It's not actually homelessness people have a problem with, it's drug addiction.
Then surely those same people are working to destigmatize it and provide help right?
Right?
Honestly some of these comments really dont fit to the solar punk ideals and should get removed.
Especially because land squatting, building low tech communes and working together on problems is what happens in many of those camps and thats just so solar punk to me.
I don't really think injecting fentanyl in a tent on the sidewalk should be classed as 'building a low tech commune'
Nope nope nope nope nope. How do you know what communities and organizations the people in the tents belong to? Or how they've organized their network of tents and mutual aid, what relationships they have with nearby homeowners and business owners, how they gather and share resources and make decisions?
Squatters and the unhoused routinely, out of necessity, form partnerships and communities with other unhoused and insufficiently housed people. We'd call those communities "communes" if they were made of rich white people owning homes. And yeah, people in those communities use drugs just like people who own houses do.
Thinking more deeply about it, I think you've identified by example one of the many ways neoliberal ideology encourages discrimination against unhoused people. Neoliberalism teaches us that every unhoused person is an individual whose individual choices are to blame for his low social and economic status. So we assume unhoused people are alone, that they don't belong to communities, that they have no family or social support, that they don't have a network of mutual aid - even though, when someone is unhoused, having networks of mutual aid are even more important than they are for people with secure housing. And that lets us dismiss the unhoused as people without social connections who only care about their personal self interest.
But no, that dude in the tent shooting up fent probably is part of a commune. He meets with other unhoused people to pool money and buy food or take advantage of free meals at the local gurdwara or use a gym membership to take a shower. He advises newly homeless people, he seeks advice from elders in the community, he hangs out outside his tent or at a local meeting spot and chats with other community members. He's part of a network of mutual aid that shares intellectual and social and financial resources to help each other in their disadvantaged circumstances. And if he's not in a network of mutual aid which fits the definition of a commune, it's not because he can't be, but because he chooses not to be.
Unhoused people are not animals. They are humans. That means they communicate with other humans. And that means the unhoused form the same networks of politics and society and economics and mutual aid as everyone else.
I'm so sick of people talking about needles whenever homeless people come up. It's slander, plain and simple.
I used to live in Seattle directly next door to a homeless encampment. I used to walk by it every single day for 2 years. I have never ONCE seen a needle on the ground, day or night. You know what I did see a bunch of? People claiming that there were needles everywhere, without a shred of evidence.
Uhhh...great? I'm happy you had a good experience? But the data and programs over the last few years disagree with your assertion here.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/more-than-32000-syringes-collected-in-pilot-needle-program/ (note why it was started)
https://mynorthwest.com/2361336/seattle-ramps-up-efforts-clean-litter-needles-graffiti/
Are all homeless folks users that leave needles lying around? Statistically, no, of course not. Is it a likely correlation? The data is above for you to draw your own conclusions.
The people by you might not be IV drug users and the people leaving needles around aren't necessarily homeless. Almost all of the opiate addicts I know are or were housed but the IV users would still use in public.
Those needles found in camps could belong to housed people who used near the camp or in the camp and do not live there.
Also worth mentioning unhoused people are not necessarily drug users. I know a lot of sober Iraq vets on the streets of NYC.
Public spaces typically have intended uses. When those spaces aren't used for what they are intended, something needs to change. When the homeless set up 1000 survival spaces in a public park... the rest of us should suffer because of their bad decisions/luck? Use your energy to make a difference instead of an ineffectual post. Vote in better policy makers.
I agree, but is it a meme?
Yes, memes are viral thoughts, often utilizing fun to spread, but not necessarily so.
It baffles me that anybody today would say memes aren't or shouldn't be political. I think politics and ideology are the primary reason people create and share memes today. The funny animal cheeseburger phase of meme culture is long over. As witness Reddit meming Trump into office and all the racist conservative memes your boomer relatives share.
solarpunk memes
For when you need a laugh!
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