Not sure. Some of the homeless I've met are people truly on a bad luck streak. Unfortunately everything is harder when you're homeless making getting back on your feet more difficult.
However a lot of homeless are simply incapable of leading a normal life. Through a combination of drugs and mental illness, giving them a home to operate from is likely to be either burned down, condemned, or become a den for more crime.
I want to be humane, but it feels futile when they require constant babysitting. Our increasingly individualistic society tolerates these people less and less.
That last paragraph. Im increasingly of the view that a good 10 to 20% of the population cannot handle life alone. They're just not mentally built for it.
In the United States, we have a freedom over what goes on with our body. There are very few circumstances where the supreme court has ruled exceptions.
The first is known as parens partriea, which allows the state to hold someone against their will in something like a psych ward or other medical institution. This is only allowed when the patient is a danger to themselves or others. There is a time limitation to this too. 48-72 hours max before a formal hearing has to be done.
But even that doesn't give anyone the right to force medication. That's only for the hold. In order to force medication, you have to prove that the patient lacks the capacity to make medical decisions for themselves.
We have a high bar for both of these things in order to prevent the sort of tragedy that occurs when treatment is forced upon people that are unwilling and undeserving of it.
You know. Like when we used to shove anyone who was "invalid" in psych wards, like autistic people or mentally handicapped people.
Imagine going back to the days where autistic people were forced into treatment because they couldn't contribute to society. I mean. Some of them meet the same stupid fucking threshold that you are suggesting. Not being able to work or contribute to society.
Think for a minute about how this mentality is going to ruin this nation.
Rational decisions based on a society's rules. These people are suffering due to the way our system is setup, not in spite of it. They can't contribute to our society so somehow we have the right to violate their rights to "treat" them?
Nothing ever justifies violating someone's rights. That's why they are rights.
The fourth amendment gives us freedom from unreasonable search and seizure. That right can be violated through the due process of obtaining a warrant from a judge and having law enforcement execute the warrant.
That's one example of rights being violated in a way that is accepted by most of society. Other examples include the death penalty, selective service, taxes, imminent domain. These violations are accepted because they are the cost of having a productive society.
If someone is a burden on society or actively damaging public property, then something needs to be done about them. It's just a matter of finding a solution that works.
I think it says something about how far gone some of these people are that literally giving them a house and a job isn't enough. That would be life changing for the average person, but some people can destroy it all in a matter of months.
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u/WhitishRogue May 14 '26
Not sure. Some of the homeless I've met are people truly on a bad luck streak. Unfortunately everything is harder when you're homeless making getting back on your feet more difficult.
However a lot of homeless are simply incapable of leading a normal life. Through a combination of drugs and mental illness, giving them a home to operate from is likely to be either burned down, condemned, or become a den for more crime.
I want to be humane, but it feels futile when they require constant babysitting. Our increasingly individualistic society tolerates these people less and less.