December 4, 2007
SFist Finds: Oh Yeah, Merry Christmas
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Today's find was sent to us by SFist reader/commenter Jerry Jarvis, which he found somewhere along Howard Street. We can imagine how much it would suck to come to work and find someone sleeping/peeing in your storefront every morning, but the addition of the handwritten "Merry Christmas" at the end seems extra bitter.
If you're found sleeping on this porch, we will not disturb you or ask you to leave...we'll just call the police and have them haul your homeless ass away... so find somewhere else to sleep and piss... ...oh yeah, Merry Christmas
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hahaha!
lovely font, too.
I usually dump pots of boiling oil on them when they are pissing/crapping/sleeping on my front porch. It's pretty effective and prevents repeat visitors.
I prefer airhorns
lovely font, too.
that is beautiful! i wonder if it's from ravy' place from live 105. she often complains on air about the bum sleeping on her building door stoop.
there was one sleeping in the doorway of my building recently. it's an exit from a hallway to the backside of our building that you can't see out of so i hit the door kind of hard when i use it. a homeless guy was sleeping on the other side and it hit him. i heard him go 'ughh'. i gave him a few seconds to get up while i called security. he was gone and never came back after i'm sure i bruised a rib or two with that door.
it was kind of fun!
As someone who DOES have to do doorway crackhead removal every, single, morning I completely understand the added bitter.
As someone who DOES have to do doorway crackhead removal every, single, morning I completely understand the added bitter.
that's the spirit!
ho ho ho!!!
As a bum who enjoys sleeping in other people's doorways, I'm really getting a kick out of these replies!
A few questions and ponders:
#1:Is the person sleeping in the doorway the person who deficates?
#2:Is there proof?
#3: There are 6,000-10,000 people who are homeless in San Francisco and 1,500 shelter beds
#4: Every person who is with out housing, is a human beeing and should be treated like one. Not some "wild" animal who needs to be beaten to move out of the way.
#5: What are the chances of YOU becoming homeless?
Did you loose your job?
Domestic problems?
Alcohol/drug problem?
#6: Has anyone on here, besides Jerry Jarvis, ever talked to someone and asks them what is it THEY need to exit homelessness?
The responses may surprise you
As a bum who enjoys sleeping in other people's doorways, I'm really getting a kick out of these replies!
elihu,
You will never understand but it is your attitude that creates homeless people.
the holidays are a perfect time to make soylent green out of them
redseca, i'm sure thousands of homeless people are homeless just because someone said their circumstances are understandible. oh hey, random dude said it's OK to be homeless, i think i'll just go ahead and do that now!
besides, attitudes don't create people. other people do. cha-chig!
redseca, i'm sure thousands of homeless people are homeless just because someone said their circumstances are understandible. oh hey, random dude said it's OK to be homeless, i think i'll just go ahead and do that now!
besides, attitudes don't create people. other people do. cha-ching!
What about the Jewish homeless? Bastards.
they're not homeless, they're avant-garde.
1 - maybe..maybe not.. does it matter?
2 - again, does it matter? are you saying it's cool to have someone sleep on your doorstep as long as they aren't poopin there? anyway i think few people have enough time to track down the sources of feces they happen across (espcially with the many times per day this happens in sf) i actually think most of the poop i encounter from day to day is from dogs but that's a noe valley thing. it certainly adds to the luster and charm of this beautiful city, all the poop.
3 - yah, that sucks i guess. too bad this is the only city in the country where they can live instead of moving to a place where they have more available shelters? or is it just we are the only city that will tolerate their presence with such passive-aggressive faux-care flair.
4 - agreed. but the responsibility goes both ways. the ones who are completely nuts get a little more leeway here and probably need to be helped with some meds or whatever, but the ones who are running the 'professional victim' path get a littler harder to take. i try to treat homeless folks with a little sympathy and respect but ask the same in return, dudes hasslin me for change when i ain't carryin any and then getting all huffy about it need to chill.
