getting a little tired of the crack/meth heads

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Slava

Honestly, who would be cool with owning a property next door to this kind of facility?

Many people own property next to low income, government-sponsored, and at-risk housing complexes and don’t even know or notice. They exist all over Calgary.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Yeah, so perception, but not any serious number of violent events that eclipse other issues in the city.

He witnessed a weird situation in the mall, and a squeegee kid tried to clean his daughter's car's windshield. It's interesting, I guess.

Well, one, perception is reality. It'd be one thing if this was another Sliver-only issue, but in fact most people I've talked to about it are flabbergasted at how far it has gone.

Two, it's not just about violence. And what you consider weird many more would consider incredibly uncomfortable to the point of changing their daily routine in a way that makes life harder and more challenging just so they can avoid run-ins. I'm not sure why you think 999,500 of us need to be uncomfortable to make sure we don't disturb the 500 people using public spaces illegally.

I do like the squeegee kid line FWIW. I mean, when you're resorting to twisting the situation to downplay it to fit your narrative it doesn't really strengthen your point, but we'll call that one a wash because the humour was on point.

[PepsiFree]

BC Housing releases reports a year or two after the opening of their Rapid Response to Homelessness complexes and are about as positive as you can expect. Nobody is saying this is a “silver bullet” (and I can’t believe how many times it needs to be repeated that there isn’t a silver bullet, that this requires a comprehensive approach, but if people want to keep repeating themselves I’m fine to continue as well) but this is one “bullet in the chamber” of an effective solution, if that’s the kind of analogy you want to go with.

Here is one such report: https://www.bchousing.org/publicatio...t-Outcomes.pdf

[PsYcNeT]

Men will try to overhaul the entire system to avoid feeling harassed and uncomfortable.

Women are just told to cover up.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

Men will try to overhaul the entire system to avoid feeling harassed and uncomfortable.

Women are just told to cover up.

Them Muslims might be onto something.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

Men will try to overhaul the entire system to avoid feeling harassed and uncomfortable.

Women are just told to cover up.

It obviously doesn’t apply to everyone in this thread but there was something very unintentionally funny about the (very) few posts mocking “defund the police” and other social justice initiatives involving situations where marginalized people are disproportionately discriminated against or in danger… in a thread calling for widespread societal change and billions of dollars in investment because a homeless person was rude to someone and acting scary and they didn’t like it.

[Leeman4Gilmour]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

This is an absurd conclusion, though, considering nothing about our response or society’s treatment of homeless people and addicts indicates an abundance of compassion. If anything, it’s a half-hearted attempt at showing compassion. “We” are acting in a way we believe compassionate people act, which is incredibly different than acting with an abundance of compassion. If we had too much compassion, we likely would not have this problem, because we would have funnelled actual resources into fixing it.



I’m surprised a few posters aren’t understanding this. This fantasy of rounding up all the homeless addicts and arresting and imprisoning them or “ethically forcibly confining” them to a mental institution and then just forcing them to be fixed or die in prison or get beat to death by the police or something is cool and all if that’s the road people want to go down, but how is any of that remotely conducive to actually curing addiction? Why would they bother?

Sliver’s big issue is actually seeing these people, he’s repeated it several times. Alleviating their HOMELESSNESS solves the immediate issue. You can alleviate their homelessness by giving them a home. A crazy concept, I’m sure. Then, for those who are also suffering from addiction or mental health issues or a combination, you offer treatments (as many on site or near site as possible). For those who aren’t or are no longer suffering from addiction or mental health issues, you work with them on transitional employment to get them back on their own two feet and eventually to a place where they don’t need government housing. The idea isn’t to give them mansions, just places to live that are safe and comfortable, but places they will eventually want to move on from. For those who simply refuse to engage in the program at all, then there’s nothing inhumane about increasing the legal consequences for remaining homeless or addicts. But you have to wrap it all together.

The people complaining the loudest in this thread don’t seem to want comprehensive solutions. They want punishments, or to fix it while saving a buck, but i’m not seeing a lot of interest in actually solving the issue in a way that makes sense from the main complainers. They just want to try a slightly different half-measure, which history tells us is not going to work. Finland, Portugal, Japan, Denmark, there are different examples of effective approaches to the issue, none of them half measures, none of them as lazy as just opening up more mental institutions, all of them with a ways to go yet but still far ahead of where we are.

Another problem is that people view this as a political or ideological debate/issue, when it’s not. As soon as you blame the “other” group for not solving this, you lose 100% of your credibility. Part of the reason this doesn’t get solved is BECAUSE people politicize it. So stop being part of the problem.

You state concluding part of the problem is abundance of compassion as "absurd" and a few posts later someone thinks it's "no big deal" that our transit shelters are being used as drug dens. We have to be less compassionate and more passionate to do as you suggest (and I agree with). Go all in on a solution.

Whatever that solution is, it's going to be government funded so it being political is unavoidable. And, you're going to have the "lock them up" crowd and the "hug it out crowd" and everything in between. So, being ideological is unavoidable.

