Is this the Bay Area population of HN expressing their frustration that there are many homeless people in SF? These posts come up from time to time.
I was there some 4 years ago, and I met some homeless folks for sure, but the city was nice.
I was there some 4 years ago, and I met some homeless folks for sure, but the city was nice.
That said, what did strike me as a little odd were a lot of comments on the Vision Pro threads about where if you walk around with it on outside, you'll be instantly mugged. That's just... not the case where I live in my Indiana suburb. I leave my front door unlocked, and have had no issues leaving my laptop visible on the seat of my locked car when I'm out and about. People here seem to take for granted some amount of low level violence and theft as normal, which shocks me. I don't know if comments like those come from Bay Area residents, but I sort of assumed so because I've thought that's where the user base here skews.
I mean, as someone who visits San Francisco for work from time to time... I'm fairly sure that's not actually true? It's never felt particularly unsafe; it's just a normal largish city (albeit with an awful lot of homelessness).
... Is that not the attitude of the police _everywhere_, though? I've never heard of the police anywhere taking much of an interest in items stolen from cars; it's not like they really have a realistic way to pursue that even if they wanted to.
The mentality I don’t understand is the whole it’s “part and parcel” for living in a city. That it’s normal for crime to creep around, for litter and feces to be spread, and for drugged out people to be laying in the streets.
That’s not normal and it’s considered unacceptable in many places. Places for free than SF nowadays.
In my opinion it's not so much homelessness that is the issue, but rampant heavy drug use (methamphetamine and fentanyl). I think the term homeless is a misnomer. It's the debilitating drug use and the consequences of what that does to people's behavior that causes downstream issues to public safety. Working class people who are trying to do everything right (like the Walgreens worker) are the ones most impacted, and that to me is the most frustrating part.