Is Homelessness A Sign That Our Society Is Broken?
Recently I came across this video from Jonathan Pie. He basically states that homelessness is a sign that there is something wrong with society and that we can fix it by following his designated strategy. I think his analysis is superficial and seriously flawed.
It is understandable to want to make emotional arguments about the subject but this is also why most arguments tend to fail. Nonetheless, let us play along his rhyme of thought simply to demonstrate the absurdity of his assumptions.
Let us increase social welfare and house more people as he proposes. Heck, we even take the thousands of tons of free food that we burn every year just to keep the prices steady and use it to feed the entire planet. Sounds pretty great right?
But what would be the long term result of such action? The poor people that did not have the initial means to support themselves, will breed carelessly. Eventually, we will have even more homeless and hungry people on an exponential distribution. Fast forward 2 decades, and we suddenly need the square root of the initial food supplied just to sustain the new people added into this ecosystem.
Could start picturing what would happen in matters of housing housing? If one wants an active parallel in regards to how the environment got screwed by mindless welfare breeding then look no further than the plague of cats. Stray cats alone have caused massive environmental damage so far that ranges from uncontrollable diseases to mass extinctions of other species. We constantly support their breeding because they are cute, meanwhile causing a tremendous ecosystem disturbance.
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Society is not broken because of homelessness. This is how societies actually work. It is important to also note than I am not blaming the homeless for the situation they are into. The phenomenon is merely a statistical distribution. The best we can do to keep the phenomenon at bay is to stop intervening. Remember, much like everything else in life, when you subsidize something, you get more of it. Historically whether that was social welfare, bullying, single mothers or any other issue that the government tried to control, the numbers increased. People are lazy. Humans will always strive to find the easy way out whether that is an elaborate business plan or a way to get that government check.
Let us not forget that more and more people today live much better even if they live in the streets. If you want to help the homeless in the long run, then stop helping them so they won't breed and multiply the problem. Yes, it might sound gruesome since they will probably die, but at least you won't assist to the future death of exponentially more people that will end up in the same situation, causing even more problems to society.
We have to accept that a percentage of people will be fucked no matter what we do. Same thing applies to those who are millionaires. It is a statistical variant in a universe that is build on supply and demand. The reason we see extreme %'s while most of us are somewhere in the middle relies on the same universal principles. Rare genetic mutations will always happen same as extreme weather phenomena. We cannot get away with it. We cannot build a perfect society or a perfect universe.
There is no eternal heaven nor a utopia here on earth where everybody is comfy. Most religions have capitalized on the idea of salvation and elimination of suffering because they simply had a lack of understanding about basic statistical distribution. Don't worry, most gamblers still have the same problem. Humans are not build for math. We are build for narratives. This is why the homelessness problem is supported emotionally and not logically.
This is also where political ideologies fall short as most religious affiliations. In such groups there is a tendency to perceive the world as some kind of immediate direct causation, ignoring the intermediate trillion-chaotic events that take place in between. For example, if one makes an animal sacrifice they will get the reward they wish for. If they perform a rain dance then rain will come to feed the crops. If these events do not occur then the ritual has not been performed correctly and needs to be repeated. In the same simplistic respect, more people would think that if you increase homeless centers then you will get rid of homelessness. This is too simplistic, too emotional, too narrow minded.
You can even catch this cognitive dissonance while one makes the homelessness argument. For example they will explain to you how life is chaotic and how that specific human became homeless from a series of unexpected events that were beyond his control — which is true. They are absolutely correct. When it comes to the solution though, they will neglect all the trillions of causal events that cause homelessness, and they will find the solution from just a simple causal action - e.g: build more shelters.
We have to accept that phenomena like homelessness exist because of simple statistical distribution and often there is very little we can do about it. The entire world works under complicated relationships that are extremely hard to decipher. Homelessness is a problem, but sometimes the solution is simply to stop intervening, just to minimize its effect. Society is not broken because such unfortunate events take place. Decay, problems and death are part of a healthy system that evolves and changes. Society would be broken if everything appeared to be perfect.
The last thing that is needed is a government initiated War on Homelessness.
Indeed, whenever there is a "War" on something, we get more of said something.
War on Drugs increases the drug problem; war on poverty creates more poverty; war on terror breeds more terror.
We need the government to start a War on Prosperity and Happiness.
Anytime something involves people, you are dealing with something that is not a controlled environment. Sure you can "lead a horse to water" as the saying goes, but you cannot make it drink. Though there is a portion of people who try to help themselves and cannot catch a break, there are also those that have no desire to help their own situation. The latter is something you cannot really fix on an absolute basis.
