>If you agree homelessness is an issue than the right attitude to have is to reduce it no?
Back in the mid 1980s, the Village Voice[0] ran a feature article entitled "What do homeless people want?"
The author helpfully provided an answer in the first sentence of the article: "Homes, mostly."
Given the very visible homeless population in New York City[1] at the time, and that more and more of those folks were families with children, it seemed a reasonable question to ask, with a readily available answer.
And in 2000, there was a piece in the San Jose Mercury News[2] about full-time school teachers working in the San Jose public schools who were living in homeless shelters because they couldn't afford housing on their salaries in the South Bay.
And yet, 30+ years later the problem is getting worse -- due to the lack of affordable housing stock, increasing economic insecurity and inequality, among other, lesser, issues.
So let's not continue to believe the Grimm-esque fairy tale that poor people are poor because they're lazy or stupid. And that all homeless people are drug-addicted, mentally impaired losers.
So what is it that homeless people want? Homes, mostly.
Yet our zoning and housing policies make increasing housing stock to meet demand and effectively difficult, if not impossible.
Yes, homelessness is a serious issue. And something I experienced back in those fabled 1980's. And I did have a drug (cocaine) problem while I was homeless. Then again, I didn't start using those drugs until I was already homeless. Hmmm. Correlation isn't causation, but...
> So let's not continue to believe the Grimm-esque fairy tale that poor people are poor because they're lazy or stupid. And that all homeless people are drug-addicted, mentally impaired losers.
Also, substance abuse can be an outcome, not just a cause. People go homeless after getting addicted, yes, but people also get addicted in order to numb the experience of being homeless too. Using drugs is a reasonable response to a loss of hope; I’m sure every single person here has some experience with increased alcohol consumption as a response to stress. It’s perfectly human, and most of us wouldn’t do any better if we were homeless tomorrow.
Also, this attitude is never applied to the rich and powerful addicted to things like cocaine. Which is kind of curious. It makes you wonder if the issue isn’t drugs at all..
Back in the mid 1980s, the Village Voice[0] ran a feature article entitled "What do homeless people want?"
The author helpfully provided an answer in the first sentence of the article: "Homes, mostly."
Given the very visible homeless population in New York City[1] at the time, and that more and more of those folks were families with children, it seemed a reasonable question to ask, with a readily available answer.
And in 2000, there was a piece in the San Jose Mercury News[2] about full-time school teachers working in the San Jose public schools who were living in homeless shelters because they couldn't afford housing on their salaries in the South Bay.
And yet, 30+ years later the problem is getting worse -- due to the lack of affordable housing stock, increasing economic insecurity and inequality, among other, lesser, issues.
So let's not continue to believe the Grimm-esque fairy tale that poor people are poor because they're lazy or stupid. And that all homeless people are drug-addicted, mentally impaired losers.
So what is it that homeless people want? Homes, mostly.
Yet our zoning and housing policies make increasing housing stock to meet demand and effectively difficult, if not impossible.
Yes, homelessness is a serious issue. And something I experienced back in those fabled 1980's. And I did have a drug (cocaine) problem while I was homeless. Then again, I didn't start using those drugs until I was already homeless. Hmmm. Correlation isn't causation, but...
[0] https://www.villagevoice.com/
[1] https://citylimits.org/2013/03/11/a-brief-history-of-homeles...
[2] https://www.mercurynews.com/