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My parents wouldn’t even have the fucking space to let me stay.
And then we have people like musk, who grew up with a golden spoon and view those on social security as parasites.
He doesnt see them as parasites. He sees them as people who cant stop him from stealing from/exploting them.
Liberals are also to blame for gaslighting and selling workers out to the capital class for 50+ years. The last Democrat President that actually fought for the proletariat was FDR with his New Deal programs.
Yes, liberals were less evil than Republicans, but when Obama tried to give us universal healthcare they stabbed him in the back and when Bernie set multiple grassroot funding records, they conspired against him and stabbed the entire nation in the back. So if we factor in the opportunities for real leftist leadership that liberals stole from us than that opportunity cost is nearly as damaging as what Republicans are doing.
nearly as damaging
really? More BS false equivalence. The liberals where never in control enough to make any of that happen. They may not be perfect by any means but to say they’re “nearly as damaging” as the right is just ridiculous.
Convenient that when the GOP has a razor thin edge they get everything they want with almost no issue, but when DNC has a super majority they can barely get watered down health insurance reform.
It’s a lot easier to get things done when you get to cheat while the other side has to play by the rules.
That’s the difference between ethical governing and the unethical abuse of power.
If you want liberals to “get everything they want”, and ignore democracy, they’d have to do it unethically.
Wouldn’t it be better if everyone played by the rules, and governed like they are actually working in the best interests of voters?
Then let’s apply the same reasoning we did in November. Some unethical abuse of power is going to happen. Wouldn’t you rather it be less?
The real problem is most of the DNC don’t want the things they say they do to get elected. They get the same conservative money the GOP does to be sure those things don’t happen.
In the past the Democrats did good things for regular people.
Today’s Democrat party is incapable of doing good things for regular people. Literally no better than Republicans these days tho.
There’s no false equivalence in comparing two arms of the same Duopoly.
Literally no better than Republicans?
You’re either a troll or completely brainrotted
So when do the Dems step up and do something to fight back instead of shrugging while voting for fascism?
All Dems are voting for fascism?
The votes wouldn’t be passing if they didn’t vote for it.
Yea… dems aren’t great and I’d love to see a new party. But, I do not understand people saying “the party that is bad at governing is basically as bad as the party taking over the nation through brute force.” Insane logic.
My mom died when I was 20 and the old man sold the house and took off with anything of value while I was just out of electrical engineering and there was a big economic downturn in the early 90s … I crashed on people’s couches in crack house neighborhoods and sometimes slept under bridges or highway overpasses… Had no car - no job and lucked into a job at Sears selling PC’s back when windows 3.11 was king. I earned enough to buy a bike and bike my way to work from wherever I was crashing and bought a damned pink barbie backpack from a tag sale for 2 bucks so I could bring my suit jacket and tie required in those days and I took a damned ribbing until I could get a better situation. People that have a fallback are lucky as hell and should consider themselves so.
I’ve been homeless twice. Thankfully I had a car and I could live out of it temporarily while I found some family to save my ass while I got back on my feet.
If I hadn’t had family keep me from rock bottom it’s hard to say if I would have pulled out of those situations on my own.
Unfortunately for many people they have little to no empathy for homeless because they have been lied to or attacked by homeless and they then view all homeless that way.
I remember once in my teens I skateboarded over to a sandwich place to get lunch for myself and my brother. On the way there I passed a homeless guy with a sign asking for “anything”. I decided to get him a sandwich while I was there. Just a basic turkey sandwich or something as plain as I could think of. When I tried to give him the sandwich he threw it back at me and told me I should have just given him the money so he could get drunk.
That experience really tainted my view of the homeless from that day onwards. Then later in life I would have two different girlfriends get grabbed by homeless people over the years.
I have a buddy that lived downtown and the homeless people there were always breaking their windows and stealing their stuff. One of them set fire to the side of their house out of boredom. When the police came they just escorted him to the street and then left. He didn’t get tried for arson or anything. The cops don’t care. They have no system in place to deal with those people.
Its easy for people to have empathy for a group that they have never interacted with. Anyone who lives near homeless or regularly interacts with homeless people will tell you that not all of them are good people who just got abandoned by society. Some of them are evil bad people who have refused help or just don’t want it. Most of them need mental support.
