You apparently don’t know the meaning of ad hominem. Look it up, it’s not a synonym of “insult”.

So we're just insulting these people?

Correct. If you wanted a phrasing that makes more of a statement you could suggest we are dehumanizing them.

Fair enough, I was trying to be charitable to OP but I agree, it's just a plain insult and I myself use have used this argument when insulting people ;)

look at paul grahams essay about "ways to disagree". name calling is even lower than ad hominem

Openly defecating on the streets may open you up to being called trash. Who knew!

Sometimes it can be helpful to think about why people are doing this, put yourself in their shoes. Many times homeless people are forbidden from using bathrooms in businesses, and often cities do not provide outhouses or enough public restrooms for the amount of homeless the city has. I promise you many of these people using the street as a restroom would prefer an actual toilet. I wouldn't jump to calling someone trash because they don't have access to the basic amenities that others do.

Sometimes it can be helpful to not try to treat the systemic issue and just treat the immediate issue.

For example, it’s not possible for me to solve the systemic issue of drugs and mental health in order to stop public defecating. It is possible for me to arrest the person for pooping in the street.

I think we should do both at the same time. But we certainly shouldn’t arrest people for pooping because they have a systemic issue invisible handsing them toward public pooping.

People can be trash for different reasons. And if a systemic issue makes someone do trashy behavior, then they are still trashy.

It seems to be missing the point to point out lack of empathy for arresting poopers.

Calling someone "trash" is not helpful to the discussion. It dehumanizes them, and dehumanization is the first step down the road that historically has often lead to atrocities. We're talking about real people, not trash. People who are down on their luck, or homeless, or struggling with mental health or addiction. Even if they're out there assaulting people, they are humans that require fair justice, not "trash" that requires disposal.

The least they could do, I mean the absolute least is find a storm drain to shit down or a bush to shit behind. Anything is better than deliberately shitting in the middle of the sidewalk to fuck with as many people as possible. Make no mistake, the people who do this have antisocial intent.

YES.

The societal dysfunctions are because tech ppl, the ones who ask the laypeople of the world to allow them to fix all their problems, have built a literal dystopia of social problems in the place where they have the most actual wealth and power to build something else. There is no greater argument for the myopia of VC-tainted tech solutionism than SF itself.

SF was a liberal mecca way before anyone knew what a "VC" was. What that means and the consequences is what's changed, not the political demographic.

Maybe someone needs to pitch an Uber for ordering someone to beat criminals up

I built this. Try it by calling 911. Monero address in my profile.

I think you mean corporal punishment.

In what way does using harsh language to describe harsh people cause DAs to not enforce crimes? How does one thing directly cause the other?

I did, thanks for the catch; in my mind I said corporal but my hands and eyes apparently disagreed.

"Harsh language" isn't the problem, it's the framing and lack of empathy for these people.

* * *

Do you live in the bay? Portions of SF have always been sketchy, but I am enjoying this "liberal dystopia" quite well.

15 years in and no one in my family has been a victim to any crime.

I currently live in Sacramento. It's undeniable that the bay has gotten much worse even if it was "already bad" decades ago. I actually had a nice week in the bay two weeks ago, but I was in a rental in a nice neighborhood. And don't get me wrong; I've walked through SoMa at night even recently and while it was pretty sketchy I didn't feel unsafe. That doesn't mean I couldn't have gotten mugged.

> > > Since I moved here, I have sen people break into cars (numerous times), fill suitcases with products from Target and Walgreens and leave without paying, casually smoke meth in a crowded bus, empty their bladder and bowels in the middle of the sidewalk, etc. all of this brazenly and in broad daylight.

> 15 years in and no one in my family has been a victim to any crime.

The reason provided above is as anecdotal as the one provided by GGP, and cannot be solely used to build any arguments/conclusions from.

There's also an axiomatic conflict between this & GP: The general neighborhoods that glerk and random314 live in may not be the same neighborhoods, resulting in the conflicting self-reports written above. It is possible that random314 lives in one of the nicer neighborhoods that glerk mentions offhandedly, and unless shown otherwise, has not been to FiDi or SOMA:

> > > I think a lot of people live in their nice neighborhood bubble and have never stepped foot in FiDi or SOMA.

I live in south bay, the original silicon valley. The bay area is home to 7M+ population, it isn't just tenderloin.

I'll have you know, my ivory tower is devoid of any riffraff!

Boiling frog

Just went to SF for the first time in 5 years. So much worse. Wasn’t great in 18, but back then I walked across Golden Gate Park alone during the day and it was beautiful. I cannot imagine now. Market st is hell.

GGP is more visited than ever, and a lovely hang out place with people playing the piano outdoors, tons of families and food trucks on the weekends.