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Comment by junon | Hacker News Reader

There's human feces everywhere outside the tourist/financial districts, and the entirety of the inner city (Tenderloin) is disintegrated and full of poverty, homelessness and crime - and it's predominantly people of color who accumulate there.

If that's "diverse" and "beautiful" then I'd hate to think what "monocultural" and "dull" looks like...

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> There's human feces everywhere outside the tourist/financial districts,

This is not accurate. The Sunset, Richmond, Parkside, Presidio, Marina, and many other parts of the city are very clean (or at least not notably dirty for a city). Perhaps the Marina/Presidio could be called tourist areas but the Sunset and Richmond certainly are not.

I think the homeless dude passed out covered in (presumably his own) shit at the Stonestown muni stop not 2 hours ago would disagree with you

Sunset, Parkside, and Marina are all wealthy areas in the north/west of the city.

Richmond is not in SF city.

Presidio is right next to the pier and thus I would consider it a "touristy area".

You're living under a (perhaps bejeweled) rock if you've lived in SF and never seen human shit, someone peeing between some cars, dead animals, homeless literally everywhere, disheveled buildings, trash piles lining the gutters, etc.

Someone who doesn't know that the Richmond is a district of San Francisco doesn't get to pompously lecture me on not knowing about the city I lived in for seven years. Also, the Sunset is not a particularly wealthy district and it's not in the northwest.

I never claimed that these problems don't exist, but the idea that they're part of life in every part of the city is simply false.

Richmond is also a city, hence why people usually say Richmond District if they want to explicitly refer to the NW District of SF when discussing the city and the surrounding area.

Poster you’re replying to isn’t wrong, just as you aren’t.

They were providing a list of neighborhoods in SF. It wasn't ambiguous and would have been well understood by anyone familiar enough with the city to comment on the state of SF. There's also a Richmond Virginia (among many other Richmonds), none would make sense in the context of a list of SF neighborhoods.

Why are y'all talking about Sunset and Parkside as if they're different things? Parkside is in the Sunset district, is it not?

Also many of the highest ranking schools are in the Sunset, and house prices there are very much on the high side (compared to, say, around Portola)

Richmond is not in SF City. It's in the greater SF area. Just like Oakland isn't in SF city.

You're dodging the argument at this point.

San Francisco has an Inner/Outer Richmond district. It’s the area north of Golden Gate Park. Inner/outer Sunset is south of Golden Gate Park. How can you be such an authority on SF and not know this? Yes there’s a Richmond city but it’s not what’s being referred to here…

You don't even live here. Your twitter bio says you live in Germany... "Homeless literally everywhere" - no, not literally at all. "Trash piles lining the gutters" - you don't even know what you're talking about.

People can move. Crazy concept.

I’ve seen someone take a shit on the sidewalk in the Marina (chestnut street). And I’ve seen similar stuff in the sunset. And to the OP I see this stuff fairly often in the financial district.

Anywhere near Market is mid to high levels of gross for sure. I think in FiDi and the East Cut companies pay for private cleaning services (and perhaps some private pseudo-policing as well) but these areas are directly adjacent to highly distressed parts of the city.

I've lived here for over 5 years and can absolutely confirm there are a few parts of the city that are dirty and have the feces/needles that people who honestly can't afford to live here love to talk about when they're denigrating the city. As you've noted, there are lots of neighborhoods, MOST of the city, that are very clean, safe, and obviously very desirable to live in.

The parts youa re talking about are not city at all imo, its precisely the places that try to get as far away as possible from SF, within SF.

Hmmm. I lived in the heart of the Castro for 15 years. When I arrived it was lovely. When I left (3 years ago, pre-covid), it was... not. Homeless and vacant storefronts everywhere.

The merchant who has been running the shop below my place longer than I have been alive (and I'm OLD by HN standards) put it this way: The Castro is dying.

Maybe there are neighborhoods changing for the better somewhere to balance it out, but I kinda doubt it. The change is real.

The Castro is certainly not dying. I live in Noe and I walk through the Castro quite often - it's still a lively neighborhood.

Imagine saying "Yeah, there are human feces all over my living room and kitchen, but the bedrooms are clean. Overall it is a great place to live."

Whenever I visit SF I run into someone who looks like an extra from a zombie movie every time, without fail. Sometimes they "violently beg" by lunging at your feet as you walk past. Scream obscenities. Offer stolen goods at red lights. And if you somehow don't see them you can certainly smell them.

Just because we collectively got desensitized doesn't make all this OK.

Probably smells better.

You clearly have no idea what you are talking about.

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