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Fundamentally the core problem is that no one wants to spend the money to get real traction on these issues, which would require create affordable housing, and
by Tiktaalik 2y ago
Fundamentally the core problem is that no one wants to spend the money to get real traction on these issues, which would require create affordable housing, and even more expensive than that treatment beds for persons enduring drug addiction. The additional problem of course being that there’s a shortage of doctors and nurses to work at hypothetical treatment centers that don’t exist.
So because no one wants to spend any money the only option left is harm reduction measures because they’re more affordable.
Problem being of course is that harm reduction is no solution in its self, and the point is merely to prevent death while people await the aid of actual solutions.
There is now a voter backlash against harm reduction because no one sees anything improving and they’ve been convinced by disingenuous media that it was harm reduction itself that was the problem, not the complete disinterest in building affordable housing and treatment beds.
Voters need to wake up and recognize that they need to pay for solutions. I don’t expect this will happen however. Opposition parties will slag the status quo and say they’ll do other things, but then immediately do nothing once in power when they realize the cost. Been seeing it my whole life living here.
- blackeyeblitzar 2y agoI don’t think what’s happening in west coast cities is going to be solved by paying for anything - whether it is housing or rehab or whatever. A lot of people at these unsanctioned encampments are anti social and want that lifestyle of drug addiction. They refuse services and also refuse to work. They don’t care about taking up spaces meant for other things, or destroying public bathrooms, or stealing, etc. If they’re facing no consequences they’ll keep impacting everyone else. I know this isn’t true about everyone but I would say it’s true of many. I’m no longer a believe in the compassion first approach and now think a tough approach is more effective, even if it’s not perfect.
- pjc50 2y agoPeople aren't born like this, and a solution of "wait for them to die" seems neither effective nor humane.
- polski-g 2y agoThe heritability of substance abuse disorders is around 0.5 For some people, they are indeed "born like this".
- tharne 2y ago> People aren't born like this, and a solution of "wait for them to die" seems neither effective nor humane. Fair enough, but giving other people's money to government entities who have been failing to deliver on these issues since before I was born does not seem like an effective solution either.
- MathMonkeyMan 2y agoIt might be cheaper to help people than to imprison them. What else is there?
- voxic11 2y agoI think measures like this one are basically intended to push the problem elsewhere. Make it someone else's problem.
- polski-g 2y agoThat is the only option: https://twitter.com/kaseyklimes/status/1632096902022832130?t=4klXXzO6bPb_jgu3k4--QA&s=19 https://twitter.com/kaseyklimes/status/1632096902022832130?t...
- floor2 2y ago> Voters need to wake up and recognize that they need to pay for solutions I'm a middle-class nobody from a poor background, I own a single-story 3-bedroom, 2 bathroom house. I pay $18,000 a year in property taxes on my house. I pay an additional 8.5% sales tax on everything I buy locally. I pay tens of thousands of dollars every year in income taxes. Just how much more do I need to pay? Why should we trust that giving the government even more money will solve the problem, when every previous experience shows that they spend massively while barely impacting the problem?
- Tiktaalik 2y agoTbh the public is already overpaying severely with the status quo in terms of constantly paying for emergency services call outs. Many experts have said that money would be saved by housing people instead of letting people unhealthily sleep outside and then spending money on emergency medical care. Spending more money on capital projects like housing, if that means a pull back on high operating cost emergency services, then that is more financially sustainable than the status quo. All I know is that the status quo isn’t solving the problem and spending less isn’t going to work.
- bishbosh 2y agoCompletely agree. It's a maddening conversation because this is fundamentally what the defend the police movement is about. Meat heads with a 6 months of training and a gun are the correct solution to almost no problems, yet occupy some of the largest budgets our cites and states have. Then we pass more and more laws to empower the meat heads and continue to wonder why nothing's working.
- tharne 2y ago> Many experts have said that money would be saved by housing people instead of letting people unhealthily sleep outside and then spending money on emergency medical care. To be fair, most of those experts are consultants, non-profit leaders, government employees, or talking heads who have a financial and reputation stake in a very particular type of solution, so I'd take that with a gigantic grain of salt. These same types of experts have been trying to solve housing issues since at least the 1950's with more and more money being spent and little to show for it. If anything, the problems seem to be getting worse.