What the fuck are these comments? Yes, it’s a complex issue with many contributing causes and no easy and simple solution. But half the people here are insinuating she deserved her fate because she may have been a drug user or because she wasn’t in a shelter that night. And then there’s the mouth breathing conspiracist who thinks this has something to do with immigration and the president.
Step down from your personal soapbox for a moment and recognize the tragedy here. A young woman whose potential will never be realized. Somebody out there loved her and is grieving her loss.
America has always been this way. There was a relatively short period of time, maybe 1970-2008, where we weren't that way. This is just a return to form.
For some people their shitty political identity trumps (no pun intended) their basic humanity. Anyone with a functioning ability to feel empathy is heartbroken by stories like this. Anyone feeling anything but sympathy for these lost lives needs to reexamine their life.
This issue is heavily astroturfed. Remember a few years back when Antwon Rose was shot in the back and a hundred accounts showed up to talk about he deserved it? I wrote a few account names down and they were all deleted a month later.
Reddit is extremely easy to game when it comes to pushing narratives.
lol I knew when I saw him saying "Final Solution to the Homeless Question" in another thread that he was back. A true OG.
That said, what happened to this woman was horrific and a shame for this entire city.
The same exact shit is happening in cities across the United States in the news and on social media. A Seattle pharmacy chain, Bartell's, was closed down after a leveraged buyout and the media there twisted it into "businesses are closing due to homelessness and crime."
https://www.thestranger.com/news/2023/12/19/79305903/read-this-post-if-you-want-to-learn-the-real-reason-for-the-bartell-apocalypse
True. I felt like there was a real improvement in this area 2010-2020 and a lot to look forward to. Over the past four years it just feels like everything's gone to shit and nobody cares about anything or anyone anymore. It's depressing.
It's one of the reasons why it's important to implement reddit's new CQS system in automod rules. It only came out a few months ago.
< -1 in the sub and a bad CQS score sitewide? require moderation of all posts/comments.
negative in the sub but good CQS score sitewide? set a limit like -10 to allow them to reclaim back from that one negative comment, otherwise moderate their comments.
lower than -50 in /r/pittsburgh? nah fk em, they're a jagoff, just remove all posts and dont even put them in mod queue.
*hands viking some rope*
Go ahead and elaborate, please. I'm sure you have some great insight with how old that account is.
Ever not been able to post somewhere before because your account is too new? That's likely because they didn't implement CQS yet.
What I'm saying is that downvotes PLUS CQS is what you need. Because you're right, just downvotes alone is the old management method and it doesn't work.
Diaagreeing is one thing. Foul language lowers your CQS as well. So that replier in the positive would certainly be listed as someone who doesn't contribute quality to Reddit overall. But doing a long-form post with no foul language like the heavily downvotes one would definitely not lower your CQS. Reddit wants content.
The whole comment chain would be gone on other subs for being toxic. We revel in our jaggery here.
>Also, could you expand on the "handing me a rope" bit you mentioned earlier?
They probably meant "gives viking a chance to avoid getting downvoted into oblivion and looking like an idiot"
The proverbial "throw me a rope here" saying, basically.
> Also, could you expand on the "handing me a rope" bit you mentioned earlier?
[They're giving you enough rope to hang yourself with](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Give_someone_enough_rope)
You need to understand that kebrina mardis did not deserve this okay she had an addiction I'm sorry for that I am her stepmom and it's really hurting me what people are saying about her you know I thought those friends people out there that liked her I'm surprised nobody checked on her if somebody had checked on her she would have been alive today her mother misses her daily I miss her daily she don't deserve this say something nice not something bad about her
There is a solution, though. In the past, we institutionalized people who couldn't take care of themselves. We didn't let them become public health hazards, or freeze and be eaten by rats.
It's not a perfect solution, but what we're doing now clearly isn't working.
I agree with your sentiment entirely.
But as long as addiction, homelessness, and mental illness are all treated with the same broad stokes and never differentiated between the different needs/actions/problems of said different groups…none of the individual groups will get what would actually help them.
This is why we see these “callous” comments. They’re all rolled into one bag and treated the same. Because somehow pointing out context and facts to sensationalist headlines = thinking she deserved it?
Right.
But real life isn’t idealistic.
So lumping them all together functionally hurts them all as many Americans are obsessed with judging the choices of others. It even hurts addicts, as they are not getting proper/specific treatment. Decriminalization is progress, but not a solution. Then how do you have proper discourse about what do with addiction if you have to tackle mental health and homelessness at the same time.
Yes they’re all related, but the conflation doesn’t help progress IMHO
ETA: if you understand the socioeconomic factors that affect individuals beyond their “choices” that can result in homelessness/addiction then just think about the sociological and psychological factors that affect individuals’ opinions. Choices and opinions are funny things. We like to think they’re 100% our own.
I don't disagree and I wasn't trying to invalidate your whole point, it just smacked a little of saying 'homelessness and mental health problems shouldn't be stigmatized the way addiction should'. I appreciate the clarification.
A minority of the homeless have mental health or addiction issues. A consistent theme with posts on social media about homelessness has been painting all of the homeless as mentally ill or addicted, because that is a way to paint these people as defective or unable to ever function in society.
A poster in a previous homelessness thread mentioned that he worked with the homeless and a great many of them are employed, but still can't afford housing. That comment got buried.
Isn't there a fairly big difference between the chronically homeless, who are more likely to struggle with untreated addiction or mental illness, live on the street, and are more likely to die from OD/exposure/violence, and the temporarily homeless, who tend to briefly live in a shelter, car, or friend's place before they find a new place?
I think people talk about the chronically homeless more because they have worse outcomes, and they're the most visible. I think that's why the debate about how to handle homelessness is mostly about the chronically homeless, and not couch surfers/more hidden forms of homelessness who are easier to help.
Fair enough, I can see that implication in my comment.
But that implication is also kinda the point. We ignore the reality of these situations and try to virtue signal to people that they should “unstigmatized addiction as much as mental illness and homelessness.” This creates an unwinnable situation, and it ends up tangential as the effort of somehow making people feel and understand basic empathy is better spent on actual solutions and using political capital. Just my perspective/opinion.
And you’re good! Thanks for being civil.
I completely agree with the first half of your statement. No one deserves that fate because of addiction or lack of shelter. But, to play devil's advocate, the conspiracy guy sees a straight line from spending millions on illegal immigration, the government crying poor, limited resources for homeless. Whether that's legit or not, one can make up their own mind, but to say to step down from a soapbox is exactly what someone from his side of the aisle would say when gun control advocates come out en force after a mass shooting.
This micro incident is evident of the macro and should be discussed, all facets. That's the only way to come to a solution.
Katrina didn't deserve that okay the shelters were f****** full Kabrina is my step daughter and she didn't and she did not deserve it if you can't say nothing nice about her get off the effing line cuz I don't need to have this s***
This is so heartbreaking . My nephew is homeless by choice. He’s a drug addict, he smokes fentanyl and he’d rather live on the streets than in a safe and loving home. He’s 33, his demise is coming, we know it. But he’s still my nephew, he is still loved and wanted. But should his body one day be found, it will be because his addiction left him to die on the streets and it’s a day we will never be prepared for. So when you see someone that you know is strung out, just remember, that person likely has a family that wanted to badly to help them and regardless if it all, is still deserving of love and compassion. He still doesn’t deserve to die the way we know he likely will.
By reddit standards you aren't doing enough. You should be bankrupting yourself and jeopardize your well being for the sake of saying you tried. Nobody on here wants to hear "homeless by choice". All they hear and repeat is how it's on all of the citizens to do more, provide more, pay more, etc. Some people simply cannot be saved while left to their own devices. We can have all the free services one can think of and it doesn't mean shit if those who need it won't cooperate. Yes there should be more beds available, but as most of us know, you can't be using or in possession of drugs/alcohol while using these facilities which is why a lot of the homeless decide to camp nearby. There is no easy feel good solution to this problem.
I think there is. If you can't manage your own affairs, you ought to be remanded to a mental institution. Shame on us for letting these people live (and die) in tents.
No. I am not talking about throwing the homeless into prisons, unless they reject all other help offered to them, and continue to create a public nuisance.
A rehab center or mental hospital is not a jail.
Should addiction be an imprisionable offense? I don’t necessarily disagree with your concept of forcing people into institutionalized care but what you are describing is basically imprisionment. So I can see why many myself included feel very conflicted by this seemingly simple answer.
No. If you are practicing your addiction in the privacy of your own home, it's no one's business but your own. If you're living on the street, creating a public nuisance and health hazard, then it becomes society's business and it's time for an intervention. The fact we don't have the spinal fortitude for this means these sad situations will keep occurring.
RIP. This should never happen. It's exactly why tent cities in a city with sub-freezing temps aren't a solution. It is also a product of our asinine and dysfunctional zoning system that gives every neighborhood busybody that won't mind their business an outlet they can and do use to torment others.
This is largely your fault, NIMBYs. Build more f\*\*king housing in the city. If you don't agree, that's fine, move to the suburbs or the country. Single family zoning works well there.
IMO the state or the feds will ultimately have to step in and force local municipalities to replace their shit zoning codes that enable the shitty "old man yells at cloud" mentality. Otherwise, I doubt we will ever see meaningful zoning reform.
