alt Hacker NewsI live in Oakland. Something I've noticed in a lot of the "THE CITY IS GOING TO HELL" commentary is that often people are pointing at visual symptoms - a homeless encampment, graffiti - as a proxy for "things are bad," and it doesn't take a lot of pulling on that thread before you get to "well just look at them," and it's real hard to cast that one in a "race-neutral" way. I've heard people complaining about hot dog vendors on the street as some kind of public nuisance, I've heard people point to wall murals as a sign of moral decay. Fine, that's your jam, that's what the suburbs are for, but if you don't like seeing poor people, make a society that doesn't create so goddamn many of them.
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You need some kind of proof that a homeless encampment is bad for the city or that someone might not like to be near one for reasons that might not include racism?
The author is complaining about people defecating in public spaces, not about graffiti.
Homelessness is pretty race neutral tho? Especially in Oakland, which is incredibly race-balanced.
Visual disorder is real harm, not a proxy or suburban preference.
Encampments produce fires, needles, waste, blocked sidewalks, and local crime spikes. Surveys show high mental illness and substance use rates among the homeless. Mild climate plus weak enforcement concentrates the problem beyond local poverty levels. Treating every complaint as coded racism blocks diagnosis.
Unpermitted vendors create safety and fairness issues for taxed businesses. Illegal graffiti is vandalism that costs owners. Oakland fines them. Murals are different.
Pure tolerance by the left produced tent cities. Enforcement and treatment shows recent drops in both homelessness and crime.
People who want orderly streets are not required to absorb the costs. Working neighborhoods take most of the hit.
I dunno have you been to Vesterbro (he is talking about Copenhagen afterall)? Especially around H17? It's pretty gross. It's also spitting distance from Tivoli Gardens where you might want to take your kids out for the day.
The most objectionable thing about his post is that he's calling out gypsies specifically, but also Denmark relatively recently passed sweeping anti-begging laws kind of specifically targeting Roma people...
I've lived in east coast cities (NYC, Boston, and Philadelphia) for the majority of my adult life and while homelessness is less of a problem in the northeast because of the climate there is still a good amount of it in the major cities. I think it becomes way too easy to tune out those commentaries and avoid the parts of the city that they apply to.
In Philadelphia, I lived a few blocks away from the Girard stop on the L train. I would just avoid walking by the station because it was a hang out for homeless people and drug users in the area. Pretty much everywhere within a 10 block radius of the station is built up, there's always people out, and it feels like all of the local businesses in the area are thriving (more recently there's been too many chains opening up which sucks but I digress), there's barely any homelessness or crime with the exception of package thieves (I just bought a $20 box off amazon to put in front of my house and never had a problem) and the occasional car window being smashed.
In NYC, especially Manhattan although the same applies to the outer boroughs, unless you live around a more touristy area then you don't even think about it. In Boston even less so besides downtown.
I don't think trying to contain people to specific areas is a good solution. There's obviously a greater social issue across the US and other developed nations and it's a very hard problem to start solving, but I would guess that most cities continue to ignore it as long as its easy for the majority of the population to ignore it.