. Having lived their for a large portion of my life it's big issue is the lack of mass transit. That's due to Federal car centric infrastructure policies, prop 13 that causes muni's to favor commercial development over residential, and a incompetent short sighted politicians. Problem is housing is a problem all over. Which is more due to the international cabal of capitalist slumlords that run things. Those guys love using the financial system to bid up prices of existing real estate vs building new stuff.