There are two kinds of people when it comes to homelessness: those are urge compassion for the unhoused, and those who demand crackdowns on encampments.
Count me among the latter.
The debate was recently rekindled when Fremont passed the most sweeping anti-encampment law in the Bay Area. The new ordinance “Prohibits camping on any public property, and restricts camping on private property not designated and equipped for such camping.” It also “Prohibits the storing of personal property on any public property.” Were these prohibitions to apply in Oakland, we’d see an immediate end to most encampments, including those in our public parks as well as (for instance) the couple who have made my local bus stop their permanent home.
But some people don’t like Fremont’s ordinance. A letter writer to the Chronicle calls it “senseless, cruel and dangerous…Politicians,” she adds, “are more concerned with public posturing than actually doing something to help the most vulnerable…”.
To accuse Fremont’s government of “public posturing” is a lie. What the city has actually done is to respond to the cries of the public to clean up their streets and enforce the law. When a politician does that, it’s not “posturing,” it’s responding to the will of the people, which is what politicians are elected to do. Indeed, “posturing” is exactly how Oakland’s politicians have reacted to encampments: by ignoring the law, giving the public the middle finger, and allowing, if not encouraging, these encampments to proliferate across the city.
Public anger at encampments is fueled by the widespread feeling that most homeless people are not victims of high housing costs or a racist capitalist economy. I believe that most unhoused folks have made terrible personal decisions and are paying the price of their actions. No one can say that we, the public, haven’t been warned about drug addiction, or about dropping out of school, or about rejecting the norms of a civilized society. Don’t we all perceive the road to perdition that becoming an outcast leads to? Isn’t this why we do our best to steer our children toward stable, productive lives? Because we know the outcome of a life that deliberately rebukes normalcy: you end up sleeping in a park and scavenging through garbage cans and breaking into cars.
I’ve lived in downtown/uptown Oakland for close to forty years and have watched thousands of homeless people. I think after all this time I’m entitled to come to some conclusions about them. And I have. These are, for the most part, selfish, narcissistic individuals who disdain laws for our common good and feel they have the right to degrade our neighborhoods. They believe they can get away with flouting our norms and standards because idiot politicians like Libby Schaaf, Carroll Fife and Sheng Thao assured them that they’re our “brothers and sisters” and that Oakland would welcome and protect them. It was like inviting the Visigoths to sack Rome. They came, they did indeed sack our city, and they’re still preying upon us. Even though Oakland government has begun making feeble efforts to clear some encampments, these are just symbolic motions. Everybody knows Oakland isn’t serious about clearing encampments. If it were, there would be no more encampments.
So this whole “compassion” argument is a red herring. The people needing compassion are the normal, contributing citizens of Oakland: taxpayers, seniors, law-abiding residents, small business owners, you, me and people like us, who are the foundation stones for an abiding civilization. As for the homeless, or 99% of them, let them leave Oakland. We don’t want them here, unless they shape up and get with the program. If they wish to change, and are serious about getting rehabilitated, we’ll help them. If not—well, here’s a bus ticket out of town.
Steve Heimoff