Laws Against Aiding Homeless

If they wish to remain homeless then it is their choice and we should move on to the ones who wants to become a productive member of society. My argument is give them the tools to help themselves and leave those who decide to not utilize these tools. You can't force an alcoholic to get well unless they want to.

We really should get some statistics of how many homeless people want to get on their feet compared to the ones that don't or unable due to mental instabilities or chronic drug addict.



Cost efficiency should be a top concern with government programs as this is your money that they are spending. Using the homeless as cheap labor in order to integrate them into society would be a cost effective way to solve the problem. The unintended result would be prisons fighting tooth and nail as the privatized ones would lose the ability to collect some income off the backs of their work release programs.

In the end, you are looking at an investment. That homeless guy went from being a black hole for charity or government handout would become a tax paying citizen. Any intelligent politician should be able to realize that. The large problem is making the necessary change in the legal system along with a shift in societies perspective on homeless people.

Ziggy just mentioned a problem of once the people are working at McDonalds or where ever. Nobody can live on their own working at McDonalds which is true but, this is better than the status quo with just handing out money without really doing much else. Th e problem of having to "house" the homeless person could be in some form of apartment building for the ex-homeless person still working at McDonalds. While this could lead to them turning into "projects" I think the mentality of the people wanting to get back into society would prevent this from occurring.

Also I move to have this thread moved to Serious Discussion due to the nature of the arguments being made here.

I move to have it kept until some-one posts that picture:
"you gonna get RAPED".


Seriously, It's been a long time since I've seen a real discussion on random, why not just leave it to fuck with the new guys?
Maybe it will set an example for some of them--step it up a bit.

First, the fact that he got arrested is a problem, especially in this case because the police specificly said that they wouldn't enforce that law yet. But Montanez was arrested because he was part of an organization that didn't get a permit as well as having too many people gather at once. Not because he was helping the homeless. If he had more people helping him, he wouldn't of gotten arrested. The ratio would of been acceptable. I don't agree with that, because maybe he couldn't get anyone else to help him.

BTW didn't you post this?:


These aren't laws, the report is the debate of them. For the exceptions where the city has ruled against them, then hell yeah people should be up in arms.
I'm not saying that these laws aren't stupid, but it isn't like the government is trying to perscute the poor.

Just gonna make sure you caught that.


Sounds like a good plan, but you'll have to convince the people that the raise in taxes is for a good cause since the program will suck extra money from the city. I doubt many are going to like it especially during this economic crisis.


So they can all starve in their "tent city" faster than in the city/town because they can't beg for food? If we were to offer aid, it would cost a lot of money to start this up, and as you know, cities have something called a budget. Unless you're willing to pay more taxes.


Preventing littering and public indecency already sounds like a good reason to me, but another reason is to give police power to stop gang and drug problems.

It's those retards in California. I mean seriously, how do you actually make it illegal to be homeless anyway. If somebody took it to court the law would fail instantly.

The homeless can be divided into two main categories:

A) The mentally ill
B) Those with a malformed biography

Effective approaches to the acute homeless problem must therefore also be bipartite:

A) must be given free access to effective long-term treatment (not going to happen, as that's """socialism""" (lolamericanstalkingaboutsocialism))
B) must be re-integrated into society through paid labour (quite as in the quote about Daytona Beach, FL, or your own proposal). However, care needs to be taken that participants aren't just given the runaround as sub-minimum-wage labour force, as this would negatively effect the job market at large.

These are, however, cosmetics. Symptome treatment.
The only effective approach to the chronic homeless problem would have to be systemic in nature.

The thing is, razama, it seems to me that you are talking about the video, while I'm talking about this shit in general.

What do you mean "these aren't laws?" Be more specific; define "these". Are you trying to say that the "can't sleep outside or beg for money" laws aren't laws or that the bill of rights and the application of it on a case by case basis to protect the rights of the homeless that have been the victims of the enforcement of the "anti-homeless" laws isn't a law?

Since I read the report, I perfectly understand that going on a case by case basis of the enforcement of the "anti-homeless" laws may not always mean infringement of rights, and I also know that there have been court cases where the court actually acknowledged the infringement of their rights and defended the homeless.

Start reading from page 89 where all the court cases are.

You forgot the third group which is expanding at a rather alarming rate. Those becoming homeless due to the economy.





I won't debate the faults of socialism and the problems bigger government brings in this thread.

Anyways there are alternative methods to help the mentally ill without having to trash our economy in an already pretty dejected state. While I feel sorry for those who have mental illness, what are we supposed to do? Throw money at them until they are barely stable, even if they are unable to be productive? I believe people can do a far greater job than some bureaucrat in an office.

The second part is missing the fact that the pay system would be similar to a temp. agency. They help get you a job based on your relative skills then take a percentage of your paycheck. Prisoners receive a reasonable pay before they have it taken from them by the state to pay for their room and board. It's not like they will be working .35c on the $. If anything they are undercutting "work release" prisoners due to the fact that you know a homeless man is less of a threat to your working staff.

I believe that a malformed biography includes the economic fuck ups in people's lives.

Mm? What alternative methods in particular are you referring to?
And where do bureaucrats in an office come into play?



In the "already pretty dejected state" of the economy, few employers will probably touch the homeless as they can get more qualified labour at cheap rates from the pool of "normal", desperate job-seekers. So, either you undercut their wages, and effectively discourage employers from offering long-term employment to anyone, or the homeless won't find qualified employment; leaves them to unqualified labour, where they'll be competing with illegal aliens.

A simple answer is Charity. Salvation army actually gave a co-worker of mine medication for her disease.




Government programs come with bureaucrats, regulations, waste, etc. Governments do a piss poor service for the amount of money they spend. I would rather donate all the money that would go into a government program via taxes to a charity because the charity would do a better job at a lower cost.



We use prisoners as cheap labor for jobs anyways. In simplicity, we are exchanging work release prisoners for homeless people. Same simple unskilled jobs that we could probably teach a monkey to do. These prisoners do various tasks from roadside trash pick up, park restoration, etc

As for undercutting wages, these people will do the basic of basic work such as flipping burgers, pushing shopping carts. It is already minimum wage work, you can't go any lower without breaking the law.

These are problems that are only connected by the individual. Homelessness does not cause drug use and, although drug use can cause homelessness, it can also cause things like paranoia.
By that thinking we should outlaw curtains, because they aid one of the symptoms of paranoia, which is a symptom of drug use.
(A gross exaggeration, but it conveys my point.)

Eliminating the homeless because they contribute to the drug problem is like prohibiting people of color from walking down your street because your house was ransacked.



Also, another reason I would have liked this to stay: I'm arguing the concept of homelessness, not the merit of this law--contradictory to the spoonfed topic.

What?


The homeless aren't the only ones involved in drugs...


The reason I mentioned drug use and gangs is because that's what the law was really meant for. If we're going to argue about this law, I have to quote the original purpose of the law. Making sure our streets are kept clean comes as a bonus.
You might argue, "If it's only for gang members and drug dealers, then why involve the homeless?"
If we allow the homeless to loiter while arresting the gang members and drug dealers for the same reason, this could be used against the court making it a precedent, meaning the the criminals can get away.