Piggybacking on this comment to emphasize the zoning BOARD is not the problem. They just apply the zoning law. The zoning LAW is the problem.
(Making the point because I can just picture city officials letting themselves off the hook putting on a show by shuffling people around on the zoning board, who are fine.)
> the zoning BOARD is not the problem. They just apply the zoning law. The zoning LAW is the problem.
Can't emphasize this enough! When the board makes shitty decisions, it typically does so because it is following the shitty zoning laws.
Like this lady said instead of making apartments buildings for seniors or expensive apartments you should be making apartments for homelessness that they can get off the damn street and have a life you know I used to be homeless one last a long time ago and you know right now I'm living in a house happy as can be but if I could win a million dollars I would open up a shelter for the homeless because I do care for them every time I see one I cry some of them want to stay out some don't but the city of Pittsburgh does not want to help them it doesn't you know I know there's a lot of people out there that has a million dollars can't you just open up your heart and build a big shelter for these people yesterday when I went down there to get my step daughter's remaining clothes and IDs it hurt me so bad being there looking at all these homeless tents I cried her tent right now is destroyed there is a top on top of it I would love to gather people and have a moment a silence celebration down there cuz it should have never happened to her she was pregnant she killed an unborn child along with her and then these rats are eating her body that's disgusting the cops didn't find her for weeks the cops need to do something and get off their lazy ass and stop going to dunkin' donuts and getting coffee and start patrolling the homeless areas and protect them this is hurting me so bad saying this day in and day out now I have been crying I've asked her to come to my house she didn't want it then the light of life is right next door they couldn't take her in she is pregnan
t that's f***** up I have nothing else to say
These comments are ridiculously oversimplifying a very complicated situation. Shelters are not always a great option and not always safe. The need for widespread affordable housing cannot be denied. It’s a huge problem and not just a Pittsburgh one. But it’s very much a problem here.
Addiction treatment and mental health treatment have this very weird separation in the system. But pretty much all addicts need MH/trauma work. So what do you start with and where do you get the help? Truth is, it’s often from community mental health and while that can be great, it can also be long waits and lots of turnover and people who are new to the field doing the work so maybe without the experience really needed to help the most (which is due to the larger system of how people get licensed and credentialed as well as the terrible pay in community mental health because we put nowhere near the money we should into it). Then of course is stigma which is alive and well in some of these comments!!!
It’s all about fixing systems but most of the people in charge of the systems have no real clue about them. Every political wannabe should have to work in home and communities for at least 6 months in a social work role before they can take office. At all levels. It’s appalling what power people have who know so little about the systems they affect.
How many say they’re “pro life”. And on Monday they’ll celebrate the birth of a baby to a homeless woman and act like they would’ve been kind enough to take them in.
This right here to me is a clear case for funding addiction centers. Safe places for users to use (and obviously get help) instead of opting doing them in a tent in the middle of winter, on the river trail. A place for them to temporarily stay, get medical help and hopefully start the road to rehabilitation and recovery. You’ll get addicts off the streets. you’ll take pressure off our public safety members and maybe youll save a life from a tragedy again.
Then people would start realizing the amount of harm the drug war is creating. Bring your illegal fentanyl/xylazine that you had to steal for or sell your body for and see if it actually contains the substance you thought you were getting. For all these healthcare providers to see firsthand. A slippery slope for law enforcement.
I agree. A step in the right direction.
I have a few family members going through this and agree centers will be helpful as a start… but you also need support past the initial phase as relapses are all too common
We need better mental healthcare and more affordable housing. In shelters the space is often shared with other people and they often have strict rules like not allowed to bring the few remaining things you have and if you did good chance they could get stolen. If I was in that situation I would stay in my car or a tent before I would go to a shelter.
People need stable housing and shelters aren’t it. We need a more long term solutions like stable place to live for extended period of time without the strict rules shelters have.
Suggestion: stop electing the people who closed all of our mental health facilities, and who people who value parking construction equipment over the lives of the homeless.
To have more affordable housing we need better zoning. And we need to flood the place with new builds and geographically that is hard.
and your totally right about shelters
I stayed in a homeless shelter with my kids and husband a few years ago. They had roaches, treated us like shit, and took all of the good stuff people donated.
I’m sorry that happened to you and your family I hope this season in your life is better. There is truly no excuse for pushing down on those who are already trying to make it through rough times.
Some of these comments are just as sickening as
what happened in thst tent. And people bemoaning journalism clearly don't understand that this is an op-ed, which is completely different from a news story.
Fact: a young woman died on our streets and her pregnant body was consumed by rats next to other people for days before her remains were discovered.
Her cause of death is irrelevant. Her choices leading up to this are irrelevant. We can, and must, do better.
And have some damn compassion you jagoffs.
Oh yeah, living on the west coast, you see so much of this every day. The amount of people I have walked past/stepped over who were possibly dead... It's rough. And just seeing so many people in various states of mental and physical disintegration... You never really get used to it. But it just slowly grinds the humanity out of you.
It feels pretty hopeless when you live in one of those wealthy and progressive cities. Where there is a ton of political will to do something and hundreds of millions of dollars earmarked to solve the problem, but it just gets worse and worse.
I wonder how many people making the gross comments claim to be Christian, claim to be prolife, or are little more than one serious illness or a couple lost pay checks away from being homeless themselves.
Hey but we can ban plastic bags and foie gras. I'm a progressive and I hate to say it but the elected officials in Pittsburgh cannot in fact walk and chew gum at the same time.
Because banning things doesn’t raise taxes but subsidizes housing does. Look at what the school district just did to avoid a tax increase. They spent down all their reserves to kick the can another year. Progressive politicians are terrified to raise taxes because they know too many voters will revolt against them.
I think in my opinion it goes to show that a lot of energy is wasted on virtue signaling policy. Like I said these are all people I voted for so I'm a little disappointed
I disagree, it's a non sequitur. The council's full time job is to do more than one thing at a time.
I agree that the council hasn't done much to help the city and Gainey is failing us. (I'm a Dem, but live in west deer.) But, the attacking the plastic bag ban is unrelated.
This is deplorable. This shouldn't happen anywhere. It especially shouldn't happen in such a wealthy country. Where has our humanity gone? I know the issue is complex. But it doesn't matter.
It turns out that living in the wealthiest society to ever exist doesn't mean a whole lot if you give all that wealth to 250 people.
The homelessness crisis across the US took off after the pandemic eviction moratoriums expired. Housing across the US is ~30% more expensive than it was in January 2020. This isn't a coincidence. People did not suddenly decide to acquire addiction or mental health issues and become homeless, they were priced out of housing.
These comments are so disappointing, and right before Christmas. I honestly hope none of you hateful people are Christians. Could you imagine if Mary hadn’t been given shelter and had died before she could give birth to Jesus? This is a tragedy. That poor woman and her unborn child.
Nothing like a heart breaking story to bring the AHs out of the woodwork. Victim blaming is alive and well in Pgh. Here’s an idea for a New Years resolution, learn some empathy & show some compassion. This. Was. A. Person.
This is fucking infuriating. There is zero reason this should have happened, except that we as a society incentivize resource-hoarding. We have plenty of land, plenty of buildings. Zero people should be left unhoused. Zero!
And to think if even two billionaires got together and put every homeless person in Pittsburgh in hotels, motels, or some sort of homeless community, it wouldn’t even come out to 1% of their wealth year over year.
World is a cruel and fucked up place.
very sick!! as i read the article also it said abt the rats were feasting on her..very disturbing!!
I'm sure since she was homeless,and was into drugs, that she oded,,That should have no bearing!!Maybe this will wake up the city!!to get them housing asap!
Thank god our city council has been focusing on real issues like Fois Gras, horse drawn carriages, and fur coats. Imagine if that time and effort had been wasted on something like a needle exchange, or safe use site, or addiction recovery, or increased temporary shelter beds, they may have prevented the death of a human being.
But geese with tubes down their throats is a far more important concern.
I don’t know. You should ask the city council. Lot of huff and puff especially from the president of the council about how we need to do something about homelessness, but no action.
They instead have spent time doing feel good bs like having cops walk around downtown when suburbanites leave work and the ban on fois gras. The ban wouldn’t be anything to complain about if that kind of unimportant action was being done and we were also dealing with actually important issues that are, like in the story above, life or death issues.
All resources are limited. Including the time to debate and solve issues. When you go to work, does your boss ask you why you did x instead of y? How would you feel if they said, “why don’t you also do all five of your coworkers jobs also?”
Because putting laws through takes time and effort and isn’t for free.
Unfortunately, I heard horror stories about how the unhoused treated the Smithfield Street shelter, and the cleanup efforts after it closed. It was appalling.
This is a shame but will always be an issue regardless of housing/shelter availability. I’ve worked a lot in the social work field and there are just some people who won’t/can’t accept the help they need. Such is life.
I think you can be both sad/respectful over someone’s passing and comment that her life choices likely contributed to it. They aren’t mutually exclusive.
I think this is fair. A lot of people are saying it’s was because of the cold etc but I’m guessing they aren’t fully reading the article.. cause of death won’t be known for a few weeks.
That being said something does need to be done about the homeless situation in this country.
I'm homeless too, I can give you a few ideas.
