Interesting… where I’m from most cabs are Mercedes limousines. I never heard about people thinking less of Mercedes because they are popular with taxi drivers.

Yeah, that thing about red states sending their homeless to you guys is absolutely fucked. Makes policies that would actually help seem like they don’t, because more desolate people keep showing up, even though you guys are doing your best.

Also agree about the billionaires obviously, and I think the whole silicon valley tech culture also doesn’t help. FAANG employees with their big salaries can just afford way higher rents and costs of living than the average american, driving up the prices. But I’m sure as a resident you know all of those issues better than I do.

I hope it gets better for you guys, it’s an incredibly sad situation, especially in such a beautiful city like SF.

Sounds absolutely horrible, and I definitely understand that residents don’t wanna live or work in these environments.
I don’t think there is an easy fix for this problem tbh. Or at least not on a local level. From what I see SF is doing a lot of social stuff right, or at least better than the rest of the country. On the other hand you have crazy inequality pushing people into desperation and addiction. This somehow needs to be solved, but it might get worse before it gets better. Idk man, it’s tough.

Where I think people can make a difference is on a personal level. A little kindness goes a long way, and those people are yearning for empathy. You said they are like 4 year olds, and I think they are probably just as vulnerable. Addicts don’t have the luxury of thinking about consequences, they just survive until the next fix. So the right thing to do is be as kind and understanding as possible, even though they might make it difficult.

If you don’t have it already, might I suggest you get some Narcan for your workplace? Sounds like you could literally save a life with it someday.

First, no they don’t give out free drugs. Even tho having clean drugs would help a lot in reducing the harms of addiction, I don’t know any government that would pass that.

Obviously fentanyl is fucking dangerous and toxic, no matter how you take it. Overdoses at those sites happen. That’s why they are equipped with Narcan, and also have a line to medical services. So users that would OD somewhere in private and not make it to the ER have a chance.

The second important part is all the stuff that goes with taking the drugs themselves. Usually addicts don’t have a ready supply of syringes and other paraphernalia to use their drugs. This leads to them sharing needles, using dirty gear and other behaviors that spread diseases like hepatitis c. By handing out clean needles and other things, a lot of those diseases can be avoided. They also hand out other medical supplies to treat the damage from the drugs and living in the streets.

Finally, they always offer addicts that want to quit support and help them find treatment. This is the most important part. Addicts trust the people at those sites, because they treat them like people, not junkies. So there is a higher chance that they feel safe enough to ask for help when it’s time for them.

I hope that answers some of your questions. If you want to learn more, Channel 5 with Andrew Callahan has a great series on drugs and homelessness on YouTube. There’s one Episode where they go to a safe injection site, but the other episodes in Philadelphia and SF are definitely also worth a watch. You will see some absolutely harrowing and terrible shit tho. If you have the stomach I highly recommend them.

https://youtu.be/Ym7qS27oiHU?si=UpV19WFJL7MU9Zqq

Edit: Reading some of your other questions in this thread I definitely recommend you watch those Andrew Callahan documentaries. They will answer a lot of your questions and hopefully clear up some misconceptions. Start with San Francisco Streets, then watch harm reduction facility and finally Philly streets.

They wouldn’t have to shoot up in the streets if SF still had the safe injection sites up. People who shoot up in the streets do so mostly because they want to get found if they OD.

Making it illegal to be high won’t make addicts want to stop getting high, it will just push them into dark corners where they die when they OD. Imo that’s way more unacceptable.

Iirc Dr. Oz used to be quite the renowned heart surgeon. Makes it even more tragic that he chose this life as a charlatan giving harmful advice, instead of using his talent for good.

It already does. Just not so much in the countries that are most responsible for the pollution.

Hey man, I had some of the same anxieties about being a late bloomer, never finding a girl, not knowing what to do if someone showed interest etc. This will probably not be new advice to you, but here we go:

No matter how old you are, it‘s never too late to start things. Go out and have some fun, socialize with women, try dating, do hobbies with women involved etc. Invest in yourself, have a basic level of hygiene and dress socially acceptable. At some point you will find someone who is into you, and if you are open and up front about your lack of experience, they will probably overlook most of the early dating blunders.

Just don’t go into it all with the expectation that something has to happen, or that if you do the right things someone has to be into you. It’s ok to fail, it’s ok to be awkward, you learn a lot from it.

If you wanna talk privately about this stuff, shoot me a dm.

Even though we all knew that stuff falls to the ground if you leave it unsupported, we still needed someone to gather some scientific data, find reasons why and prove that gravity exists. That’s just how science works.

You were so close! The first four paragraphs were a perfect argument against the death penalty. And then you somehow turned around to argue for it in the last one?

The logical conclusion from your argument isn’t a quick death, it’s trying to reform offenders, no matter how heinous their crimes. If that’s not possible, keep them locked away, but treat them humanely and keep trying.

As far as I know it’s mostly because of the appeals process and because of the drugs they use. Nobody wants to make them anymore.

Reform, and if they continue to pose a risk for society keep them in a prison/psychiatric ward until they die or are reformed.

Look at how Norway handles Breivik for example. That guy is a proper monster. But he still gets treated according to human rights, cause he is still human. We as a society should be better and more rational than the monsters that we condemn.

Maybe people in the south forgot, but the rest of the world definitely always knew that it’s a symbol for racist historically challenged losers.

Time to put some sanctions on tax havens then

If you sell it right that could be a hit with all those brexit voters

A lot of them probably are dead, but Hamas also can’t hand over all their bargaining chips. What is keeping the IDF from completely wiping out Gaza once there are no more hostages there?

Why is this downvoted so heavily? The article is pointing out some valid issues.

One point I wish they would talk about tho is that a lot of this patriarchal sentiment stems from the fact that about 80% of Italians are Catholics. It’s gotten better but the church is still propagating a lot of these conservative ideas on women’s issues.

Man is almost 70 and still jogging and shooting homeless people while filming it! Must have been a wild life.

Mate, it’s a little too easy to just blame foreign agents and idiots for all this mess. The radicalization process of the GOP has been going on for decades, the social divide has been widening and the US media is doing its part to stir the pot. Sure, Russian trolls played a part in whipping up the frenzy, but the main problem is a home made one, of unchecked capitalism without any regard for whom it might hurt. Without it, trolls wouldn’t have anything to feed on. Happy, well educated people don’t fall for that shit.

US have been living on a policy of fuck you, got mine for decades. It’s a political, cultural and economical problem and it wasn’t invented by foreign agents, it’s home made. People are desperate, uneducated and feeling disenfranchised. If you present them an easy answer and act like you hear their problems, they’re gonna love you for it. A president like Trump was just a matter of when, not if. Blaming stupid people and foreigners won’t fix shit.

Also, it’s quite ironic that you have so many spelling mistakes, in a paragraph making fun of people for not being able to spell empathy…

I mean, idk how it is after the musk take over but twitter used to be a legitimate tool for political organizing. Iirc they used it a lot during the Hong Kong protests and it was a driving factor during the Arab spring. Free communication for the masses helps in these situations, especially in an otherwise state controlled media environment.