Public Disorder & the Decline of Vancouver's Livability

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by MIPS

It's simple: 50 years ago (or even the 90's which was 30 years ago) you caught someone in the act you could give them a few swings with a baseball bat and questions were not asked as they were loaded into the wagon.

There's a business model out there now that you so lay a finger on Ollie the Crackhead, there are a handful of directions you can go for subsidized Legal Aid and they'll nail you. You can't even dump them at city limits anymore. We don't even send them to labor camps to work off six months for petty theft. It's Colonialist. It has been noted that in the fall there is an uptick in petty crime that lands you four to six month sentences. Really, the idea is that instead of spending the winter on the street, you become federally mandated to get clean clothes, three squares a day, medical services and a warm bed. Then in March you get the boot and it's back to stealing cheese and breaking into garages for things to fence. What's the worst they'll do? Give you stable living space again? Oh no!


Likewise the fact that a double standard exists in encampments, illegal trailer/RV parking and just straight-up sitting on the Granville strip with three backpacks, some blankets, two dogs and a drug habit can't get them dragged off and their possessions destroyed invites blight. Make them unable to establish and they will move on. Part of that requires eliminating portions of the criminal code which were feel-good ammendments that were drafted because of some niche incident or lobbying but is now actively exploited either by shady poverty rights groups with conflicts of interest or legal aid groups who know that as long as they get petty criminals in the courtroom they get a paycheck.


Point I'm getting to here is if you are homeless, unless it's your dealer looking for the money you owe him, you've been untouchable for years.

It's astonishing how some people think human rights are somehow revocable and going back to the good ol' days of rounding people them up and sending them to forced labour camps is the way to go. Just hit people with a bat and put them in a chain gang because that'll solve their problems.