5 - i got laid off a few years ago, took me nearly a year to find a job, with the combination of unemployment checks, burning up some of my carefully hoarded savings, and penny pinching, i managed to keep off the streets. now i freely admit i had a far superior safety net than some of these guys, but it takes a pretty long series of bad decisions to end up on the street, it's not like it happens overnight. it takes a while to completely alienate yourself from your family while squandering job and educational opportunities. and in this town you have alot of opportunities for job training, treatment, and even cash subsidies - there's probably no more progessive place in terms of programs to get un-homeless..
6- nope. luckily there are lots of social worker types around the area that can do that kind of stuff. if i gotta pay taxes, might as well go for something besides killin folks in iraq and giving nat ford raises, that's as good a use as any i suppose.
anyway i don't think people who ask questions like these are the problem, and i really do feel some sympathy for these guys even if its just to the degree where i support programs and stuff to help, particularly for cases like families and where kids are involved in which really disastorous situations led to homelessness and not just being and idiot who can't handle drugs to the point where they screw up their life. it's obviously much more complicated of a problem than a few folks rambling on a message board at lunchtime are gonna solve either.
Yes, indeed, it is attitudes such as Mr. Hernandez that allows homeless people to continue ravaging our streets and doorways. The people who are the problem, the ones to whom this sign is addressed, are not the unfortunate ones who truly need assistance.
No, these are the chronic homeless, many of whom do not want shelter or assistance. These are the ones we need to deal with.
Yes, indeed, it is attitudes such as Mr. Hernandez that allows homeless people to continue ravaging our streets and doorways. The people who are the problem, the ones to whom this sign is addressed, are not the unfortunate ones who truly need assistance.
No, these are the chronic homeless, many of whom do not want shelter or assistance. These are the ones we need to deal with.
that's a brilliant post andyc. i have often wished the media would write a story about the homeless to show us how they got that way. ask them and follow up with some investigation. i think what you would find is exactly what you said. they were rotten people for years that pissed off/abused so many that nobody was willing to take them in anymore. it would show society at large how little sympathy these fucks truly deserve however, which is so unpolitically correct it will never get printed.
1. Is that relevant?
2. Ditto
3. There's big bridge out of town and a whole country full opportunity that lies at the end of it
4. Every person that has to deal with the homeless is a human being and should be treated so
5. None
6. Has anyone ever stopped me and asked what I need to exit PS3lessness?
You may think these answers flippant but your questions have been asked a million times. Your preaching isn't working. Go away and think up something original, you patronising twat.
1. Is that relevant?
2. Ditto
3. There's big bridge out of town and a whole country full opportunity that lies at the end of it
4. Every person that has to deal with the homeless is a human being and should be treated so
5. None
6. Has anyone ever stopped me and asked what I need to exit PS3lessness?
You may think these answers flippant but your questions have been asked a million times. Your preaching isn't working. Go away and think up something original, you patronising twat.
double post bollocks
All of the arguments and comments are nothing new to this city. Some may call it "rhetoric" but it is REALITY. I am happy that andyc was lucky enough not to end up on the streets. But, there are plenty enough people on the streets who were unable to have a "safety net" like many people in this country.
This country solved homelessness after the great depression up until the 1980's. Why can't San Francisco be a model city to end homelessness.
We are the first city to ban plastic bags, and Mayor Newsom's Project Homeless Connect has been copied in several cities..........
So tell me San Franciscan's, what can we do to help those unfortunate enough to have to sleep on the streets?
We could start by not enabling them to continue to do so. Got any better ideas that don't involve me, not you, bearing the social and financial cost? I doubt it, but keep playing the same record over and over again, because fewer and fewer people are listening.
