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Comment by chrisseaton | Hacker News Reader

> and the problems are massively overblown

For all the places I have worked in and visited through my life, including poor countries in Africa, Europe, Russia, and places as extreme as Afghanistan, the only place I have ever seen someone openly defecate in the street is San Francisco. And I've seen it many times in San Francisco.

It's not overblown. Your reference points have been distorted. It's not normal. People don't do that in other cities.

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...This actually happens in the downtown of literally every major metro in the US because the US is terrible at dealing with the underlying issues that lead to this sort of thing as a whole.

Just because you haven't exposed yourself to it nor seen about it in disgusting sensationalist shitshow that is media in the US doesn't mean it isn't happening.

Is there some CDC or HHS data on public defecation?

e: remove false info

The incident in your link occurred in Canada, not San Francisco.

I could have sworn when I first heard about it, it was a SF thing. My bad.

I’ve seen it in Vietnam, India, and heard about seeing it in Brazil from friends. I’m sure it’s more common than you think, we just have a very embolden and large homeless population with not enough public toilets and way too many substance abuse / mental health issues.

I was born and raised in Brazil where I lived until 25 in a major city with no shortage of poverty and inequality. I have never seen or heard reports of people defecating on the street. Though at least in the northeast it’s common for men to urinate.

I had a friend living in Rio, who told me of a woman who did this before getting into her car. Now I’m not saying it’s common, but it isn’t like SF is the only place in the world where it’s happening.

For whatever it’s worth, I’m from San Francisco and I’ve never seen anyone do this either. But clearly it happens.

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