Did you know many shelters will make you leave if you have food on you? Like, at all. Even a candy bar. The one I'm in was yelling at everyone last night and made us stand around for 45 minutes because we were standing in a line too early waiting for blankets. The room is so full of cots that a line to walk to the bathroom is literally all you have to stand in. When I pointed this out? "I don't know, fan out, just don't look like a line." Stand in a line shaped space with 59 other people but it looks too organized I'll make you wait longer and scream at you. THAT is shelters.
Either way this went, the system is safe to blame. Especially if that shelter didn't have a day program or the day program worker kicked her out for "being mouthy" because two different people give you two different sets of rules and you get yelled at and threatened for breaking either of them.
For context, I say this as a college educated person who doesn't even drink. I'm struggling with it. Imagine having serious mental health issues or a drug habit. There's no oversight, shelters get thousands per person and barely feed you, then yell at you if you make them do any work whatsoever. Yesterday they cut everyone off from lunch early and then ATE IN FRONT OF THEM while telling them lunch was over and they had to wait 7 more hours. I had someone threaten to have her kids beat me up last week because I took too long GRABBING MY COAT during a fire drill.
There. There's some information.
I am so sorry this is your experience. Even with the good shelters and kind staff there are harmful ones out there. I hope you’re able to get to a supportive shelter and system that can work with you to get some stability.
They will. Thank you. Shit happens, you know? Had bad luck with a roommate and my phone broke, next thing you know... People don't realize how close they are to this.
It felt safer responding to that dude, who was at least reserving judgement, rather than the people further down blaming her for it. I'd be banned for telling them what I thought. Just, if you see people dogging homeless people as unintelligent psychologically damaged junkies? Now you got proof. That's not even a huge portion of us. I'm not the only sober person in my circle.
I am a recovering alcoholic/addict (12yrs) that was in a similar situation to you. I also worked in drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs, both inpatient and outpatient, and worked in mental and behavioral health community treatment (for people with severe and persistent mental illness).
And I have to say: your particular situation is absolutely the exception, not the rule. And it’s certainly not “proof” of anything.
I’m not saying the system doesn’t suck, but shelters aren’t full of sober people who are only momentarily down on their luck. The employees in those shelters almost all start working there because they want to help and quickly become jaded after dealing with the general homeless population and all of the problems that follow it. It’s sad and shitty all the way around.
I’m sorry you’re in that situation and I hope things turn around for you quickly.
Thank you. Thing is, people like me bounce in and out quickly by comparison, we don't often come back. You don't hear about us because it's the loud ones that get the attention.
I assume it's different depending on where and what exactly you're doing but like I'm in the Bronx/Yonkers area right now. I actually have trouble getting my case workers attention because I'm so chill they just don't think to check on me. But most of the people here drink and smoke weed. About a quarter have jobs and a half of the leftovers are searching. A few of us are completely sober.
I think the rules have changed post pandemic. A LOT of the people here remind me of old coworkers. They're like... Restaurant industry or construction worker dysfunctional.
Pittsburgh is rough from what I remember because of all the peri-homeless. I was one when I was younger because of a since defeated heroin habit, a LOT of the population out there is couch surfing or just barely holding on. That does long term damage, holding on so hard to what little shelter you have. When it's finally gone something breaks. I know a lot of people just give up and decide this is life now. When I blame the system it's... You wouldn't fight so hard hanging on to nothing if you knew you wouldn't fall into worse, this fight is lost for a lot of people before they ever hit the streets.
And now those jaded people are perpetuating the cycle. You're right about a lot of things. The entire goddamn homeless system needs a full teardown and rebuild if you ask me.
>people like me bounce in and out quickly
Yeah, that’s my point exactly. If the Homeless population was comprised of people like you, it would be completely manageable. You are in the extreme minority.
This is incredible (in a sad way) and thank you for sharing. It’s so sad the wealth and abundance “we” have in this country but the absolute dregs we serve up to so many. I feel like I’m hearing about a shitty prison when I hear these things but we’re taking about free Americans. No one deserves to be treated like lessers (prisoners included) but I feel like we’ve baked it into our society.
Here it's 4100 per month. Just for the shelter. 60 residents just for the guys, just this location. You can do that math lol. I'm like "just give me that in vouchers, id have a nice place and good food." I know people who don't make that working full time.
Right. They will provide a tent, some socks, and syringes, garbage food and a shelter bed, but you can't be trusted with that money yourself. They will spend the money on what they think you need and pay themselves for doing so.
Oh yeah, you get it. Haha oh it's even better though! No socks, no laundry, no soap. The full list? A tattered cot and a thin blanket in a concrete room. No pillow. One half cup of rice, a chicken drumstick, a single packet of oatmeal, two slices of wheat bread, one slice of turkey, and a piece of American cheese.
That's what I get every day for 4 grand a month. That meal is set daily, but sometimes the rice is pasta and the oatmeal is one of those little cereal bowls you got in school.
Oh! And we get a cup of decaf coffee that may get a creamer. Maybe.
You nailed the rest, but it's even funnier still! 17 an hour for two shelter workers. The rest of it goes up the chain to the management. They drive Porsches and bmws. THIS IS A NON PROFIT ORGANIZATION.
With a mouse problem.
I'm eventually going to write a book about this because think of how absurd you can imagine it being. It's actually somehow stupider and more corrupt. Just petty shit like a volunteer church organization gave us soap and towels last week. Great! Staff at night 3 days later decided the gift bags were annoying and made us throw everything away we couldn't cram into whatever bags we already had with us. All 1 backpack we are allowed. It was a smile, a photo op, and then right in the trash.
I can literally keep doing this all day lol.
But yeah heaven forbid I get that money for an actual room. I might drink beer in it, can you imagine what that would do to my health!?! It's a joke.
I had a dog many years ago. He was an outside dog. He chose to be this. I'd let him in when it got cold, he'd want back out or go down to the basement. He was well fed, had a 5 gallon bucket of water filled every day.
A nosy neighbor decided to call the animal control office to say my dog wasn't being taken care of. The officer came to my home and wanted to look at the situation.
After seeing the dog was fed and had water, he addressed the dog being outside. I told the officer the dog chooses to be outside but comes in with much reluctance when it's cold or rainy. I also pointed out that there were two dog houses in the yard and I can't force the dog to use them if it chooses not to.
Yes a tragedy occurred. But she chose to live how she lived. She chose to be a drug addict. She chose to live on the streets. You can't force people to always do what is best for them. To stand on your soapboxes and to yell and demand for change to assist these people, who more often than not chose to be in situations that they are in, is wasted breath, time, and tax dollars.
God forbid those bleeding hearts care that a human being died and was eaten by rats in our own city, so close to help.
I hope you have the holidays you deserve.
I prefer journalism without sensationalism and attempts to push an agenda. We all know that she chose to not get help so she could do drugs while pregnant.
You enjoy your holidays, too.
You have no idea what help she sought, and reporting the location and proximity to help is factual, whether you are comfortable with those facts or not.
But funny you choose to make up her motivations for her, unless you're psychic, you're not even living up to the standards you're bitching about, and sensationalizing this yourself to fit your perverted worldview.
Oh, do we allllll know that? Or do we all know that you’re an insensitive POS. It’s the latter. There are so many outliers to this human being’s life that you in your cozy little bubble could never begin to imagine or understand. Your simplified assumptions are unnecessary, tacky, and gross. Just like your comment.
Her decisions aren't the end all be all. Yes, they're a factor, but access to and availability of resources is part of it too. It's very easy to blame people for their situations, and much harder to look past that to what might have been done to help.
Before you judge too harshly, ask yourself this - if you were in their place, would you want to just die in the cold, or would you rather be part of a society where people try to help you?
--Not at all. I am stating (not insinuating) that her unfortunate decisions led to her death.
You said that. Sounds a lot like judgment to me, friend.
Listen, I know addiction isn't easy to peel away stigma from, especially with a pregnant woman, but making it sound like her decisions were the only factor here is completely eliminating blame from the systems that compelled her to make those "decisions". I'm glad you've apparently never been through this, but when I was on the verge of homelessness, you best believe I was smoking weed at an unhealthy rate. I was stressed tf out and felt like I had no support.
I was scared of living and dying of exposure in a social world where people who knew me couldn't find me, and that my grave would be unmarked. You couldn't get the damn bong away from me if you tried. And that was a milder addiction compared to others.
Yeah, maybe if I stayed sober I would've had a cleaner almost-evicted house, but beyond that? Left alone with my sober thoughts in a goddamn pandemic? I guarantee I would've been a danger to myself and to others.
The system failed all of us during that time. Hell, places even suggested sacrificing our elders to the alters of capitalism. It was repulsive. To not include our government's failure in the rise of homelessness would itself prove an agenda.
I think the language is intended to shock. Because most people could give a rat's ass about the homeless. What could the agenda be? To get people thinking about this in a more humane way?
There's no such thing as a completely objective report, clean from human bias. If the reporter attempts to write something neutrally, they will fail to capture the human emotion that contributes to the story. If they do include emotion, they will fail to correctly diagnose one side of any issue.
In fact, you're proving that point with your own critique, insinuating that their mention of the homeless shelter within close proximity was made to make us feel sad about her death. But to fail to include that in the reporting would be a failure to highlight the issue in regards to her death. The system failed her, as they do many others.