Help who you can and hope it makes a difference for atleast one. There is no absolute fix when people and human emotion is involved.
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It is easy to dismiss and claim the interventions (yes, most government ones increase the problem) as though being right about this one point wins you moral high ground, but you miss something important.
In countries like Australia and The Netherlands they are just hiding the problem. I have seen several countries in Eastern Europe and they have less homeless and it is not so difficult because the cultures there do not see it as abnormal.
But where the problems are worse, is because of multiplying laws. Every new law makes someone a criminal, or raises the bar so starting out is basically impossible.
In fact I almost had a job here in Amsterdam when I started out here, good solid IT job, I think it was sysadmin. But my passport expired. Then I got stuck, waiting for bureaucrats.
Having talked to quite a few people who rely on the charities here, I can say that the great majority of homeless people are this way because of laws about citizenship, documents, frickin paper. Stuck in the middle of catch-22 situations like the one I am in now still because of a mistake by schiphol passport office.
Many of the homeless do some kind of work or business. Some just do the stuff organised by charities, some are scavengers, some ar traders and brokers. The transition to "white market" is impossible without a hefty up front cost to provide a regular bed, laundry.
Just think for a minute about how you would feel if you could not count on getting good sleep, could not buy adequate clothes (after being in it so long II have homeless-radar and I can point these people out to you. It is not just dirty or ill fitting, the person walks and looks at everything different and you can't see that if you don't know ehat it is.), had to worry about health problems they cannot adequately treat, constantly needing to find ways to stay warm in winter and spending half the year coughing and wheezing because of being unable to get properly warm or getting wet, or just picking up the latest virus doing the rounds.
Many people drink, smoke, and crack, coke, meth, heroin also, because they feel trapped and just want to feel like they aren't for a while. People think giving them alcohol or money makes them worse. Well, sometimes it leads to a fatal accident. But it isn't the impediment to escape. You have to look closely at every case to judge that. When I see some people, they just need to go somewhere else to break out.
Myself, I have a major problem with the last phase of digestion. Being stuck on the street, with the ever vanishing toilets and the pittance of 50c tourist toilets... More than a few times I have come to grief. How do you resolve such a soiling without even warm water?
I will just say it again: Laws about citizenship and right to work and requirement of ID are huge obstacles that are a frequent reason in the homeless people I have met. There is indeed a contingent of others just looking to get a welfare payment, sure, but they are not representative.
Solving the problem, you can't make it go away. But laundry, showers, a clean warm dry place to sleep, you can't take on a regular job without clean clothrs and good rest. But I think in many places, laws just need to be abolished and homeless themselves make their solution.
Hi, @loki - I share your analysis of the problem. I am glad to hear that you, as someone with direct experience of the problem, holds such views. My growing perception of the human experience is that human governments, as we presently know them, are the primary source of the difficulties we experience.
We should not need "permission to work" - if we are willing to work, and can find someone offering such work, we should be able to simply agree with the source and go at it. We should not need "permission to exist" in some particular location. As long as we're not interfering with someone else, we should be free to travel and exist wherever we wish. We should not be shuffled aside with pejorative classifications like "black market" v "white market," most of which have nothing to do with morality and everything to do with whether or not the local "government" (thugs) can get their "piece of the action."
And, @kyriacos, much as I appreciate your article, I'm a little bewildered by your response to @loki - leading me to suspect that there may be some history between you of which I am not aware?
While that may be true in some absolute sense, in my experience, human government is the source of 90-plus percent of bureaucracy.
I am in complete agreement with this statement...
However, I will continue to maintain that, were we to eliminate the oppressive regulation of human government and its concomitant bureaucracy, we would probably eliminate 90-plus percent of the problem of homelessness. 😄😇😄
Homeless is just one of the myriad of problems caused by government. War, Democide, corruptly approved and even enforced giving of medicine without a diagosis (eg, vaccines, fluoride), and education system whose primary goal is to stop people considering government the problem, and I think I can write all day long about all the problems with having a centralised legislation and arbitration system, and how many people it kills every day.
Couldn't agree more, my friend. Couldn't have said it any better.
so its not the laws mate, nor the shelters. Even in an anarchic society you would still be fucked. You could easily misplace a working permit, license...bureaucracy doesn't end with abolishment of government so stop throwing your fuck ups to somebody else's back.
You have at least a year ahead to update your passport. I assume you are not the "organized" type now are you?
Neither you, nor the embedded video, talked about the actual problem.
And without talking about the actual problem, we cannot talk about a solution.