[Yeah_Baby]

Originally Posted by Slava

Honestly, who would be cool with owning a property next door to this kind of facility?

I'm planning to move from a 90s era suburb to the core in the next few years, so I'd like deal. Would it be my first choice? Maybe not but the facilities need to go somewhere.

[Derek Sutton]

Originally Posted by Locke

I think I said this a while ago in a different thread, but low-cost, dense public housing is going to be a tough sell too.

You cram a bunch of people with addiction and mental health issues into a cramped space with nothing to do and nowhere to go and you're essentially just lighting a powderkeg.

There are a lot of reasons homeless individuals dont want to go to shelters or public housing, its not only just because they would have to follow their rules but a big element is that they can be very dangerous places.

Yes, they're afraid of being randomly attacked by meth heads and cr@ck wh0res!!

[81MC]

Originally Posted by Slava

Honestly, who would be cool with owning a property next door to this kind of facility?

People who currently don’t.

I’m literally a good arm away from one, and a minutes walk from two more. I’ve been there spending hours outside with the guy with a scar across his entire chest telling story of mustering his friend. I’ve been there to sit in the curb with a lady who was yelling down the street and showing her ass to the ghosts at midnight, who needed a long hug and someone to call DOAP. I’ve checked the head wound on the drunk who smashed into a pole out front. The routine mild annoyances like passerbys who get a little too friendly and don’t understand social cues, like the ‘yes yes good and you oh yeah oh yeah oh yeah oh yeah okay can you please carry on I’m trying to play with my daughter not learn your life story for the 10th time this month’ cues, or sirens once a week at 2 am, or transient population who treats the residential roadway like a freeway.

They need to exist, and it’s good. But only a fool would actually choose it for their neighbour.

I mean, it’s good those things exist because they’re needed.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Leeman4Gilmour

You state concluding part of the problem is abundance of compassion as "absurd" and a few posts later someone thinks it's "no big deal" that our transit shelters are being used as drug dens. We have to be less compassionate and more passionate to do as you suggest (and I agree with). Go all in on a solution.

Whatever that solution is, it's going to be government funded so it being political is unavoidable. And, you're going to have the "lock them up" crowd and the "hug it out crowd" and everything in between. So, being ideological is unavoidable.

Compassion isn’t accepting the circumstance of others and choosing to ignore it, so I’m not sure how an individual not caring if bus shelters are used as drug dens has anything to do with compassion. Considering nobody believes an addiction to be a positive trait and sleeping outside to be desirable, an abundance of compassion would likely lead to actively wanting those things to be changed or erased. Compassion for homeless addicts isn’t “leave them be,” so again, you’re being absurd.

And yes, it is currently political and ideological. My point was that it can’t be, because the right solution is going to be bipartisan and transforming what we view as competitive ideologies into complimentary ones. Suggesting the next “solution” is going to be political and ideological is just admitting that the next solution isn’t going to work.

[peter12]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Many people own property next to low income, government-sponsored, and at-risk housing complexes and don’t even know or notice. They exist all over Calgary.

Yes, there’s one for recovering alcoholics about two blocks from my house and you wouldn’t know it.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Many people own property next to low income, government-sponsored, and at-risk housing complexes and don’t even know or notice. They exist all over Calgary.

Quite a leap to go from low-income housing to say a safe injection site or something like that though. You're trying to imply that I think poor people are bad or something ridiculous like that, which isn't the case.

Originally Posted by 81MC

People who currently don’t.

I’m literally a good arm away from one, and a minutes walk from two more. I’ve been there spending hours outside with the guy with a scar across his entire chest telling story of mustering his friend. I’ve been there to sit in the curb with a lady who was yelling down the street and showing her ass to the ghosts at midnight, who needed a long hug and someone to call DOAP. I’ve checked the head wound on the drunk who smashed into a pole out front. The routine mild annoyances like passerbys who get a little too friendly and don’t understand social cues, like the ‘yes yes good and you oh yeah oh yeah oh yeah oh yeah okay can you please carry on I’m trying to play with my daughter not learn your life story for the 10th time this month’ cues, or sirens once a week at 2 am, or transient population who treats the residential roadway like a freeway.

They need to exist, and it’s good. But only a fool would actually choose it for their neighbour.

I mean, it’s good those things exist because they’re needed.

I 100% agree these things are needed and need to exist somewhere. I just think that's the easy part of the discussion, because probably an overwhelming number of people would agree with that. I'm not comfortable in being around that kind of thing though, and I have no desire to live near it. Which I suspect is also the majority of people.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Slava

Quite a leap to go from low-income housing to say a safe injection site or something like that though. You're trying to imply that I think poor people are bad or something ridiculous like that, which isn't the case.

Probably no bigger of a leap to go from a supportive housing complex where human beings actually live to a safe injection site. But do you.

[Yeah_Baby]

Originally Posted by Slava

I 100% agree these things are needed and need to exist somewhere. I just think that's the easy part of the discussion, because probably an overwhelming number of people would agree with that. I'm not comfortable in being around that kind of thing though, and I have no desire to live near it. Which I suspect is also the majority of people.