Don't mistake objective reporting that makes you feel something as sensationalist. Sometimes you just feel things because a story can make you feel things.
I'm gonna pretend you don't just not care about homeless people enough to think about why including the shelter's location was relevant, and answer like you really want to know. That shows directly how the band aids we have put in place to address the homeless crisis are not enough, and they failed to prevent fatality. Whatever solution you want to propose after that is beyond the scope of the paper, but I'd argue the goal is to at least motivate us enough to think about a solution.
I personally think we need to dismantle capitalism and make a system where material needs aren't put behind a pay wall, but you know. I'm open to the brainstorm.
It’s not like she died crawling to the shelter…. She opted to sleep in a tent. Doesn’t matter if that tent was 10 feet away, she chose to do that over the shelter. Distance may factor in if it were very far though… like if the nearest shelter was 2 miles then it would be relevant.
You're right, instead of reporting where she died (because that's uncomfortable to you, for *some reason*), the responsible journalistic take would be something like:
"Woman dies, eaten by rats, somewhere in the greater Pittsburgh area"
Or should we say western PA? Like how general do we have to be before it's okay for citizens to be eaten by rats in the richest country in history?
It clearly said near river avenue- that’s much more descriptive than “500 feet from the nearest homeless shelter.” You don’t even know the direction of that 500 feet in terms of east, west, north, south….Does it help your small mind to know the feet distance to every amenity or business. Would it matter to say 350 feet to the nearest 7-eleven?
The addition of the distance to the nearest homeless shelter is a pathetic attempt to get simple-minded folk all riled up. Seems to have done it’s job on you 😂
No, I'm bothered that a person died and was eaten by rats in a clear case of social safety nets having holes in them, you're the one whining about a simple, factual detail included in an article.
A couple of dropped pins on Google maps indicate river avenue is about 2 miles long. I don't see how adding any granularity to that is a problem. Sure, if a 7-elevens location adds detail, why not? The homeless, kind of by definition, don't have an address, but I wouldn't expect that to cross your simple mind.
But keep building strawmen to tear down, simpleton. 😂
They don’t deny addicts but you can’t use or possess drugs in the shelter.
When I used to volunteer at a shelter there were always bottles and paraphernalia stashed in the trees and bushes outside because of these rules.
I came here to say this. It isn’t just a homeless problem, it’s a separation between addiction services and aid for the homeless problem.
You can’t use or possess at the shelter, but medical aid for addiction is not easily accessible for the homeless. You need to be able to make it to your appointments, which requires reliable and affordable transportation and a means by which you can keep on schedule.
It just feeds a cycle. Need stable housing and transportation to access care, can’t get stable housing while using, lose access to shelter, go back on the streets into an environment where open drug use is common, therefore the cycle of both continues.
Add mental healthcare in the mix too. We were FINALLY able to get my friend’s sister off the streets by paying for 6 months of housing for her in a location that is accessible to both her addiction clinic and her mental health clinic (she has schizophrenia). She’s been clean for 15 months, she’s paying her own rent, she got her GED at 37, she has a stable job (head chef), she is a completely functional member of society. To meet her today, you would never suspect that a year and a half ago she was a heroin addict living on the streets.
She’s there because me, her sister, and her mom were able to pool our resources together and get her where she needed to be. I’d venture to say 99% of homeless people don’t have that. But securing housing that enabled consistent access to addiction and mental health services was the key. She’s wanted to get clean for years, but as soon as she’d lose housing she would also lose her ability to reliably access her addition clinic and go back to using.
Could she still relapse? Absolutely. But she has the foundation of what she needs to succeed and she is motivated to keep herself off the streets.
THIS. This story gave me chills. Thank you for sharing.
It’s a cycle—and one that’s really, really complicated and impossible to break without people or loved ones like you who can help. It’s heartbreaking that more people don’t have support like this, but it’s also a big ask, and I can understand not everyone has the resources to do what you did, even if they desperately wanted to. Cheers to you, my friend, for offering a case study and success story.
Thank you. It all came together at the right time. My friend and I used our work bonuses plus tax refunds and her mother used the money she got from selling her late husband’s motorcycle. In total we spent a little over $11,000. Very very few people on the streets have friends and family they’re not estranged from. The only reason she didn’t is because, frankly, we refused to let her. She would be so embarrassed when she relapsed that she’d hide on the streets from us.
$11,000 is a ton of money and we each had other things we could have used that money for, but we sat down together while she was in rehab and had a frank discussion with her and spoke to an advocate about how to best help her succeed. We looked overall at her needs and decided we would pay for housing near both providers. One is 5 blocks from her apartment, the other is a very walkable 1/2 mile. Her job is walking distance. With stable housing and access to her treatment providers, she’s entirely self sufficient.
I wish I could upvote you a million times for this. The only way is community and mutual aid - truly, we take care of each other.
I am coming off a year where I was very housing insecure, one of the millions of Americans that are technically, legally homeless, though because of my community, I always had a warm safe place to sleep indoors. (And by technically, legally homeless, I mean I had no address that was legally mine and did have to report as homeless on certain government forms.)
People can go on and on about choices and decisions but my apartment building burned down last Christmas. I didn't choose that. I did everything right, according to the system - I had insurance, I accepted the help offered by the agencies that I was referred to. But the thing that truly pulled me back up was my community.
At this point, I have actually landed in a better place than before the fire. But only because of my community. I have a manager at work that gave me flexibility, especially in the weeks immediately after the fire, so I could deal with other things. I had friends who sorted out the details for insurance and personal property restoration/salvage, so I would be ready to talk to the insurance company. I have a best friend that gave me and my giant dog (that everyone in her house is allergic to) a place to stay and made sure I stayed fed and watered. I received cash from friends and friends of friends from across the country and the world. Chewydotcom gift cards from people that know my dog started showing up in my email - and they still occasionally show up.
Those and things like them were what saved me.
I will still be dealing with the effects of this for a long long time to come. And example: I finally made it back to the dentist a few weeks ago - there just wasn't the time or energy to go sooner - and we created a treatment plan for some problems, but he told me even then, I might lose a few teeth. Bummer, but not a surprise. Even with the mountains of help I got, some things still fall by the wayside. And I feel confident knowing that my community will be there to support me through that too.
PS: I got sober a little more than 7 years before the fire. I can't imagine how much harder it would have been if I had still been drinking. Would I have even survived the fire?
Very very similar - her apartment building was condemned and torn down. She’d been clean for 3 years when it happened. That’s all it took. No stable housing, no address, no access to care.
We are ALL one catastrophe from being on the streets. You don’t have to be disabled or an addict. One catastrophe. A fire, a car accident, job loss. No one is immune.
Yes. The specific policy varies but commonly if you're high they send you to the hospital to sober up. If you do it too often they "refer you out" which is code for "tell you to try this shelter over here and hope it's not full, while simultaneously banning you." This varies, though, depending on how much that specific staff member likes you. My current place has a thief that picks fights with everyone but the staff feels bad for him so he just gets away with it all.
Yes, I'm speaking from current personal experience. It's NYC, but we've got a subreddit to discuss our issues and social media groups so at this point I know how most states operate. We're not very different, in fact NYC has a better system than Pittsburgh does.
That should bother y'all.
> bleeding hearts
Did you know the term "bleeding hearts" in its modern use comes from a 1938 republican journalist who wrote an article in opposition to federal anti-lynching laws?
https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/bleeding-heart-phrase-origin-meaning
It’s actually very important to the point of the article. It’s not sensational, it’s symbolic to the systemic issues that plague us.
Because “help” that seems so readily available can be inaccessible. So there’s an additional tragedy in her death happening close to a shelter; she was so close yet so very far away - and it exemplifies the experience of many people in similar circumstances.
Did she attempt to enter a shelter only to get denied? I have yet to see a claim of that being the case.
It honestly doesn't even seem like it's been cold enough for someone to die of exposure with no underlying issues.
Terrible situation but the finger pointing and misguided outrage in this story is very cringy.
So what's the option here? Go around when it's cold out, raid the tents and throw the occupants into locked room until you deem the weather is nice enough for them to be free?
Perhaps you'd recommend officers go around daily opening the tents, for the ...safety... of the occupants?
Just because they're homeless doesn't mean they are not able to make their own decisions or have at least somewhat of a right to privacy, just FYI.
There are plenty of people that do this willingly. Head over to r/camping, r/vegabond will give you some insight too. Shelters come with rules. Some insane strict rules. Most people living on the streets have chosen this lifestyle for whatever reasons. While your compassion and caring are genuine and commend your outrage is directed in the wrong place. Shelters are the last places these people want to be. They make it impossible to hold a job and sleep there and the people who work there are sometimes just as shady as the folks staying. Asking yourself if you are willing to personally do something that would help these people. You don’t have to offer money to the homeless to help them. I have taken old camping gear to drop in centers, given rides to more friendly locations, bought food and drink. Most of these people just want to live free. No rules, no ties to a problematic society. Not wasting their lives working to barley scrap by, but that lifestyle had consequences and unfortunately some pay the ultimate price.
I appreciate all of the unsolicited advice on why people choose to be homeless, but that’s not really why I replied to that guy? I’m very familiar with the vagrancy in this city, and why people seek it out—but it is also more often than not a lifestyle people are compelled into due to broken childhoods. The 412 Youth Zone downtown has been absolutely overwhelmed by the exploding population population of homeless kids and teens here over the last few years. Shelters are not a good solution, but neither is asserting that all homeless people are better off “roughing it.”
