But they get help Marie, there are government services and charities that focus on helping them. You can't help people who don't want to help themselves.
Discussion
I understand that, but $5 in my world doesn’t even buy me a coffee so if that helps make someone’s day then I’m fine with that.
I'm conflicted about this.
In a past life, I volunteered as a crisis counselor. There are a f---ton of taxpayer funded services available, but most are undiscoverable without inside help, and all are very hostile, obstructive and bureaucratic.
So they hire university-educated social workers to navigate the paperwork maze, at least for those needy persons with a high-enough diversity score.
Some homeless people aren't diverse enough. Some are, but don't have the patience. Some are, and have the patience, but what they actually want is drugs not a roof and a paid friend to talk to.
If we can't yet abolish #government, at least we should abolish the toxic "social welfare" bureaucracy. #ubi now! Also #legalisealldrugs to starve a few more human-hostile bureaucracies.
Where I live, homeless people are everywhere. Many of them are drug addicts. I’ve talked to some of them. The ones who are capable of holding a conversation tell me they wish they could stop, but there aren’t enough people to help. They could go to shelters, but they’re afraid of being robbed or hurt there. So they live on the streets and try to look out for each other. There are food banks that provide at least one meal a day, and the lines are long. They can’t possibly serve everyone. I don’t know how this gets fixed in any system, under fiat or bitcoin.
In Britain, between about 1920 and 1971, #heroin was available on prescription. It is CHEAP to manufacture, $1 / hit. The junkies held down jobs, lived at least to middle age, and didn't bother anyone.
Make illegal drugs a prescription drug problem. Expand who can prescribe. Overdose deaths will still be sad, but they won't cause second- and third-order problems like the WoD does...
I’ve heard good things about how Portugal handled their drug addiction problems. I agree with decriminalizing this stuff, but even with that there would still be a lack of housing, employment, and decent healthcare for anyone trying to find a way back.
True. But an imperfect solution is far better than the status quo. (Except for those benefiting from the dysfunction, but f--- those guys)
It’s also different when you live in a country where the government was responsible for getting its poorest urban black citizens addicted to crack and then punishing them for possession at a much higher rate and more severely than affluent white citizens for powdered cocaine.
That means you have two problems (well, many more than two).
Here our law enforcement "greenlight" drug dealers who also happen to be informers. These stay in business as long as they provide a steady stream of warm bodies to the prison system (smaller, junior dealers), and until they get rich enough for law enforcement to rob.
That's not quite the same as Crack-For-Contras, but its a lot closer than most ppl admit.
They need mental help. And not all of them want to get better and contribute to Society.
They are EVERYWHERE, In the city by my job. They'll come up to your car and bang on the window
It is a really bad area