Benches have been removed for your inconvenience

Can we though? Are you thinking of the shareholders at all?!? Someone's going to have a tough time having only 4 holiday homes to choose from... 😬

Im thinking what happens if the people that are not homeless sue the city for a lack of areas to sit down? Regular people. Tired people. People just waiting. Disabled people. Elderly. Pregnant. Etc

The fact that anyone disagreed with you is a sign of how problematic this country is.

The problem is this only works in areas where the homeless aren't a majority of drug addicts. In North America this is infeasable they will piss and leave syringes everywhere. This just creates avoidable work for the people cleaning out this stuff.

Nice link, too bad it'll probably start 404ing in 2 months :(

Based on the context, I'm assuming you meant condemn, not condone...

We have the solution and it's not very hard. Have social workers maintain these areas. It's really not that expensive, employs people, builds important social vibe and allows you to have your benches.

It's a solved problem.

Bruh, these people will sleep anywhere. The floor of a place with a roof, walls and heating is a fucking dream, even if the places doesn't have benches. This is just borderline hostility towards regular people using public transit.

Hey so you know, "condone" is to allow or accept a practice otherwise considered bad or unacceptable which I think is not what you meant here. It sounds like you want to say something like "condemn anti-houseless architecture/city planning" unless I've misinterpreted your meaning.

In months of being homeless and staying at a shelter I really got into it 3 times. Was almost hit by drivers 30+ times. I can't even figure out how to be legitimately angry at homeless people when, for example, there are cars on the road. Being hit and pushed into the road by a dumb removed on her phone is 100x worse than a screaming match.

I just don't care about "soft" people who have it tough because they need to deal with homeless people occasionally.

Examples: Using crosswalk by bus station when a young woman drives nearly into me, looks up from her phone, no indication of humanity - just staring blankly.

I flipped off / called cops stupid motherfuckers for stopping in the crosswalk forcing me into the main road (I've been nearly hit multiple times walking behind a car in the blind spot.)

I've kicked cars that have cut me off. I'll be using a crosswalk and people who drive seem to be too stupid to make a left and look for people walking. Luckily I never spun myself.

I've dented multiple hoods by slamming my fist into cars / trucks as they fly up the inside and skid into the crosswalk.

I've knocked people's mirrors, although sadly it's hard to break them as they just fold, so you have to really slam them.

This is just traffic. One of the worst things when you're homeless, but it's not the only thing.

It's just so much worse dealing with "normal" people. The system turns us into fucking heartless monsters. A homeless person is much less of a negative force on the world. It's you, it's me who are trash. We're hurting them way more.

Edit: one time I was out early and stepped into the street with a thud. A man across the street gets pissed for stepping on his shoe. Screaming, possibility of a fight... that's what I got from homeless / drug addicts. Much less depressing, degrading, etc. than when you're forced to interact with the homeful.

the local homeless around the library were either very publicly using drugs

Biggest drug dealers in America - the Sackler family - weren't worth our time to punish. So some guy who washed out on Percocets and can only afford Fentanyl shouldn't have a place to sit.

There was definitely a big outcry about how the library was being anti-homeless, but it was nuts because there were people on the other side still complaining about how the library always stinks because they let the homeless people in there.

In America you have two options -

1. pretend homelessness and addiction aren't happening
2. destroy public property in a scorched earth campaign against drug use

The very idea of housing, treatment, and rehabilitation is too socialist to consider.

NIMBY City, USA.

If only they had somewhere to go other than a Library...

One homeless person decides to do drugs in front of the library. I guess we have to remove all the benches and make everything very inconvenient for everyone.

The one person does a thing so we have to take it away rule doesn't apply to people with houses.

"Oh look somebody stabbed somebody to death with a knife. We better take all the knives away from everyone." This would never happen.

What if a homemed person did drugs in the library (which probably happened statistically)? Would you close up the library?

I guess I'm just saying this because you feel like the act was some how moral, I'm telling you it's not. That's okay, real life can be tricky, but don't kid yourself, removing those benches is anti-homeless behavior.

You don't have to take the blame personally for it, just own it. But if you don't admit that you're part of the problem, then that's pretty bad.

You seem to assume that any logic or reason was used in the decision making that led to this action. But I assure you, as soon as racism, classism, or any other form of bigotry enters the process, any reason left jumps out of the window.

Not if we can get some proper sidewalk spikes.

The bare ground is way colder than a bench, since air is a good thermal insulator.

where they won't be bothered

so you're saying we need to employ people to specifically bother them. thanks for your suggestion, and please feel free to use our suggestion box if you have more ideas.

Homeless don't feed the capitalist engine.

Cops be like, "a'ight makes it easier to kick you".

Ah yes, this must be from the great "wear a mask" trend of 2010. I remember those times well.

The benches still aren't there

Yeah, and some people want or need to sit.

Yeah, it's the people who own that train station platform! And that's... oh, the government.

Or anywhere. They have the influence, they can use that and their resources to help create real change.

I have and will continue to walk out mid transaction when I notice particularly egregious shit like that. It's the least I can do. Actively talk into the camera, and make sure they KNOW exactly why I'm walking out. Does it do any good? No, but it makes me feel a bit better.

Yeah, but what about Joe Boomer who is bitter about working a dead end job for 40 years? He can't just sit back and do nothing as other people receive things that he didn't!

He's stuck in a shit mortgage, so that means you need to be too. Otherwise you live under a bridge.

Totally agree... Ignoring the homeless won't make the issue go away.... No one wants to live in the streets especially when you are in a Nordic country.... We see in Montreal cases of poor souls who froze to death ... It is really tragic when it happens...

Why not just turn one of the unused states in the middle into a giant homeless colony?

For the price of bread, water and heroin, you'll never be bothered by them again.

It is, it even mentions disabled people in the post, but an ADA violation isn't the magic bullet people think it is, someone still has to be able to take on whatever organisation has made the violation, and their lawyers, and win, before anything changes.

I hope you're not either of those things...

I would let anyone extend the bench but if the systems detects the user doesn't have a valid subscription it folds back into the wall compressing the person into a chunky soup.

I would name these benches after our favorite economic model - the meat grinder.

I would hack that system and provide cards to homeless people that give them free access to all benches in the city.

Boom, problem solved. With capitalism!

Won't someone think of the {real-estate values}

We do have homeless shelters, tons of them, but still not enough. Would be nice if we fixed the problems that create homelessness so we wouldn't need so many shelters. It's a complex problem I won't pretend to know how to fix, but there's always an oversupply of people who do (pretend to know).

Homeless folks, in the sense of literally being on the street, often have either addiction or mental health issues here in the states. As our treatment for addiction is 'jail' and for mental health issues is 'deal with it', they are generally not overflowing with options.

The Deserter: The mask of humanity fall from capital. It has to take it off to kill everyone — everything you love; all the hope and tenderness in the world. It has to take it off, just for one second. To do the deed. And then you see it. As it strangles and beats your friends to death... the sweetest, most courageous people in the world... (he's silent for a second) You see the fear and power in its eyes. Then you know.