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> > What is it about this issue that makes so many people wish to treat landlords harshly? > Compassion. I don't feel like that's the true motivation. Where i

• kerkeslager 2y ago
  > If it was actually compassion, we'd be advocating for the government to provide adequate services to all homeless, paid for by taxes with progressive taxation so the rich also pay into the solution. I think that is the solution which pretty much everyone who has compassion for the squatters is advocating for. I'm comfortable saying that almost nobody thinks squatting is a good solution to this problem. The problem is, providing adequate services to all homeless, paid for by taxes with progressive taxation so the rich also pay into the solution, has to happen first, before you get rid of squatting protections. Because otherwise you're just taking away the bad solution and leaving no solution, for the people most harmed by the current situation. And mysteriously once the squatting protections are gone and property owners' problem is solved, homelessness stops being a conversation until the next time it causes a problem for a rich person. You're noticeably vague on what you think "adequate services" means. I refuse to be that vague. There is one, and only one, solution to homelessness: homes. Not shelters, homes. Not mental health services (though that would be good, too), homes. Homes: places where you can have privacy and security and pets and the right to decide who gets to enter the space. Services that do not result in homeless people being in homes are not adequate. Until I see a real solution to homelessness implemented I'm really not interested in solving the problems homelessness causes for better-off people. Solve homelessness, and those problems will likely go away on their own; if not we can talk about it then. But until then, I'm quite okay with society dealing with the ugly consequences of its ugly failure to provide homes for its people.
  • jjav 2y ago
    > But until then, I'm quite okay with society dealing with the ugly consequences of its ugly failure to provide homes for its people. This ignores a fundamental characteristic of human nature. If you want people to help you out, you can't screw them over. While I don't know anything about the legislative process in Spain, I guess it is not too different from elsewhere, so you probably need broad support from the masses (middle class) to make big changes. We already established (elsewhere in this discussion) that the rich don't feel any impact from squatting. They have private security forces, so it is a non-issue to them. So if we want the government to provide for adequate services, middle class support is needed. If we allow all middle-class property to be stolen by squatters, there will be zero support from the middle class to provide any help to the thieves. Like it or not, basic human nature.
    • kerkeslager 2y ago
      > This ignores a fundamental characteristic of human nature. If you want people to help you out, you can't screw them over. This is a totally naive approach. I have 0 hope that the rich will "help us out" no matter what we do--rich people don't become rich by being generous. Either we use our majority to make them be productive members of society and pay their fair share, or we get nothing from them. This idea that we're going to concede to them on a few issues and they'll suddenly stop hoarding resources is a total fantasy. > We already established (elsewhere in this discussion) that the rich don't feel any impact from squatting. They have private security forces, so it is a non-issue to them. I disagree. The middle class has largely been disfranchised from owning the homes they live in, so the idea that there's some massive section of the middle class that owns second homes they leave empty doesn't hold much water. The people you're talking about aren't middle class. > So if we want the government to provide for adequate services, middle class support is needed. If we allow all middle-class property to be stolen by squatters, there will be zero support from the middle class to provide any help to the thieves. Like it or not, basic human nature. Thank you for the strategic advice, but no thanks. This strategic advice you're giving sounds suspiciously like you trying to represent rich people as middle class, and represent rich people's goal of enforcing property rights as a step toward achieving goals that you don't even support. That may not be your intent--for all I know, you completely support the progressive taxation and regulation of landlordism necessary to provide (free) homes for the homeless. But if that's the case I think you're being naive: the promise that if we just give the rich people what they want they'll magically become generous and start giving back has been part of the conversation for decades, and those promises are never kept.
• diggan 2y ago
  > I don't feel like that's the true motivation. Where is the compassion for the middle class worker who can just barely afford some house, just to have it stolen (see parallel threads in this discussion for accounts of that happening) then? If you have someone trying to break into the house you live and stay in, you don't call them "okupas", it's trespassing/breaking and entering. One quick police call and you'll get help to have them thrown out. The squatting/"okupas" thing is about occupying otherwise vacant properties.