But hey, if we can ban plastic bags in this city, we can fly to the moon in hollowed-out pumpkins! Wake up dude and smell the opiate-laced human poop.
ahh, elihu, luck had nothing to do with it. that is my point - i was nowhere even near coming close to homelessness despite losing my job etc. and the other 70 or so people who lost their jobs when my old company shut down also did just fine too. in fact, i've never known a single person in my entire life who lost their job and ended up homeless because of it.
the 'safety net' is something that is maintained by more than just being in the right place at the right time. i was eligible for unemployment benefits because i busted my ass at that job for 6 years prior to the layoff. the total amount i got back was just a fraction of what i had already paid in taxes during that time. i also had plenty of family and friends that would have happily put me up if they knew it meant i would be sleeping out in the streets.
believe me, i suffer under no illusion that a lot of homeless folks don't have those connections or chances. all of the people at my company were skilled tech professionals, etc. and that's not a common profile for somebody forced to sleep on the street obviously. but my point is that things like family and friends are as much yours to lose as to make. there's a time where you have to decide that you either want to stay hopped up on drugs and completely alienate yourself from society in preference that to having a roof over your head or whatever. in san francisco, there are plenty of people that want to help folks make that choice and many programs and opportunities to help! i just don't see a lot of the folks in this town as even really facing that decision, because there's no reprecussions for the fact that they hang out and piss all over the place or leave needles around where other folks might tread. i don't know if criminalizing that type of behavior is really the solution but there's not much incentive for a lot of these folks to want to change the status quo. thanks to the nice weather, living around here on the streets isn't even near the bottom of the barrel of the human condition... i mean your average homeless person here still lives in better conditions than a lot of folks in africa and so forth, and they get better drugs to boot so why worry about changing ways right?
still, i'm in agreement that solutions are needed, it will probably require a balance of more draconian measures combined with more comprehensive support systems and making people use those systems, identifying the hows and whys of homelessness on a very individual basis and attacking those root issues rather than just providing stipends etc. if our country didn't outspend the entire rest of the globe combined on defense, the money it might take to get social workers and medical and housing facilities would be easy to come up with..
how about we buy all those foreclosed houses for pennies on the dollar in the central valley and house these fuckers one last time until they prove that housing wouldn't solve their problems. then we build huge jails for them in the desert where they can break rocks, dig canals, whatever until they die.
Point taken andyc,
The federal government has increased their production on "US Defense". With the money that it cost to produce, 1 Destroyer, the government could house several thousand people.
There are people all over the world, and including San Francisco, that are structualy challenged.
A piece of information you and others might not be aware of is that if someone, whom is with out housing, and is on the top of the wait list, then receives a citation for "aledgedly" braking the law for say, camping, or sleeping on the sidewalk, , and it happens to go to a warrant, then the person is automaticaly denied public assistance in housing.
When the warrant is no longer in the criminal justice system, then one can go and re-apply for housing and their name goes to the bottom of the list.
So as you can see, there are challenges that someone has to strugle with that this current city administration has yet to resolve.
Point taken andyc,
The federal government has increased their production on "US Defense". With the money that it cost to produce, 1 Destroyer, the government could house several thousand people.
There are people all over the world, and including San Francisco, that are structualy challenged.
A piece of information you and others might not be aware of is that if someone, whom is with out housing, and is on the top of the wait list, then receives a citation for "aledgedly" braking the law for say, camping, or sleeping on the sidewalk, , and it happens to go to a warrant, then the person is automaticaly denied public assistance in housing.
When the warrant is no longer in the criminal justice system, then one can go and re-apply for housing and their name goes to the bottom of the list.
So as you can see, there are challenges that someone has to strugle with that this current city administration has yet to resolve.
Point taken andyc,
The federal government has increased their production on "US Defense". With the money that it cost to produce, 1 Destroyer, the government could house several thousand people.
There are people all over the world, and including San Francisco, that are structualy challenged.
A piece of information you and others might not be aware of is that if someone, whom is with out housing, and is on the top of the wait list, then receives a citation for "aledgedly" braking the law for say, camping, or sleeping on the sidewalk, , and it happens to go to a warrant, then the person is automaticaly denied public assistance in housing.
When the warrant is no longer in the criminal justice system, then one can go and re-apply for housing and their name goes to the bottom of the list.
So as you can see, there are challenges that someone has to strugle with that this current city administration has yet to resolve.
But you've fucked up your point in the first sentence. The government could house several thousand people...Wwhy should the government house people? These people should house themselves. And they can do this quite easily by moving to somewhere else in the country where affordable houseing is abundant. No one has a right to live here.