Remember a song "King of the Road"?
A society where you could approach someone and trade some menial labor for some accommodations. This no longer exists. Its either pay a minimum of 50 hours a month for an apartment, or sleep on the street. There is nothing in the middle.
And this isn't even the problem. If you speak with homeless people, most cannot handle a schedule. Most cannot handle being caged in. Most are not homeless just because of a lack of homes.
These are people who seriously need help living. And that requires real skills from a real caring person to solve. The problem doesn't go away by throwing money at it. Thus, the govern-cement will never be able to solve the problem. All the govern-cement has done is move the bar higher, so that more people are a paycheck away from being on the street.
People are not homeless because they are lazy. And providing the whole world with food, shelter and clothing would be the easiest thing to do. (It would take less money than what we are paying now)
People are not lazy, they have been forced into inaction by govern-cement regulations. It is too hard to do anything, and if you did do something, it is too easy for govern-cement to step in and take it all.
If there are no prospects for the future, than people self medicate. Drug use and homelessness abound. This is where we have to apply effort at the govern-cement level.
As a society, we should provide everyone with a room, a meal, and a green jumpsuit if they show up.
I agree there will always be homeless people, and also people on the "poor end" of the statistical distribution.
These statistical distributions, however, are descriptions, not laws of nature, and they vary wildly over time and between countries.
Up to a point, a group or society can decide where the "poor end" is, by introducing a universal basic income or some such. In The Netherlands, everybody can get an income that is just about enough to get a roof over your head and food, so everybody has the opportunity to get off the street.
Those that remain are on the street by choice, or they spend all their money on alcohol or other drugs, or they are illegal aliens (such a strange term), or they haven't won the battle with bureaucracy yet (hi @l0k1!), or they are mentally ill and too confused to take action (the last group is actually on the increase in The Netherlands).
The ladder out of the pit is there in plain sight, but you have to climb it yourself if you want to. This is different from fighting homelessness directly by supplying free shelter and food, and I rather like living in a society that limits "maximum poverty" in this way.
Another thing is numbers. While there will always be homeless and poor people, if the percentage of homeless people in the population is large and/or rising, then perhaps something is going wrong in society. In that sense homelessness can be a symptom rather than a problem that needs to be addressed directly. Fighting homelessness directly won't solve the problem of which it is a symptom, though.
Meanwhile, I must admit, I help the homeless people I encounter when I think it will do them good in the long run; giving money to an alcoholic is not very efficient. Not helping someone in need who is in some way part of my group or tribe or whatever you want to call it is immoral in my personal morals. YMMV.
Pff, longest comment I ever wrote here, I think.
this is the only answer i could come up with
Too general. Five out of the six people I got off the streets have houses and jobs now, three of them did the same for other homeless people. It depends on how you go about it; most people want to work and take care of themelves, and can with a little nudge, and one little nudge is all they get from me. Also, people on welfare here are pushed very insistently towards jobs.
If there aren't any jobs, I would rather have a few dependents in a group than dying people. It goes against how I think about solidarity in my group and violence. Nature isn't necessarily the best thing to model civilization after, after all, not much NAP there. I must admit I don't care about the whole population, just about my clan, I'm primitive like that.
Do you think a universal basic income would have the same effect as welfare as you describe it?
Yes. A universal basic income will change nothing since 0 will be equivalent to 500 or 1000. Every single price will rise from that standard.
That's just a tenet from some or other economic belief system. Prices are usually flat when supply can keep up with demand, spending power or money supply alone don't set the inflation level, plenty of real-world examples out there. I thought you were a Popperian?
I like what @builderofcastles writes. I wrote about homeless too and the dogs. We have homeless but we understand them. It is ok to have homeless because there is so little to do about it. Even without money - is one poor?
"And I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale." ~Thomas Jefferson
I have no answers on how to solve the homeless problem. However, as I sit in my warm house, listening to the rain, I'm very much filled with compassion for those who are sitting in it. Sadly, I have known some people who were unwilling to make the needed changes in order to "get their feet on the ground" with a job and so forth. However, I've also met those who truly can't get a break no matter how much they try and just need a little help. Regardless, the fact remains that where I live, it's winter and people are living outside and it's sad.
Help for the homeless is founded on Judeo-Christian traditional narratives, tending to the suffering of individuals for its own sake, as what orders of Nuns always did. it was about helping people as they were, and as needed; a rather singular mission, and not so much about societal integration (eg. no idealogical distinction between poverty and terminal illness) It's interesting to consider how this foundational narrative changed and currently intersects with modern secular society and our economic preoccupations/values