this post was submitted on 15 Nov 2023

609 points (95.5% liked)

News

22846 readers

4715 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil

Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.

2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.

Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.

3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.

Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.

4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.

Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.

5. Only recent news is allowed.

Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.

6. All posts must be news articles.

No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.

7. No duplicate posts.

If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.

8. Misinformation is prohibited.

Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.

9. No link shorteners.

The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.

10. Don't copy entire article in your post body

For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

rjc@lemmy.world

Thekingoflorda@lemmy.world

gedaliyah@lemmy.world

Blackbeard@lemmy.world

little_cow@lemmy.world

jeffw@lemmy.world

609

San Francisco homeless sweep was cheered on by the right. It was also illegal (www.vice.com)

submitted 10 months ago by STRIKINGdebate2@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

122 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hundreds of unsheltered people living in tent encampments in the blocks surrounding the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco have been forced to leave by city outreach workers and police as part of an attempted “clean up the house” ahead of this week’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation’s annual free trade conference.

The action, which housing advocates allege violated a court injunction, was celebrated by right-wing figures and the tech crowd, who have long been convinced that the city is in terminal decline because of an increase in encampments in the downtown area.

The X account End Wokness wrote that the displacement was proof the “government can easily fix our cities overnight. It just doesn’t want to” (the post received 77,000 likes). “Queer Eye but it’s just Xi visiting troubled US cities then they get a makeover,” joked Packy McCormick, the founder of Not Boring Capital and advisor to Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto VC team. The New York Post celebrated the action, saying that residents had “miraculously disappeared.”

top 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] Semi-Hemi-Demigod@kbin.social 72 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (4 children)

The San Francisco Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing had a 2022-2023 budget of $672 million dollars. This does not include EMT and police services. It's just what they earmark for homelessness.

In 2022, there were 7,754 unhoused people in San Francisco.

That's roughly $86,000 per person they spend on getting them housing, and still failing at it. The average rent for an apartment in SF is $3500 a month, or $42,000 per year. They're spending twice as much as they would if they just got apartments for people.

[–] Oka@lemmy.ml 32 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Where is that money going, I wonder

[–] Furedadmins@lemmy.world 33 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Housing is just one aspect. Food, medicine,, paying for employees (social workers, security, medical staff) etc. But even if say 75% of that was for housing it's not easy to just say rent them apartments; first off not enough apartment buildings are willing to take them in. It's difficult to even find cheap motels that will work with cities to temporarily house the homeless even though it's guaranteed money. Cities are looking at building shelters but then it's NIMBY time. Without dedicated facilities with mental health, addiction, etc treatment which the US doesn't have homelessness will be a forever problem.

[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 5 points 10 months ago

Two recommendations from me: Podcast limited series According to Need, which is about homelessness in the Bay Area. Book The End of Policing, has a great chapter on homelessness and costs (though I endorse the whole book).

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 18 points 10 months ago

BUT BUT BUT WE CAN'T JUST SOLVE PROBLEMS, WE VAVE TO MANAGE THEM.

[–] ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works 10 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (7 children)

Most long-term homeless people can't just be given free apartments - they have serious, often untreatable problems that would make such a solution unsustainable.

[–] Semi-Hemi-Demigod@kbin.social 33 points 10 months ago (2 children)

A quick google shows that most homelessness advocacy groups can cite numerous studies that show housing-first solutions are not only more effective, but also cheaper.

[–] ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works 6 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Are these studies specifically of the long-term homeless population?

load more comments (4 replies)

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 5 points 10 months ago

And here are some examples:

Look up the groups behind projects like these and you're sure to find documentation for their effectiveness. I'd much rather fund these than shelters where nobody feels safe.

[–] kttnpunk@lemmy.world 8 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

Shut the fuck up, there are so many empty, insured buildings rotting away or even sitting in great condition but if we had to build new ones that CAN be done cheaply. No matter how bad they are, their problems would undoubtedly be VASTLY improved by the roof over their heads, and it could be sustained easily by the government taxing the rich even obscenely slightly. But no, instead we pass that burden onto the middle class so they get brainwashed into hating the poor too. Or stigmatizing, looking down on them, writing them all off as lesser beings who don't deserve a shred of hope. But realistically? Even if you have a million dollars today you could end up like them tomorrow. I remember somebody new starting at pizza hut who had just lost his house and was selling his Ferrari- it can happen to you. So many people are right around the corner from being homeless themselves and don't know it. Don't ever let anybody downplay that reality.

load more comments (3 replies)

load more comments (5 replies)

[–] torknorggren@lemm.ee 10 points 10 months ago

7754 is the PIT count of people homeless at one given point in time. Many, many more cycle through homelessness in any year.

[–] Furbag@lemmy.world 32 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Why do the right cheer as if it's a permanent solution? They'll be back as soon as the important people are gone. To say the problem is "fixed overnight" is like saying "Look Mom, I cleaned my room!" after you just finished sweeping everything underneath the bed and hiding it with the covers.

I do hope they fix the problem, but I don't know what else they can try other than just building houses and giving them the keys. That would probably be less expensive in the long run, but taxpayers evidently feel better paying for homelessness programs in perpetuity rather than giving people free shit one time.

[–] nova_ad_vitum@lemmy.ca 21 points 10 months ago

Conservatives don't know how to fix or build anything anymore. They have no solution to homelessness and they don't care . Sending police to crack some skulls and patting themselves on the back for it is the best they've got.

load more comments (4 replies)

[–] Repelle@lemmy.world 30 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Were they moved into sanctuary districts? https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Sanctuary_District

DS9 just seems to get more and more relevant with age. Sad we haven’t done any better than projected by the show.

