A Boring Dystopia

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Can homeless people be fined for sleeping outside? A rural Oregon city asks the US Supreme Court (apnews.com)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/aboringdystopia

18 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/19341435

The scenes were emblematic of the crisis gripping the small, Oregon mountain town of Grants Pass, where a fierce fight over park space has become a battleground for a much larger, national debate on homelessness that has reached the U.S. Supreme Court.

The town’s case, set to be heard April 22, has broad implications for how not only Grants Pass, but communities nationwide address homelessness, including whether they can fine or jail people for camping in public. It has made the town of 40,000 the unlikely face of the nation’s homelessness crisis, and further fueled the debate over how to deal with it.

“I certainly wish this wasn’t what my town was known for,” Mayor Sara Bristol told The Associated Press last month. “It’s not the reason why I became mayor. And yet it has dominated every single thing that I’ve done for the last 3 1/2 years.”

Officials across the political spectrum — from Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in California, which has nearly 30% of the nation’s homeless population, to a group of 22 conservative-led states — have filed briefs in the case, saying lower court rulings have hamstrung their ability to deal with encampments.

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[–] [email protected] 45 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Makes sense. Fine people who have nowhere to go because they have no money. They have no money. How are they going to pay the fine? A child could figure that out.

[–] humorlessrepost 39 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Can you jail them for not paying their fines? If so, homelessness is solved! 🥳

[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago

Exactly.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Great idea. But jails are expensive, you have guards and such you have to pay. Maybe a small house, like a tiny one. Where they can come and go, and maybe find a job and start paying taxes.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

But if you put them in jail you can dehumanize them and legitimize their treatment, they are now criminals after all. You can also put them to work for slave wages without causing a social uproar.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Heh. We need to starve the machine.

[–] NatakuNox 2 points 10 months ago

Homelessness in America is 10 times higher than reported. The majority of people in prison are homeless and go from in prison to homelessness to prison again. But they don't need to imprison people for just being homeless. You make laws that only penalize things homeless people have to do to survive. Like, anti camping laws. Or, eating to close to a road.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

And the prison industrial complex needs starving.