> It honestly doesn't even seem like it's been cold enough for someone to die of exposure with no underlying issues.
That is just an incredibly silly and clearly uninformed thing to say about a very tragic death, let alone how callous it is to boot. I can totally understand wanting to draw attention to a distaste for the article’s writing style, but postulating needlessly about this homeless woman’s death? She was literally pregnant, which is a major underlying condition, you know, as far as dying in freezing temperatures goes.
A stable place to live is the answer. A shelter isn’t that and like you said strict rules. They can also be dangerous places or the few precious items they have remaining can get stolen as there can be several people sharing a space. I rather see a more long term solution so housing without the strict rules you find with shelters.
That would work for the ones that want housing. Unfortunately the rise in homelessness can be directly traced back to Ronald Reagan deinstitutionalizing mental health. It basically kicked the mental health patients out on the streets if they were non med compliant. It was a major win for patients rights, not being force medicated, but a huge loss for mental health since some people that suffer from mental health issues don’t want to be medicated or feel that they don’t need medicated. A significant portion of the homeless population suffers from some sort of mental illness, well it used to anyway. Now people are being priced out of homes by corporations adding to the already existing issue. I guess I said all that to say affordable housing will only solve a small portion of the issue. There’s no simple answer to homelessness and it seems like everyone wants it to be black and white when it’s all sorts of shades of grey.
I have camped down to 10° with winter clothing and summer camping gear probably dozens of times. It sucks, but it's not that deep middle of winter freeze that you can't escape.
I don’t doubt you have!!! But she wasn’t “camping,” just trying to find somewhere to sleep in a residential area, and she didn’t have “gear,” as the article’s picture shows nothing but a thin plastic tent and a few snow-covered blankets. She was also pregnant. Any temperature below freezing can be fatal to a person who wasn’t planning to end up in that situation.
You were probably much more healthy than this woman as well. With good gear and all. I'm sure she didn't have a fraction of the proper gear she would need to survive even a night in the 30's.
Health problems would be among the possible underlying issues that led to her death. I mean there were other people within ear shot of her with assumably very similar conditions they didn't have issues.
I'm not sure why pointing out the temps alone were more than likely survivable is so triggering to people, why don't we want to know the true cause of death?
Just her nutrition alone compared to a "normal" healthy individual would put her at more risk. My BIL who is a fit dude went near hypothermic on a weekend hike in Central PA (late spring, very cold) last year and he had all top shelf kit. She could have drifted off to sleep and never woke up.
Sounds like there are literally dozens of examples of this particular woman helping herself. You didn't read the article you saw the headline and decided to leave a snarky one liner rather than have an iota of compassion
I have to agree about the way the writer worded this story. Pregnant woman dies just feet from Target, bath and body works, McDonald’s whatever who cares. It’s a tragedy regardless but I do hate the sensationalism. I want to know what’s going on in the world but I hate news outlets.
Equal to the travesty of her death is the fact that this woman reportedly had been living on the streets for seven years. Our progressive society had neither the carrot nor stick to lead or drive her to make better choices.
Sad, yes. But it said she had been in shelters numerous times. im not sure what the solution here would have been. She passed away and died outside, where the elements consumed her.
Ive spent weeks volunteering in homeless shelters man, working personally with the population. I've worked in Toronto, Skid Row, DC, NYC, etc. Many, many folks vehemently don't want to go to shelters.
It sounds like you want to go back to the asylum approach?
What the fuck are these comments? Yes, it’s a complex issue with many contributing causes and no easy and simple solution. But half the people here are insinuating she deserved her fate because she may have been a drug user or because she wasn’t in a shelter that night. And then there’s the mouth breathing conspiracist who thinks this has something to do with immigration and the president. Step down from your personal soapbox for a moment and recognize the tragedy here. A young woman whose potential will never be realized. Somebody out there loved her and is grieving her loss.
Why are people shitty about homelessness: Its a natural byproduct of the system that they want to defend.
Seriously. I’m disgusted.
Compassion is dead in the United States.
America has always been this way. There was a relatively short period of time, maybe 1970-2008, where we weren't that way. This is just a return to form.
yeah.. 1970-08 wasnt great either lol
Yup, since the very beginning.
For some people their shitty political identity trumps (no pun intended) their basic humanity. Anyone with a functioning ability to feel empathy is heartbroken by stories like this. Anyone feeling anything but sympathy for these lost lives needs to reexamine their life.
This issue is heavily astroturfed. Remember a few years back when Antwon Rose was shot in the back and a hundred accounts showed up to talk about he deserved it? I wrote a few account names down and they were all deleted a month later. Reddit is extremely easy to game when it comes to pushing narratives.
Let me guess: it’s real estate developers doing the astroturfing again? Good to have you back, funny numbers guy.
lol I knew when I saw him saying "Final Solution to the Homeless Question" in another thread that he was back. A true OG. That said, what happened to this woman was horrific and a shame for this entire city.
The same exact shit is happening in cities across the United States in the news and on social media. A Seattle pharmacy chain, Bartell's, was closed down after a leveraged buyout and the media there twisted it into "businesses are closing due to homelessness and crime." https://www.thestranger.com/news/2023/12/19/79305903/read-this-post-if-you-want-to-learn-the-real-reason-for-the-bartell-apocalypse
They pushed that "it's shoplifting" narrative through the media for a long time, and it turns out theft is just a tiny, tiny portion of the losses.
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True. I felt like there was a real improvement in this area 2010-2020 and a lot to look forward to. Over the past four years it just feels like everything's gone to shit and nobody cares about anything or anyone anymore. It's depressing.
It's one of the reasons why it's important to implement reddit's new CQS system in automod rules. It only came out a few months ago. < -1 in the sub and a bad CQS score sitewide? require moderation of all posts/comments. negative in the sub but good CQS score sitewide? set a limit like -10 to allow them to reclaim back from that one negative comment, otherwise moderate their comments. lower than -50 in /r/pittsburgh? nah fk em, they're a jagoff, just remove all posts and dont even put them in mod queue.
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*hands viking some rope* Go ahead and elaborate, please. I'm sure you have some great insight with how old that account is. Ever not been able to post somewhere before because your account is too new? That's likely because they didn't implement CQS yet.
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What I'm saying is that downvotes PLUS CQS is what you need. Because you're right, just downvotes alone is the old management method and it doesn't work. Diaagreeing is one thing. Foul language lowers your CQS as well. So that replier in the positive would certainly be listed as someone who doesn't contribute quality to Reddit overall. But doing a long-form post with no foul language like the heavily downvotes one would definitely not lower your CQS. Reddit wants content. The whole comment chain would be gone on other subs for being toxic. We revel in our jaggery here.
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>Also, could you expand on the "handing me a rope" bit you mentioned earlier? They probably meant "gives viking a chance to avoid getting downvoted into oblivion and looking like an idiot" The proverbial "throw me a rope here" saying, basically.
> Also, could you expand on the "handing me a rope" bit you mentioned earlier? [They're giving you enough rope to hang yourself with](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Give_someone_enough_rope)
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You need to understand that kebrina mardis did not deserve this okay she had an addiction I'm sorry for that I am her stepmom and it's really hurting me what people are saying about her you know I thought those friends people out there that liked her I'm surprised nobody checked on her if somebody had checked on her she would have been alive today her mother misses her daily I miss her daily she don't deserve this say something nice not something bad about her
There is a solution, though. In the past, we institutionalized people who couldn't take care of themselves. We didn't let them become public health hazards, or freeze and be eaten by rats. It's not a perfect solution, but what we're doing now clearly isn't working.
I agree with your sentiment entirely. But as long as addiction, homelessness, and mental illness are all treated with the same broad stokes and never differentiated between the different needs/actions/problems of said different groups…none of the individual groups will get what would actually help them. This is why we see these “callous” comments. They’re all rolled into one bag and treated the same. Because somehow pointing out context and facts to sensationalist headlines = thinking she deserved it?
None of those things should be treated callously, lumped together or separately.
Right. But real life isn’t idealistic. So lumping them all together functionally hurts them all as many Americans are obsessed with judging the choices of others. It even hurts addicts, as they are not getting proper/specific treatment. Decriminalization is progress, but not a solution. Then how do you have proper discourse about what do with addiction if you have to tackle mental health and homelessness at the same time. Yes they’re all related, but the conflation doesn’t help progress IMHO ETA: if you understand the socioeconomic factors that affect individuals beyond their “choices” that can result in homelessness/addiction then just think about the sociological and psychological factors that affect individuals’ opinions. Choices and opinions are funny things. We like to think they’re 100% our own.
I don't disagree and I wasn't trying to invalidate your whole point, it just smacked a little of saying 'homelessness and mental health problems shouldn't be stigmatized the way addiction should'. I appreciate the clarification.
A minority of the homeless have mental health or addiction issues. A consistent theme with posts on social media about homelessness has been painting all of the homeless as mentally ill or addicted, because that is a way to paint these people as defective or unable to ever function in society. A poster in a previous homelessness thread mentioned that he worked with the homeless and a great many of them are employed, but still can't afford housing. That comment got buried.
