Re:In effect, Seattle is decriminalizing the use of hard drugs
by jyrkesh on Friday August 23, 2019 @03:24PM
(#20781558)
You know, I actually paused after those words because I was afraid of a response like this, but I didn't rephrase because I just figured "they'll get what I mean".
In the context of my response, I really just meant it as shorthand for "not doing any of the negative stuff that Seattleites deal with on an everyday basis". Lots of homeless people are already doing that--namely, not putting the general public at risk with violence or needles sitting around--but many of the ones visible to us are making the city worse off.
So again, my OP should really be reframed as: "if you take a dangerous drug addict and put them in a house, they're still a dangerous drug addict".
And I do implicitly mean there that if you take a non-dangerous, knocked-off-their-feet homeless person and put them in a house, you now have a housed person, and that's a very positive thing :)
Re:In effect, Seattle is decriminalizing the use of hard drugs
by vehementi on Friday August 23, 2019 @04:24PM
(#20782202)
Yes, nobody says that just putting people into housing will magically fix them. That's why there's 30 other things on the list. Someone in housing is more likely to begin on their road to recovery than someone who has to live on the streets and have their stuff stolen all the time.
Furthermore, we cannot dehumanize our fellow humans even if they use drugs. The result of such framing is vicious savagery as is seen in America, the Philippines, and other places around the world.