[–] gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world 24 points 10 months ago

No, it seems like they just had their tents and possessions taken and then we're forced to find a different street to sleep on. The sad thing is something like Trek's Sanctuary Districts would take a government that is way less cruel to the homeless than we currently are.

[–] samus12345@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

10 months to go until the Bell Riots.

load more comments (1 replies)

[–] MuuuaadDib@lemm.ee 26 points 10 months ago (7 children)

Wow that sure is a shitty thing to do to humans....

Right-wing: "yay" on all shitty things.

load more comments (7 replies)

[–] nutsack@lemmy.world 24 points 10 months ago (1 children)

republicans love the idea of a brutal authoritarian police state society

[–] Nalivai@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 10 months ago

Also known as small government

[–] verdantbanana@lemmy.world 21 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

also no one on the left went live on any national tv broadcast to denounce it either

[–] MyOpinion@lemm.ee 20 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Housing needs to be a right. Every citizen should be able to go to a housing authority and have a roof over their head if they are unable to afford it.

[–] rosymind@leminal.space 18 points 10 months ago

Agreed. I'd go a bit further. Anything regarding sustenance should be a right:

Housing, healthcare, access to clean water, clean air, at least one hot meal a day, and emergency services should be a right.

I'll even go as far as arguing that internet access should be included in that list.

Better yet, college

load more comments (1 replies)

[–] dangblingus@lemmy.world 18 points 10 months ago

Of course conservatives would cheer the continued marginalization and traumatization of society's most vulnerable. They touch themselves to the cruelty.

[–] Immersive_Matthew@sh.itjust.works 15 points 10 months ago (8 children)

I just do not understand why we are not addressing homelessness in more productive ways. We know it can be better managed as some countries have figured it out. Really crazy that we are not all on board with just doing the right thing and having a win win for all. We choose to suffer and we choose to sweep our suffering under the rug when guests come over.

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 6 points 10 months ago

Because that would involve "giving someone something for free that they DiDn'T WoRk FoR!" You can't give anything to anyone except billionaires because it's "not fair to meeeee. I work, I don't get free stuff. They should just Get A Job!™©®"

load more comments (7 replies)

[–] the_q@lemmy.world 14 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Dear conservatives,

Why are you purposefully awful?

With love, Everyone

[–] twisted28@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Only social guidelines like being homophobic, misogynist or racist are adhered to. The rest of the Bible is ignored. These people follow the social guidelines Billionaires want them to. Gotta breed more slaves.

I think their misery comes from religion limiting them in so many ways they take it out on everyone else.

[–] the_q@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I think they're just awful people and use things like religion to somehow justify their awfulness. It's easier to go "God says gay people are bad" than "gay people make me feel icky and I don't want to deal with why I feel icky so fuck them!"

load more comments (2 replies)

load more comments (3 replies)

[–] betz24@lemmynsfw.com 13 points 10 months ago (5 children)

While I agree we should be solving the root problem of homelessness equitably, the headline is misleading as I know many people on the left were also happy to have clean streets for a while.

[–] TotallynotJessica@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (4 children)

If the streets were cleaned by putting people in housing, it would be worth celebrating, but there's nothing left wing about people being displaced from where you personally live. Even if those "people on the left" have certain left wing values, it's right wing selfishness that made them happy. Those homeless people just got pushed elsewhere and those areas have to deal with a rise in the unhoused. The streets can only be, "cleaned," by housing people, otherwise you're just sweeping the, "filthy poors," into another person's area.

From an amoral economic perspective, we should either get people shelter and make them productive members of society, or just hasten their inevitable deaths on the streets by executing them ourselves. Give them a helping hand, or accept that we don't think that they deserve life if they can't play the capitalist game. The current approach costs us more money, prolongs their suffering, but gives us plausible deniability through ignorance. Fuck ignorance. Just embrace that the system is evil.

load more comments (4 replies)

[–] reagansrottencorpse@lemmy.world 13 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Who remembers that homeless encampment in Texas that was about to be ripped apart by cops, until a bunch of armed people turned up to defend it?

[–] FontMasterFlex@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago (1 children)

WACO?

load more comments (1 replies)

[–] PhlubbaDubba@lemm.ee 13 points 10 months ago

At this point the homeless ought to try staging a camp in at the city hall. Get the headlines all over them being dragged out of there.

[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 12 points 10 months ago

American liberals are only progressive until it fucks with their money.

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 10 points 10 months ago

I read the article, there doesn't seem to be any mention of where they went. The people vice interviewed seem to be playing coy and giving a bunch of carefully sanitized non-answers about what happened. ~~San Francisco just made 500 homeless people vanish?~~ No, excuse me, big ol' homeless camps just happened to up and vanish with no police intervention just in time for APEC? Yeah, fucking right. Dollars to dimes that they bussed them to the central valley. I know you can do better than this, California, get your shit together.

[–] braxy29@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago

miraculously disappeared??? wtf

[–] BeautifulMind@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago

I also noticed that after a recent sweep/camp cleanup of homeless encampments in Seattle, the local Sinclair station (KOMO) was quick to run footage of people (presumably to be representative of Seattle folk generally) basically gloating that AT LAST they did something

Yes, the right are going to do everything they can to give others the impression that everyone else also regards poor people to be vermin, to be purged... preferably violently. The purpose of this sort of language is always to condition its audience to accept, if not cheer for, violence.

[–] badbytes@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago

Lowest form of humanity, has to be near when you criminalize homelessness.

[–] kaffiene@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Hmm Republicans being inhuman and Techbros saying hold my beer. Cool

load more comments (3 replies)

load more comments