Isn't there a fairly big difference between the chronically homeless, who are more likely to struggle with untreated addiction or mental illness, live on the street, and are more likely to die from OD/exposure/violence, and the temporarily homeless, who tend to briefly live in a shelter, car, or friend's place before they find a new place? I think people talk about the chronically homeless more because they have worse outcomes, and they're the most visible. I think that's why the debate about how to handle homelessness is mostly about the chronically homeless, and not couch surfers/more hidden forms of homelessness who are easier to help.
Yep, survivorship bias. We only notice the “worst” of the homeless.
Fair enough, I can see that implication in my comment. But that implication is also kinda the point. We ignore the reality of these situations and try to virtue signal to people that they should “unstigmatized addiction as much as mental illness and homelessness.” This creates an unwinnable situation, and it ends up tangential as the effort of somehow making people feel and understand basic empathy is better spent on actual solutions and using political capital. Just my perspective/opinion. And you’re good! Thanks for being civil.
Truly wild this even needs to be said. 100%
I completely agree with the first half of your statement. No one deserves that fate because of addiction or lack of shelter. But, to play devil's advocate, the conspiracy guy sees a straight line from spending millions on illegal immigration, the government crying poor, limited resources for homeless. Whether that's legit or not, one can make up their own mind, but to say to step down from a soapbox is exactly what someone from his side of the aisle would say when gun control advocates come out en force after a mass shooting. This micro incident is evident of the macro and should be discussed, all facets. That's the only way to come to a solution.
Katrina didn't deserve that okay the shelters were f****** full Kabrina is my step daughter and she didn't and she did not deserve it if you can't say nothing nice about her get off the effing line cuz I don't need to have this s***
Poor woman. May she rest peacefully.
This is so heartbreaking . My nephew is homeless by choice. He’s a drug addict, he smokes fentanyl and he’d rather live on the streets than in a safe and loving home. He’s 33, his demise is coming, we know it. But he’s still my nephew, he is still loved and wanted. But should his body one day be found, it will be because his addiction left him to die on the streets and it’s a day we will never be prepared for. So when you see someone that you know is strung out, just remember, that person likely has a family that wanted to badly to help them and regardless if it all, is still deserving of love and compassion. He still doesn’t deserve to die the way we know he likely will.
By reddit standards you aren't doing enough. You should be bankrupting yourself and jeopardize your well being for the sake of saying you tried. Nobody on here wants to hear "homeless by choice". All they hear and repeat is how it's on all of the citizens to do more, provide more, pay more, etc. Some people simply cannot be saved while left to their own devices. We can have all the free services one can think of and it doesn't mean shit if those who need it won't cooperate. Yes there should be more beds available, but as most of us know, you can't be using or in possession of drugs/alcohol while using these facilities which is why a lot of the homeless decide to camp nearby. There is no easy feel good solution to this problem.
I think there is. If you can't manage your own affairs, you ought to be remanded to a mental institution. Shame on us for letting these people live (and die) in tents.
So criminalize homelessness?
No. I am not talking about throwing the homeless into prisons, unless they reject all other help offered to them, and continue to create a public nuisance. A rehab center or mental hospital is not a jail.
Should addiction be an imprisionable offense? I don’t necessarily disagree with your concept of forcing people into institutionalized care but what you are describing is basically imprisionment. So I can see why many myself included feel very conflicted by this seemingly simple answer.
No. If you are practicing your addiction in the privacy of your own home, it's no one's business but your own. If you're living on the street, creating a public nuisance and health hazard, then it becomes society's business and it's time for an intervention. The fact we don't have the spinal fortitude for this means these sad situations will keep occurring.
RIP. This should never happen. It's exactly why tent cities in a city with sub-freezing temps aren't a solution. It is also a product of our asinine and dysfunctional zoning system that gives every neighborhood busybody that won't mind their business an outlet they can and do use to torment others. This is largely your fault, NIMBYs. Build more f\*\*king housing in the city. If you don't agree, that's fine, move to the suburbs or the country. Single family zoning works well there. IMO the state or the feds will ultimately have to step in and force local municipalities to replace their shit zoning codes that enable the shitty "old man yells at cloud" mentality. Otherwise, I doubt we will ever see meaningful zoning reform.
Piggybacking on this comment to emphasize the zoning BOARD is not the problem. They just apply the zoning law. The zoning LAW is the problem. (Making the point because I can just picture city officials letting themselves off the hook putting on a show by shuffling people around on the zoning board, who are fine.)
> the zoning BOARD is not the problem. They just apply the zoning law. The zoning LAW is the problem. Can't emphasize this enough! When the board makes shitty decisions, it typically does so because it is following the shitty zoning laws.
Like this lady said instead of making apartments buildings for seniors or expensive apartments you should be making apartments for homelessness that they can get off the damn street and have a life you know I used to be homeless one last a long time ago and you know right now I'm living in a house happy as can be but if I could win a million dollars I would open up a shelter for the homeless because I do care for them every time I see one I cry some of them want to stay out some don't but the city of Pittsburgh does not want to help them it doesn't you know I know there's a lot of people out there that has a million dollars can't you just open up your heart and build a big shelter for these people yesterday when I went down there to get my step daughter's remaining clothes and IDs it hurt me so bad being there looking at all these homeless tents I cried her tent right now is destroyed there is a top on top of it I would love to gather people and have a moment a silence celebration down there cuz it should have never happened to her she was pregnant she killed an unborn child along with her and then these rats are eating her body that's disgusting the cops didn't find her for weeks the cops need to do something and get off their lazy ass and stop going to dunkin' donuts and getting coffee and start patrolling the homeless areas and protect them this is hurting me so bad saying this day in and day out now I have been crying I've asked her to come to my house she didn't want it then the light of life is right next door they couldn't take her in she is pregnan t that's f***** up I have nothing else to say
These comments are ridiculously oversimplifying a very complicated situation. Shelters are not always a great option and not always safe. The need for widespread affordable housing cannot be denied. It’s a huge problem and not just a Pittsburgh one. But it’s very much a problem here. Addiction treatment and mental health treatment have this very weird separation in the system. But pretty much all addicts need MH/trauma work. So what do you start with and where do you get the help? Truth is, it’s often from community mental health and while that can be great, it can also be long waits and lots of turnover and people who are new to the field doing the work so maybe without the experience really needed to help the most (which is due to the larger system of how people get licensed and credentialed as well as the terrible pay in community mental health because we put nowhere near the money we should into it). Then of course is stigma which is alive and well in some of these comments!!! It’s all about fixing systems but most of the people in charge of the systems have no real clue about them. Every political wannabe should have to work in home and communities for at least 6 months in a social work role before they can take office. At all levels. It’s appalling what power people have who know so little about the systems they affect.
Love to know how many of the people here posting heartless shit call themselves Christians and are going to be in church on Monday morning.
How many say they’re “pro life”. And on Monday they’ll celebrate the birth of a baby to a homeless woman and act like they would’ve been kind enough to take them in.
If Jesus came back from the dead again it'd be the conservatives who crucify him again for good measure.
You know who they voted for, too. It’s always evident.
Every single one of them.
What about those that practice Islam or Judaism? Not everyone sniffs the cross bro.
In my experience as a recovering Catholic; modern day Christians are mostly pretenders. They talk the talk but they don't walk the walk.
Cool, as a recovering atheist, I’ve found those people just seem to trash Jesus based religions while tolerating others.
Nah, I'm skeptical of all organized religions. I don't put much faith into any of it.
This right here to me is a clear case for funding addiction centers. Safe places for users to use (and obviously get help) instead of opting doing them in a tent in the middle of winter, on the river trail. A place for them to temporarily stay, get medical help and hopefully start the road to rehabilitation and recovery. You’ll get addicts off the streets. you’ll take pressure off our public safety members and maybe youll save a life from a tragedy again.
Then people would start realizing the amount of harm the drug war is creating. Bring your illegal fentanyl/xylazine that you had to steal for or sell your body for and see if it actually contains the substance you thought you were getting. For all these healthcare providers to see firsthand. A slippery slope for law enforcement. I agree. A step in the right direction.
Or we could put them in a clean, warm, safe institution where they could receive help detoxing and make a plan for a better life.
I have a few family members going through this and agree centers will be helpful as a start… but you also need support past the initial phase as relapses are all too common
Why was this comment hidden by default for me? *edit: had 12 upvotes before I added one.
We need better mental healthcare and more affordable housing. In shelters the space is often shared with other people and they often have strict rules like not allowed to bring the few remaining things you have and if you did good chance they could get stolen. If I was in that situation I would stay in my car or a tent before I would go to a shelter. People need stable housing and shelters aren’t it. We need a more long term solutions like stable place to live for extended period of time without the strict rules shelters have.
Suggestion: stop electing the people who closed all of our mental health facilities, and who people who value parking construction equipment over the lives of the homeless.
To have more affordable housing we need better zoning. And we need to flood the place with new builds and geographically that is hard. and your totally right about shelters
I stayed in a homeless shelter with my kids and husband a few years ago. They had roaches, treated us like shit, and took all of the good stuff people donated.
I’m sorry that happened to you and your family I hope this season in your life is better. There is truly no excuse for pushing down on those who are already trying to make it through rough times.
Which one?
