90 Year Old Man Defies New Florida Law, Continues to Serve Homeless Public

[Huston 5,800]

WUT.

 

A 90 year old man is charged with feeding the homeless in a public area due to a new law in Fort Lauderdale, FL that was enacted to illegalizesfeeding the homeless in public areas. I'm sorry but why is this even a law? I applaud him for defying it though.

 

Meet the 90-year-old who refuses to stop feeding the homeless, despite being charged

[Duke87 1,070]

It's a law that stems out of philosophy that treats homeless people as purely a public nuisance rather than as, well, people. The thinking basically goes that feeding homeless people in the park just encourages more homeless people to congregate in the park. So to the town, "don't feed the homeless" falls right in line with "don't feed the birds" or "don't feed the rats" - i.e. stop feeding them and maybe they'll go away, keep feeding them and they'll keep coming back.

 

Of course, actually doing meaningful things about homelessness is more difficult, more expensive, and often more politically untenable than simply telling them to shoo and trying to make them someone else's problem. Especially when if you're the town that steps up and actually helps people you will end up dealing not only with your own but with homeless people from all around who come to you because you give them goodies.

 

In a state like Florida, political tenability is the big problem. Remember this is the same state that deemed it worthwhile to drug test all welfare recipients in the hopes of kicking a significant number of people out of the program. After all, helping homeless people is socialism. A proper capitalist spits on them and yells at them to get a job.

[LexusInfernus 908]

Or it might serve as an incentive for those lazy bums to get a job and feed themselves. Because apparently the US loves their social Darwinism. The strong live, the weak become homeless and can die on the sidewalk of a street. 

[Huston 5,800]

I guess I'm more of a socialist then I thought I was. Yet honestly, I'm not one to be looking at this at such a political direction. But in any case, enacting this law hardly seems like anything that's going to help the unemployment situation. Especially in a country like the US where you kick the boot of anyone who has no job, money or any real potential. I can't say much for the job market in the US either but from my foreign perspective looking into the country, I'm not really surprised that there are so many homeless out there. It just doesn't seem right to see laws that forbid good-doers from serving their community just because local governments think kicking homeless people off the street to get their fair share of a meal would make them get a job (where there might not be any). Hardly a plan in my view.

[A Nonny Moose 8,263]

The fact that such an ordinance was even proposed by the city council is in and of itself shameful.  Homelessness is not voluntary in most cases, and is really a problem in search of a solution not more aggravation.  Shame on Ft. Lauderdale.

[Sabretooth78 808]

This isn't the first instance of such a type of legislation in the US or even Florida.  They passed some other law recently (it wasn't the welfare drug-testing one, which I actually agree with) but something else about as boneheaded as this.  I firmly believe that if it weren't for their tourism industry and the influx of northern retirees, today they'd be so backwards so as to make the rest of the "deep south" look like Bos-Wash.  Also if I recall correctly, even liberal* NYC recently enacted some roughly similar law pertaining to feeding the homeless and/or soup kitchens or something of the like.  Because trying to ban Big Gulps worked so well.

 

Many politicians throughout the US and at all levels seem to think you can still legislate problems away, which when you think about it runs completely counter to the beliefs that the nation was founded on.  (Completely ignoring the fact that it's also been proven not to work time and again...around the world.  See also: Legislating [your idea of] morality.)

 

Maybe it's about time we started legislating these types of politicians away.  Who knows, that might just work - sure hasn't been tried in a long time.

 

* to use the term in its incorrect, current American meaning.

 

Fun fact:  Several years ago I had read (sorry, I have long forgotten the source) that some large percentage (I seem to recall it being a majority) of the homeless population in Buffalo actually had gainful employment.  Keep in mind we also have some of the cheapest housing costs in the US.  I'm not sure how that adds up or what it means, but my first instinct is to think so much for the "get a job" sneers.

[Shy Dude 149]

This doesn't happen in other states? Because something like this went down in Orlando a couple years ago. Has living in Florida really dropped my expectations for human compassion?

[A Nonny Moose 8,263]

I dislike Florida for its high humidity and general mouldy smell, but the political odour is enough to keep anyone away.

[Compdude787 916]

I don't see why the government should have any business telling people whether they should feed homeless people. I can see the rationale behind having a law to forbid this, but it qualifies as government overreach regardless.

[Sabretooth78 808]

I dislike Florida for its high humidity and general mouldy smell, but the political odour is enough to keep anyone away.

 

+10

 

I've never seen the allure of the place (I guess that makes me a bad American) and in general it had me turned off of warmer climates in general until I met the West Indies.  Allow me to call it a lesson in avoiding generalizations.

[A Nonny Moose 8,263]

If you like warm states, I suggest Arizona and New Mexico.  Hot and dry beats hot and wet.

[Meg 368]

Just to throw in another point of view here:

 

Why You Should Support Regulating the Public Feeding of Homeless People

[A Nonny Moose 8,263]

There are some good points here.  Regular handouts of food only doesn't do anything for the situation of the homeless.  It just keeps them in food for a while.  This can be good or bad, depending on what kind of dependencies you are creating.

 

The fact is that homeless people, by and large, need and want a home:  That is, a place to stay that provides shelter, sanitation, safety, and perhaps even nutrition.  Admittedly, there are some people who, due to mental illness or disaffection, prefer to freeze to death under a bridge, but in more than half of North America that is what is likely the fate of homeless people who persist.

 

Our society must be sick in some way to allow the numbers of homeless persons that seem to be about.  What is wrong with us?

[Duke87 1,070]

Just to throw in another point of view here:

Why You Should Support Regulating the Public Feeding of Homeless People

The author of this article makes some very good points. It comes back to the whole give a man a fish / teach a man to fish issue. Giving people food feeds them but does nothing to help get them off the street and back to being a productive member of society.

So, if a city is banning feeding as part of a greater coordinated effort, that's one thing. But what's happening here is not that. They're just saying don't feed them and tell them to get lost.

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

 

Just to throw in another point of view here:

Why You Should Support Regulating the Public Feeding of Homeless People

The author of this article makes some very good points. It comes back to the whole give a man a fish / teach a man to fish issue. Giving people food feeds them but does nothing to help get them off the street and back to being a productive member of society.

So, if a city is banning feeding as part of a greater coordinated effort, that's one thing. But what's happening here is not that. They're just saying don't feed them and tell them to get lost.

 

 

This.

 

You may as well send these homeless people to the FEMA camps.

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

Our society must be sick in some way to allow the numbers of homeless persons that seem to be about.  What is wrong with us?

 

[sarcasm]There's no profit in it.  Why bother if there's no profit in it?[/sarcasm]

[A Nonny Moose 8,263]

Must be costly to have them around cluttering up public space?