It’s a very complicated issue and I dont think it has any easy or cheap solutions.
Same here on a few bad experiences trying to help
- a guy asked for money to get a meal combo from McDonalds. I bought him the meal combo, so he keyed my car for not giving him cash
- I suppose I can see this being taken the wrong way, but I tried emptying my pockets a few times, only for them to throw the counts on the ground. After that I started noticing homeless with coins on the ground around them
Realistically, it doesn’t matter anymore since I almost never have cash. They seem to know that world has gone too, as I’m rarely solicited anymore
Yeah I haven’t carried any cash for years and most of the time I offer to buy them food they decline. Once in awhile they take me up on the offer and are thankful but I am still always a little worried they are gonna throw it in my face after that experience I had as a kid.
It’s a shit situation all around.
For real. And I don’t. I always feel humbled when I see a homeless person because I’m just a hop and a skip away from being in their predicament. All it would take is an unfortunate event or two.
Yep, anyone can be homeless.
If you sell your house and are between houses now, technically you are homeless but you’re privileged you can live in a hotel or rent a storage unit and couch surf or if you have a friend or family member to stay with. If you have a job, you can still afford shelter and not lose everything. This was my family when my brother was a baby and we just stay with a friend for 2 months until we moved into our new house. Both of my parents had jobs. We were privileged.
If you’re evicted because you lost your job or got sick so you were unable to afford to pay your rent. Not all landlords give you a grace period to get behind in rent when something out of your control happened. These people also lose everything if they had no friends or family to help out. If they live paycheck to paycheck, they couldn’t save money. Many Americans are one paycheck away from homelessness. It just means if they get sick or get into an accident or lose their job, they’re screwed.
Point taken… also ouch…
The reality if you’re working class in America; we’re all one really bad day and a few less people caring about us from being homeless.
fuck.
One in four foster kids will end up homeless.
https://nfyi.org/issues/homelessness/
up to 3 out of 10 homeless people are foster kids who aged out.
what the fuck.
I thought it was bad enough knowing about the veteran rights.
some of the studies show higher rates.
The studies. on the homeless children.
Also black families are over-policed, and their kids more likely to be put into foster care “National estimates suggest that 53% of Black children will experience CPS contact by age 18, as compared to 28% of White children” “We consider that, at their root, these inequities are the consequence of systemic racism: there is no inherent relationship between race and child maltreatment. Rather, race is a proxy for the societal and institutional privileges and oppressions people experience because of their membership in a racialized group” https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9325927/
Movement for Family Power is a great advocacy organization if you want to get involved https://www.movementforfamilypower.org/
Also impacts Native Americans. ICWA was put in place to basically stop DHS from kidnapping native kids. (The Right has been waging a war against ICWA for a while too - they tend to be against any form of oversight in child welfare/adoption. They want kids to go to “quiverful” white families)
“National estimates suggest that 53% of Black children will experience CPS contact by age 18, as compared to 28% of White children”
Holy shit both of those are so high, and the the difference is also crazy
To be fair the word contact is kinda sus. I had CPS “contact” when I broke my arm in kindergarten.
I was pushed off the play ground by another kid while at school. My parents were both at work. I had a lot of bruises they also didn’t like. I remember getting questioned about it at the hospital for what felt like forever. They kept pointing out scrapes and bruises and asking how that happened. I had no clue and kept saying from playing.
That sounds like the bare minimum to qualify as contact.
If you want more statistical horror, look up foster care to prison pipeline
So when conservatives want to ban abortions they are basically trying to increase the flow in this pipeline to get more prison slave labor
Yep, people are only a commodity to be manipulated by the capitalist systems
10000% yes. The easiest people to manipulate are the desperate and manipulators love dangling carrots.
What’s worse is that this is easily recognizable but nothing will ever be done about the nutjobs who enjoy watching others suffer at their hand.
There is no reason to believe we don’t live in hell
But “poors” “ruin” “great American cities”
Make me a billionaire. Say now I’m a super selfish billionaire. I’m OK with having to ride my limo through SF, routing around the Tenderloin, to rub shoulders with those Silicon Valley MAGAs at their fundraisers? Why don’t my buddies and I stop the madness, call it Euthanize The Poors if we have to, but with crime down security costs go down too and any reproductively-derived assets (children) must be safer…
Gated communities are cool but sightseeing is part of life. I’m a selfish billionaire but I can’t visit Honduras safely b/c I haven’t fixed global poverty, now I never get to see it. My yacht is good enough for me I guess fine
Multiple angles really.