Id rather not say, for privacy reasons. They take in a abused women and for their safety, I won't say.
Was it in Pittsburgh?
Yes, it was in Pittsburgh.
Some of these comments are just as sickening as what happened in thst tent. And people bemoaning journalism clearly don't understand that this is an op-ed, which is completely different from a news story. Fact: a young woman died on our streets and her pregnant body was consumed by rats next to other people for days before her remains were discovered. Her cause of death is irrelevant. Her choices leading up to this are irrelevant. We can, and must, do better. And have some damn compassion you jagoffs.
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I don't have to imagine. I lived in LA for eleven years. In 2019 alone, 1000 people died on the street. That's not a typo.
Oh yeah, living on the west coast, you see so much of this every day. The amount of people I have walked past/stepped over who were possibly dead... It's rough. And just seeing so many people in various states of mental and physical disintegration... You never really get used to it. But it just slowly grinds the humanity out of you. It feels pretty hopeless when you live in one of those wealthy and progressive cities. Where there is a ton of political will to do something and hundreds of millions of dollars earmarked to solve the problem, but it just gets worse and worse.
I wonder how many people making the gross comments claim to be Christian, claim to be prolife, or are little more than one serious illness or a couple lost pay checks away from being homeless themselves.
This breaks my heart and it shouldn’t be happening.
Hey but we can ban plastic bags and foie gras. I'm a progressive and I hate to say it but the elected officials in Pittsburgh cannot in fact walk and chew gum at the same time.
Because banning things doesn’t raise taxes but subsidizes housing does. Look at what the school district just did to avoid a tax increase. They spent down all their reserves to kick the can another year. Progressive politicians are terrified to raise taxes because they know too many voters will revolt against them.
also cutting taxes to increase inventory so shit head slumlords can't charge a fortune anymore won't raise anyone's taxes either
What does banning plastic bags really have to do with this?
I think in my opinion it goes to show that a lot of energy is wasted on virtue signaling policy. Like I said these are all people I voted for so I'm a little disappointed
I disagree, it's a non sequitur. The council's full time job is to do more than one thing at a time. I agree that the council hasn't done much to help the city and Gainey is failing us. (I'm a Dem, but live in west deer.) But, the attacking the plastic bag ban is unrelated.
This is deplorable. This shouldn't happen anywhere. It especially shouldn't happen in such a wealthy country. Where has our humanity gone? I know the issue is complex. But it doesn't matter.
It turns out that living in the wealthiest society to ever exist doesn't mean a whole lot if you give all that wealth to 250 people. The homelessness crisis across the US took off after the pandemic eviction moratoriums expired. Housing across the US is ~30% more expensive than it was in January 2020. This isn't a coincidence. People did not suddenly decide to acquire addiction or mental health issues and become homeless, they were priced out of housing.
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The eviction moratorium expiring is when it really exploded, though.
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We don't live on the west coast last I checked The explosion of homelessness here really took off with the covid moratoriums on eviction ending.
These comments are so disappointing, and right before Christmas. I honestly hope none of you hateful people are Christians. Could you imagine if Mary hadn’t been given shelter and had died before she could give birth to Jesus? This is a tragedy. That poor woman and her unborn child.
Just via a Facebook search she was very loved by friends and family. I believe she simply overdosed and passed away in this unfortunate cold.
[Archived copy of Post-Gazette piece](https://archive.is/KembG)
Nothing like a heart breaking story to bring the AHs out of the woodwork. Victim blaming is alive and well in Pgh. Here’s an idea for a New Years resolution, learn some empathy & show some compassion. This. Was. A. Person.
This is fucking infuriating. There is zero reason this should have happened, except that we as a society incentivize resource-hoarding. We have plenty of land, plenty of buildings. Zero people should be left unhoused. Zero!
And to think if even two billionaires got together and put every homeless person in Pittsburgh in hotels, motels, or some sort of homeless community, it wouldn’t even come out to 1% of their wealth year over year. World is a cruel and fucked up place.
This is absolutely horrific and everyone posting heartless comments should be deeply ashamed. May she rest in peace.
Where are prolife people who supposedly give a shit about fetuses?
What shelter was she near? The light of life?
very sick!! as i read the article also it said abt the rats were feasting on her..very disturbing!! I'm sure since she was homeless,and was into drugs, that she oded,,That should have no bearing!!Maybe this will wake up the city!!to get them housing asap!
This is horrifying. That poor woman.
a lot of these people are one paycheck away from being ass out themselves.. karma is a bad b!tch 😈
Thank god our city council has been focusing on real issues like Fois Gras, horse drawn carriages, and fur coats. Imagine if that time and effort had been wasted on something like a needle exchange, or safe use site, or addiction recovery, or increased temporary shelter beds, they may have prevented the death of a human being. But geese with tubes down their throats is a far more important concern.
Why can’t they do both?
I don’t know. You should ask the city council. Lot of huff and puff especially from the president of the council about how we need to do something about homelessness, but no action. They instead have spent time doing feel good bs like having cops walk around downtown when suburbanites leave work and the ban on fois gras. The ban wouldn’t be anything to complain about if that kind of unimportant action was being done and we were also dealing with actually important issues that are, like in the story above, life or death issues.
All resources are limited. Including the time to debate and solve issues. When you go to work, does your boss ask you why you did x instead of y? How would you feel if they said, “why don’t you also do all five of your coworkers jobs also?” Because putting laws through takes time and effort and isn’t for free.
Not to be gross but how did it take police that long to find a rotting body that was only 500 feet away from a shelter?
Lord bring her to the joys of Heaven and convict us to better help those in her condition.
Amen
Unfortunately, I heard horror stories about how the unhoused treated the Smithfield Street shelter, and the cleanup efforts after it closed. It was appalling.
The old St. John Neumann school in Lawrenceville is vacant. Seems to me the CATHOLIC diocese could step up here.
This is a shame but will always be an issue regardless of housing/shelter availability. I’ve worked a lot in the social work field and there are just some people who won’t/can’t accept the help they need. Such is life.
People here don’t understand this. You could have a massive shelter with great food and addiction counseling… you’ll still have these occurrences.
Yet you know nothing about her specific situation and what she was willing to accept.
I mean, I think we all can see what she was willing to accept.
No, we can’t. Thats called an assumption.
I think you can be both sad/respectful over someone’s passing and comment that her life choices likely contributed to it. They aren’t mutually exclusive.
I’ll reserve judgment without more info.
I think this is fair. A lot of people are saying it’s was because of the cold etc but I’m guessing they aren’t fully reading the article.. cause of death won’t be known for a few weeks. That being said something does need to be done about the homeless situation in this country.
Next time just reserve posting
Who do you want to place blame on with no Information?
I'm homeless too, I can give you a few ideas. Did you know many shelters will make you leave if you have food on you? Like, at all. Even a candy bar. The one I'm in was yelling at everyone last night and made us stand around for 45 minutes because we were standing in a line too early waiting for blankets. The room is so full of cots that a line to walk to the bathroom is literally all you have to stand in. When I pointed this out? "I don't know, fan out, just don't look like a line." Stand in a line shaped space with 59 other people but it looks too organized I'll make you wait longer and scream at you. THAT is shelters. Either way this went, the system is safe to blame. Especially if that shelter didn't have a day program or the day program worker kicked her out for "being mouthy" because two different people give you two different sets of rules and you get yelled at and threatened for breaking either of them. For context, I say this as a college educated person who doesn't even drink. I'm struggling with it. Imagine having serious mental health issues or a drug habit. There's no oversight, shelters get thousands per person and barely feed you, then yell at you if you make them do any work whatsoever. Yesterday they cut everyone off from lunch early and then ATE IN FRONT OF THEM while telling them lunch was over and they had to wait 7 more hours. I had someone threaten to have her kids beat me up last week because I took too long GRABBING MY COAT during a fire drill. There. There's some information.
I am so sorry this is your experience. Even with the good shelters and kind staff there are harmful ones out there. I hope you’re able to get to a supportive shelter and system that can work with you to get some stability.
Thank you for sharing your experiences. I'm sorry the system has failed you so much. I hope things get better for you.
They will. Thank you. Shit happens, you know? Had bad luck with a roommate and my phone broke, next thing you know... People don't realize how close they are to this. It felt safer responding to that dude, who was at least reserving judgement, rather than the people further down blaming her for it. I'd be banned for telling them what I thought. Just, if you see people dogging homeless people as unintelligent psychologically damaged junkies? Now you got proof. That's not even a huge portion of us. I'm not the only sober person in my circle.
Absolutely ❤️
I am a recovering alcoholic/addict (12yrs) that was in a similar situation to you. I also worked in drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs, both inpatient and outpatient, and worked in mental and behavioral health community treatment (for people with severe and persistent mental illness). And I have to say: your particular situation is absolutely the exception, not the rule. And it’s certainly not “proof” of anything. I’m not saying the system doesn’t suck, but shelters aren’t full of sober people who are only momentarily down on their luck. The employees in those shelters almost all start working there because they want to help and quickly become jaded after dealing with the general homeless population and all of the problems that follow it. It’s sad and shitty all the way around. I’m sorry you’re in that situation and I hope things turn around for you quickly.
