Any data to back this up? Can't really go on anecdotal stories or EMS accounts (who only see emergency situations by design).
911, in my area, is used for a lot more than "emergencies" unfortunately... we are the ultimate real-time problem solvers. "Man down" & "sick person" calls are generally not emergencies and they tend to be our regulars, which are generally homeless.
monkmartinez has made higher-quality contributions to this conversation than we could ever hope to see in so controversial a thread. Because of that, what would normally have been a trainwreck discussion has, astonishingly, been pretty good. Let's not disparage that as "anecodotal".
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11126175 and marked it off-topic.
If there are 25,000 homeless and an EMT sees 1000 homeless people in a year (which I'd say I'm probably vastly over estimating) in situations where they are in greatest need, then all you have is a limited anecdotal view of a small proportion of the total population of homeless people at the lowest and least dignified point in their lives.
It doesn't tell you how they got to be in that situation.
It doesn't show you their day to day grind.
It doesn't indicate if they always want to be homeless, or you've just seen them when they are feeling defensive or aren't in full control of their faculties.
In short, it just shows you that because of the nature of being an EMT, he sees people in dire situations, on occasions that would frustrate anyone viewing the homeless person because of any number of high stress factors, including mental illness but also malnutrition, poor sleep or severe discomfort.
Let's look again: in my experience, most of the homeless are not looking for help to find jobs
And again: in my experience
In case you missed it: IN MY EXPERIENCE
He then goes on to explain his experience! It's called an anecdote. It doesn't mean it's generalizable. It means it's a data point, like saying a cheeseburger is "good." I don't preface every subjective, anecdotal statement with, "In my personal experience, but without citation or empirical data to back it up." He said all he needed, to where if you're asking for citation, you either lack reading comprehension skills or are just being a dick.
Posting "you're full of shit" or "citation needed" is lazy and rude. You don't want to speak up with something more sensible? Fine. That's why those little arrows next to the comment exist. Don't post rude garbage instead.
It's not rude to question assumptions or to ask where someone gets their data from.
The voting system is good on HN, but it's limited. If you post something controversial, but possibly accurate, then if only people who don't like what you say vote you down, then it just shows that people don't like what you say. If you write something popular but kind of dodgy, then you'll get voted up significantly - and given nobody but yourself can see your score then your comment just shows in normal font weight. Those who vote it down can get it to a score of 1, and nobody will be any the wiser.
So the vote mechanism is very good here, and very effective, but it doesn't necessarily improve discourse. Nor does it force people to justify their views. Nor does it help progress understanding.
I've often been asked to provide a source for my views. I'm always happy to do so. Heck, there have even been a few times it has forced me to concede that my view wasn't well thought out. If anything, bring politely questioned helped me more than it did the questioner. Other times there has been the pleasant and surprising occassion where the questioner thanked me for my sources and agreed that I was probably correct.
That's hardly "rude garbage".
It is absolutely rude to demand proof in a conversation. And this is a forum for having conversations.
A conversation isn't a research project or the pursuit of absolute truth. It's merely a social convention to find out what others are thinking and feeling.
To go around telling people they're liars or to ask them to prove that they're not liars is rude beyond belief in such a setting.
If you feel so passionate about the issue, do your own research and provide your own citations against. Nothing wrong with that. But demand that the person who said something you don't like should do it for you? Rude.
Nobody is calling that person a liar. Asking someone for evidence does not necessarily mean they consider that person a liar. They may believe they are mistaken. They may be interested in understanding how they came to their conclusions. They may want to understand why someone's world view is so different to their own.
You should ask yourself why you consider asking for evidence on a discussion forum rude. It sounds like you feel it's overly confrontational. If that's the case, then you might want to consider your own confrontation (ala "If you feel so passionate about the issue, do your own research and provide your own citations against. Nothing wrong with that. But demand that the person who said something you don't like should do it for you? Rude.")
I already answered this question, multiple times. It has nothing to do with being confrontational.
It has to do with being RUDE.
Rude: discourteous or impolite, especially in a deliberate way [1]
[1] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/rude
Nobody owes you ANY citations. You are being LAZY by demanding them. That LAZINESS is RUDE. If you disagree with someone, get off your lazy ass, go on Google, find evidence to the contrary and share. If you're too lazy to do that, then STFU instead of posting "citation needed". That doesn't add to the discussion. It's nothing more than an expression of displeasure with absolutely no effort to enhance the conversation.
One day I had an epiphany. I realised that you can't just argue with these people, you need to have a reverse citation system - you need to clearly mark out information that is dubious, ill-informed, the result of ingrained prejudice (often unconsciously so) and almost always inaccurate.
At the same time, there needed to be a way of allowing controversial views and sometimes accurate but controversial facts be detailed on the encyclopaedia.
There was only one way I could see to do it - use the same citation system that referenced sources but invert it to highlight information that needed a source. Hence I created citation needed (originally without the square brackets, whoever added them was a genius in their own right).
Guess what? It worked. 11 years later, despite the many issues on Wikipedia, finding out the source of assumptions is no longer a problem. People can go to the citations and see where the factoid is documented, or whose opinion is being expressed. It allows ordinary people to judge the view being expressed more accurately, or to look at how the data was extrapolated, to understand how the academic study was conducted, or to verify that what is claimed is actually what the original claimant was indeed claiming.
On Wikipedia, there was no way of allowing people to say that you are full of shit without destroying the project. Yet people needed a mechanism to dispute what was written. Talk pages weren't enough - bad actors could keep conversations going indefinitely without really bring challenged, whilst most readers wouldn't see the controversy of their contributions. By marking up text with [citation needed] it allowed people to think "hang on, this is disputed, where did they get this idea/information from?".
If my one contribution to society all those years ago was to have helped people improve their critical faculties and question the information given to them, then I'm satisfied I've made a positive impact on society. I certainly didn't expect it to take off like it did. I'm also not arrogant enough to think I started this questioning, merely helped start a meme that was actually useful.
If Hacker News now has its own culture of asking "where did you get that information from?" then it's a [citation needed]. You should applaud it. You should cherish that people have found a way of politely questioning the views of others and make them justify what they say without resort to personal abuse. You should be happy that people are using their critical faculties when they question implicit assumptions and claims.
You say it casts doubts on the truthfulness or provenance of the original poster's claims. Good! If the claims are of good provenance, then the poster can show that provenance. If the original poster is being truthful, then they can prove it by showing their sources.
[Citation needed]
Chris Sherlock was Ta bu shi da yu. Dozens of people can confirm that, I was at the first Australian meet up. I met David Gerard and co in London. Even Jimmy Wales can confirm it.
I'm simply embarrassed by my techie cohorts, who think they just KNOW why homeless people are homeless. The bottomline is that there are far more qualified people (homeless activists/workers) who have told me otherwise and the average HN'er will have to provide data to convince me otherwise.