Which therein lies the problem. They need to go somewhere, and folks are willing to YIBY we're not moving forward as a society. We're socialized to put the individual self over the collective. Which I think needs a rethink. But hey, I'm one of the few weirdo leftists following the NHL which is inherently a conservative leaning thing.

[Leeman4Gilmour]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Compassion isn’t accepting the circumstance of others and choosing to ignore it, so I’m not sure how an individual not caring if bus shelters are used as drug dens has anything to do with compassion. Considering nobody believes an addiction to be a positive trait and sleeping outside to be desirable, an abundance of compassion would likely lead to actively wanting those things to be changed or erased. Compassion for homeless addicts isn’t “leave them be,” so again, you’re being absurd.

And yes, it is currently political and ideological. My point was that it can’t be, because the right solution is going to be bipartisan and transforming what we view as competitive ideologies into complimentary ones. Suggesting the next “solution” is going to be political and ideological is just admitting that the next solution isn’t going to work.

You have made some good points. But, you're being kind of an #######. Calling someone absurd because they have an observation which doesn't align with your own makes me feel that way about you.

And, I didn't suggest being overly compassionate leads to "leave them be". That's you assuming and not really taking the definition of compassion at face value. I believe being overly compassionate leads to handling this issue with kid gloves (too much sympathy and concern) and ultimately not accomplishing anything.

If it's funded by the government, it's always going to be political. You just can't avoid that. If all of the parties to agree on a solution and run with it, that would be beautiful and effective politics.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Yeah_Baby

Which therein lies the problem. They need to go somewhere, and folks are willing to YIBY we're not moving forward as a society. We're socialized to put the individual self over the collective. Which I think needs a rethink. But hey, I'm one of the few weirdo leftists following the NHL which is inherently a conservative leaning thing.

I think you dont build complexes instead you mandate that part of every development includes space for homes with no building housing multiple of these units. Disperse the problem and make everyone deal with it. Essentially every multi-family dwelling should have drug addict low income, old age and regular ownership within the complex which should be part of every neighbourhood development plan. You shouldn’t be able to escape the society that enriches you.

[Derek Sutton]

Originally Posted by GGG

I think you dont build complexes instead you mandate that part of every development includes space for homes with no building housing multiple of these units. Disperse the problem and make everyone deal with it. Essentially every multi-family dwelling should have drug addict low income, old age and regular ownership within the complex which should be part of every neighbourhood development plan. You shouldn’t be able to escape the society that enriches you.

No thanks. Dispersing does not fix any sort of problem, if that is the case, lets just disperse them all to Edmonton.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Leeman4Gilmour

You have made some good points. But, you're being kind of an #######. Calling someone absurd because they have an observation which doesn't align with your own makes me feel that way about you.

And, I didn't suggest being overly compassionate leads to "leave them be". That's you assuming and not really taking the definition of compassion at face value. I believe being overly compassionate leads to handling this issue with kid gloves (too much sympathy and concern) and ultimately not accomplishing anything.

If it's funded by the government, it's always going to be political. You just can't avoid that. If all of the parties to agree on a solution and run with it, that would be beautiful and effective politics.

Sorry that you think I’m an #######. I don’t understand how you can make up a definition of compassion that is synonymous with “kid gloves” while being pedantic about “political.” I know what you believe, and I’m telling you that I disagree. Can you handle that without low-brow name calling?

Compassion just doesn’t have anything to do with “kids gloves” and it doesn’t have anything to do with ignoring a problem (you’re the one who brought it up, I don’t know why you related the two if you didn’t want me to assume you were relating the two). “Too much” sympathy and concern is pretty hard to define, but you believe it means not doing enough, or not using hard enough measures. I’m telling you that if there was too much compassion, the “compassionate” tactics that have been deployed would be a lot stronger. I don’t see how you can begin to believe there is too much compassion when most homeless people are left to die and there is a severe lack of funding and effort to fix the problem. That’s why it’s absurd. The reality is that we’re not responding strongly enough in either a compassionate way or a harsher way, and you’re saying the half-hearted response is actually just too compassionate, which is not reality.

(EDIT: to use an analogy, it’s like if someone was going hungry and you had the ability to buy them a full meal and teach them how to cook, but instead you gave them a single french fry, and someone accused you of being “too” compassionate because of it. That’s why it’s absurd.)

And yes, it is going to be political in the sense “of and/or relating to politics.” Obviously. But I explained in the original post that it should be bipartisan and not politicized, ie used as a political issue to secure votes. I don’t know how else to make myself clear to you.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

The reality is that like basically every issue that involves a moral aspect, public policy isn't actually aimed at fixing the problem but doing just enough to make the person who's politically aligned with the "compassionate" solution feel like they're doing their part and voting their conscience without significantly disrupting their own lives. It's no different than environmental policies in that regard. If a city councillor actually ran on doing things that would make a material and permanent difference they'd get absolutely wrecked, and that'll be true until the problem is a lot more front and center than just making people uncomfortable.