Biggest one is that a child is both a financial and mental stress on a parent, and our society overwhelming believes that children are primarily the responsibility of the mother. By attacking abortion, they basically saying that every woman is just one sexual assault away from a lifetime of financial, emotional, mental and social duress.
The second reason is class stratification. The financial stresses impact less wealthy families or individuals disproportionately, and less wealthy people cannot afford to travel to areas where reproductive care is legal, nor can they afford the lawyers required to fight the potential criminal cases or just pay their fines. The rich conservatives bankrolling these anti-abortion groups aren’t threatened or beholden to the policy they create.
The third reason is racism. Black women are more likely to seek abortions, partly because they suffer a higher incidence of sexual assault, but also because they have less access to reproductive resources and education. Republicans have dog whistled this in the past by trying to say that abortions are racist because black women have a disporportionate number of abortions, even going so far as to call it a Democrat genocide on African-Americans. This dog whistle shows their true intentions; force financial, mental, and social stress in ways that are “equal” along racial lines, but not “equitable”.
You could say that religion is a 4th reason, but I don’t consider it a real reason, and they cherry-pick their religious convictions anyway. You see those motherfuckers eating shellfish and wearing blended fibers all the time.
Not trying to defend their position but young kids given up for adoption at or near birth are overwhelmingly adopted. There are lines and a whole grey market.
It’s kids with shitty parents that get removed after the toddler phase that tend to end up in the system long term.
💯
While this is accurate, most people have a better chance of actually understanding it when you use the full quote.
We live in a world where people have to be convinced to care for and sympathize with those around them.
Empathy is a skill.
That’s a great point. Wish more people would practice it.
I’ve lost most of my sympathy for the homeless after having to deal with their literal shit on a too often basis.
I do understand this. Being grabbed by a woman who repeatedly yells that she wants money, or the guy who says he just wants some money to eat, so you give him some spare change and then that act in itself invites him to single you out of a crowd every single time until you learn to just not walk that route anymore.
My sympathy for them is there, but it definitely needs a grace period to recharge. I wish the world housed and fed people better so that their endless suffering didn’t spill out and overwhelm my limited capacity for it. I know how selfish that sounds.
Our increasingly cashless soceity is not doing them any favours. I wish I could easily just give a cent here and there wirelessly as I’m walking down the streett
I actually worked in public health.
There was one homeless person in particular. Nancy S had mental health issues, alcoholism, and seizures. She was a ‘frequent flier’ who came to the Emergency Room at least once a week, and sometimes more than once in a day. Conservatively, she cost the taxpayers $10 million. The time she jumped in the river and had police, EMS, and fire respond cost at least $100,000.
It would have been cheaper to give her a house and 24 hour aides, but that would have been ‘gaming the system.’
Tinstaafl, we’re not here to give handouts to lazy bums!
I agree with you. Social programs that provide a safety net for people save more money than they cost. Pretty much any government spending that helps elevate people brings in more tax revenue than it costs. I don’t know why some people can’t see that.
Tanstaafl. There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. That the phrase comes from the novel “The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress” by Robert Heinlein. Heinlein’s depiction of Luna is interesting, but he loads the dice in favor of a Libertarian society. Prison gangs were a thing when he wrote the book, which is something he brushes past. It is a very fun read, but a lot of people take it way too seriously.
I read some Heinlein but it was just OK, seemed pretty dated ideologically. Didn’t read that one.
Some people are unable to see the programs beyond “paying for it”, and so they think it’s like an exclusive club where you shouldn’t get access if you have no money. It’s only logical until you ask why we even have a government in the first place and see that the most ruthless governments are also the most exclusive ones
Step 1: Every public business is allowed to keep people from using their bathrooms
Step 2: People don’t like the homeless because they shit on the street
There’s a solution in here somewhere.
The solution is to provide housing, and whatever else help they need.
but then people who struggled to own a home would throw a fit about it, without connecting the dots on how they too were screwed over. They should receive help too.
Tax the rich, and there will be more than plenty resources to do this.
Its called a porta potty… You want one of those in your neighborhood, prick.
No… They have a permanent bathroom that self cleans… That can be installed on the street…
I used to live in a country that had these. They were great.
Only place I’ve ever seen them in the USA is in San Francisco
oh no, on top of not owning anything they have the audacity to shit too?
Imagine how we feel dealing with yours.
…at least their shit washes away with the rain.
I’ve been a homeless teen, thankfully it was over a decade now though.
Shit sucked. I get angry when I hear people make excuses about how homeless people are just lazy or trying to rip you off somehow. Like stfu you have no idea what it’s like!
That happens. I dated someone who worked in a group home for foster kids and they try to set a kid up with some place to live, like an AFC home after they turn 18, but sometimes they don’t have any options and get dropped off at a homeless shelter.
This right here is my biggest fear for my daughter.
She’s lazy. She’s unfocused. She’s isolated.
She is one of the greatest artists I have ever encountered in my life. Bad shit seems to come with that. I am afraid that the world will never know it because she isolates almost completely.
Her mother died from breast cancer when she was 13. I have been so unkind to my body and I’m afraid I won’t be here long enough to help her the way she might end up needing it.
She has her step dad who has remained a big part of her life since her mom passed away. He’s a great man and she and her mother were very lucky that he’s the one she found. She can’t get along with any of her mom’s family. I believe that my wife would always look out for her, but I wish they’d get closer. Her mom made that hard by saying only days before she died, “If you replace me with that woman I will spend eternity rolling in my grave.”
I have survived in this world because of my mother and my uncle. Without them I would have been homeless over and over again. I wish she would get closer with her mom’s family. I can’t make her stay with them though. Her aunt takes her to school if she misses the bus, so maybe she’ll look out for her.
It keeps me awake at night more than anything else.
Has ADHD ever been ruled out? Cause being treated, this immensely increases the chances of a healthy and successfull adulthood…
We’ve been trying to get a diagnosis for a few years. Everyone seems to agree she has it, but they’re scared to medicate her because of my issues with addiction I guess.
We’re pushing the issue next week actually.
A someone who became middle aged with it (ADHD), not knowing what it really was or how it was affecting me, it is worth the effort.
They didn’t really prepare me for how much being medicated would change my life. Not that it cures everything, but I had to deal with a profound sense of loss for a few weeks after getting setup.
I found it really hard when I started to remember all of the missed opportunities and experiences that this condition had taken from me over the years. If ADHD is the cause or a factor, she will thank you later.
I wish my parents had got me help. The poor things couldn’t help themselves though.
I waited too late with my daughter really, but we had a lot going on for a long time. Her mom lost her mind and totally threw everything in the wind and then got diagnosed with cancer and suffered horribly before dying.
I’m hoping I can get her turned around now.
My doctor won’t treat me (I definitely have adhd)because I’ve been on suboxone for a decade and they’re afraid I’ll abuse it I guess. I could go somewhere else but starting over on this is a nightmare. He says if I tested positive he’d have to put me in rehab.
When I began I had to dose in front of a doctor every morning. That went on for several months, then I went once a week. That went on for several more months, then once every two. Several more months of that and finally once a month.
On top of that, I had to go to group three times a week and one group with an actual psychologist once a month.
I’d love to be able to use my brain. It has taken me over an hour to type this comment haha. I keep forgetting and then coming back by accident when I look at my phone.
I’m sorry you are going through that.
I didn’t think the meds for adhd were addictive to people who have it?
My limited understanding is that whereas they would make a non-divergent person “high”, they make me more calm, collected and able to sort my thoughts. Just like Caffine and sugar often makes me sleepy. It’s kinda opposite.
My Dr. Told me that if I had ADHD, I would know pretty quickly when I took my first, very small, dose because if I didn’t have the condition, I would feel like I suddenly had too much energy, or like my body was vibrating.
The only thing I noticed first was that I could recall what I had to do later that day, which would not be the case otherwise.
In addition to the appalling foster care kid stats for homeless, around 13% of homeless are veterans (obviously some qualify as both). Funny how support for the military dries up once they get discharged.
Then we have the complete lack of any kind of assistance for the mentally ill.
We shouldn’t even pretend that we are civilized. We treat our fellow humans so barbarically.