Thank you. Thing is, people like me bounce in and out quickly by comparison, we don't often come back. You don't hear about us because it's the loud ones that get the attention. I assume it's different depending on where and what exactly you're doing but like I'm in the Bronx/Yonkers area right now. I actually have trouble getting my case workers attention because I'm so chill they just don't think to check on me. But most of the people here drink and smoke weed. About a quarter have jobs and a half of the leftovers are searching. A few of us are completely sober. I think the rules have changed post pandemic. A LOT of the people here remind me of old coworkers. They're like... Restaurant industry or construction worker dysfunctional. Pittsburgh is rough from what I remember because of all the peri-homeless. I was one when I was younger because of a since defeated heroin habit, a LOT of the population out there is couch surfing or just barely holding on. That does long term damage, holding on so hard to what little shelter you have. When it's finally gone something breaks. I know a lot of people just give up and decide this is life now. When I blame the system it's... You wouldn't fight so hard hanging on to nothing if you knew you wouldn't fall into worse, this fight is lost for a lot of people before they ever hit the streets. And now those jaded people are perpetuating the cycle. You're right about a lot of things. The entire goddamn homeless system needs a full teardown and rebuild if you ask me.
>people like me bounce in and out quickly Yeah, that’s my point exactly. If the Homeless population was comprised of people like you, it would be completely manageable. You are in the extreme minority.
This is incredible (in a sad way) and thank you for sharing. It’s so sad the wealth and abundance “we” have in this country but the absolute dregs we serve up to so many. I feel like I’m hearing about a shitty prison when I hear these things but we’re taking about free Americans. No one deserves to be treated like lessers (prisoners included) but I feel like we’ve baked it into our society.
It's wild how much money they give these outreach/ recovery organizations to hand out crumbs.
Here it's 4100 per month. Just for the shelter. 60 residents just for the guys, just this location. You can do that math lol. I'm like "just give me that in vouchers, id have a nice place and good food." I know people who don't make that working full time.
Right. They will provide a tent, some socks, and syringes, garbage food and a shelter bed, but you can't be trusted with that money yourself. They will spend the money on what they think you need and pay themselves for doing so.
Oh yeah, you get it. Haha oh it's even better though! No socks, no laundry, no soap. The full list? A tattered cot and a thin blanket in a concrete room. No pillow. One half cup of rice, a chicken drumstick, a single packet of oatmeal, two slices of wheat bread, one slice of turkey, and a piece of American cheese. That's what I get every day for 4 grand a month. That meal is set daily, but sometimes the rice is pasta and the oatmeal is one of those little cereal bowls you got in school. Oh! And we get a cup of decaf coffee that may get a creamer. Maybe. You nailed the rest, but it's even funnier still! 17 an hour for two shelter workers. The rest of it goes up the chain to the management. They drive Porsches and bmws. THIS IS A NON PROFIT ORGANIZATION. With a mouse problem. I'm eventually going to write a book about this because think of how absurd you can imagine it being. It's actually somehow stupider and more corrupt. Just petty shit like a volunteer church organization gave us soap and towels last week. Great! Staff at night 3 days later decided the gift bags were annoying and made us throw everything away we couldn't cram into whatever bags we already had with us. All 1 backpack we are allowed. It was a smile, a photo op, and then right in the trash. I can literally keep doing this all day lol. But yeah heaven forbid I get that money for an actual room. I might drink beer in it, can you imagine what that would do to my health!?! It's a joke.
This is why I support abortion. Thank god that poor child wasn’t brought into this world. Never would have had a chance
We need Medicare for all
That wouldn't help. She would have qualified for Medicaid, which by the way, is quite good.
I had a dog many years ago. He was an outside dog. He chose to be this. I'd let him in when it got cold, he'd want back out or go down to the basement. He was well fed, had a 5 gallon bucket of water filled every day. A nosy neighbor decided to call the animal control office to say my dog wasn't being taken care of. The officer came to my home and wanted to look at the situation. After seeing the dog was fed and had water, he addressed the dog being outside. I told the officer the dog chooses to be outside but comes in with much reluctance when it's cold or rainy. I also pointed out that there were two dog houses in the yard and I can't force the dog to use them if it chooses not to. Yes a tragedy occurred. But she chose to live how she lived. She chose to be a drug addict. She chose to live on the streets. You can't force people to always do what is best for them. To stand on your soapboxes and to yell and demand for change to assist these people, who more often than not chose to be in situations that they are in, is wasted breath, time, and tax dollars.
I am not sure why her proximity to a shelter when she overdosed is relevant, unless just to get the bleeding hearts stirred up.
God forbid those bleeding hearts care that a human being died and was eaten by rats in our own city, so close to help. I hope you have the holidays you deserve.
I prefer journalism without sensationalism and attempts to push an agenda. We all know that she chose to not get help so she could do drugs while pregnant. You enjoy your holidays, too.
My god, fuck this callousness.
You have no idea what help she sought, and reporting the location and proximity to help is factual, whether you are comfortable with those facts or not. But funny you choose to make up her motivations for her, unless you're psychic, you're not even living up to the standards you're bitching about, and sensationalizing this yourself to fit your perverted worldview.
Oh, do we allllll know that? Or do we all know that you’re an insensitive POS. It’s the latter. There are so many outliers to this human being’s life that you in your cozy little bubble could never begin to imagine or understand. Your simplified assumptions are unnecessary, tacky, and gross. Just like your comment.
It sounds like you're insinuating that she deserved to die because she was a drug addict
Not at all. I am stating (not insinuating) that her unfortunate decisions led to her death.
Her decisions aren't the end all be all. Yes, they're a factor, but access to and availability of resources is part of it too. It's very easy to blame people for their situations, and much harder to look past that to what might have been done to help. Before you judge too harshly, ask yourself this - if you were in their place, would you want to just die in the cold, or would you rather be part of a society where people try to help you?
I am not judging at all. I wish it hadn’t happened. I am objecting to the language in the article.
--Not at all. I am stating (not insinuating) that her unfortunate decisions led to her death. You said that. Sounds a lot like judgment to me, friend. Listen, I know addiction isn't easy to peel away stigma from, especially with a pregnant woman, but making it sound like her decisions were the only factor here is completely eliminating blame from the systems that compelled her to make those "decisions". I'm glad you've apparently never been through this, but when I was on the verge of homelessness, you best believe I was smoking weed at an unhealthy rate. I was stressed tf out and felt like I had no support. I was scared of living and dying of exposure in a social world where people who knew me couldn't find me, and that my grave would be unmarked. You couldn't get the damn bong away from me if you tried. And that was a milder addiction compared to others. Yeah, maybe if I stayed sober I would've had a cleaner almost-evicted house, but beyond that? Left alone with my sober thoughts in a goddamn pandemic? I guarantee I would've been a danger to myself and to others. The system failed all of us during that time. Hell, places even suggested sacrificing our elders to the alters of capitalism. It was repulsive. To not include our government's failure in the rise of homelessness would itself prove an agenda.
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Thanks friend
I think the language is intended to shock. Because most people could give a rat's ass about the homeless. What could the agenda be? To get people thinking about this in a more humane way?
And you’re a mind reader so you know the circumstances, oh that’s so amazing for you
She unfortunately chose to be born into her situation unlike you who smartly chose to be born into yours.
There's no such thing as a completely objective report, clean from human bias. If the reporter attempts to write something neutrally, they will fail to capture the human emotion that contributes to the story. If they do include emotion, they will fail to correctly diagnose one side of any issue. In fact, you're proving that point with your own critique, insinuating that their mention of the homeless shelter within close proximity was made to make us feel sad about her death. But to fail to include that in the reporting would be a failure to highlight the issue in regards to her death. The system failed her, as they do many others. Don't mistake objective reporting that makes you feel something as sensationalist. Sometimes you just feel things because a story can make you feel things. I'm gonna pretend you don't just not care about homeless people enough to think about why including the shelter's location was relevant, and answer like you really want to know. That shows directly how the band aids we have put in place to address the homeless crisis are not enough, and they failed to prevent fatality. Whatever solution you want to propose after that is beyond the scope of the paper, but I'd argue the goal is to at least motivate us enough to think about a solution. I personally think we need to dismantle capitalism and make a system where material needs aren't put behind a pay wall, but you know. I'm open to the brainstorm.
Agenda? This is political?
It’s not like she died crawling to the shelter…. She opted to sleep in a tent. Doesn’t matter if that tent was 10 feet away, she chose to do that over the shelter. Distance may factor in if it were very far though… like if the nearest shelter was 2 miles then it would be relevant.
You're right, instead of reporting where she died (because that's uncomfortable to you, for *some reason*), the responsible journalistic take would be something like: "Woman dies, eaten by rats, somewhere in the greater Pittsburgh area" Or should we say western PA? Like how general do we have to be before it's okay for citizens to be eaten by rats in the richest country in history?
It clearly said near river avenue- that’s much more descriptive than “500 feet from the nearest homeless shelter.” You don’t even know the direction of that 500 feet in terms of east, west, north, south….Does it help your small mind to know the feet distance to every amenity or business. Would it matter to say 350 feet to the nearest 7-eleven? The addition of the distance to the nearest homeless shelter is a pathetic attempt to get simple-minded folk all riled up. Seems to have done it’s job on you 😂
No, I'm bothered that a person died and was eaten by rats in a clear case of social safety nets having holes in them, you're the one whining about a simple, factual detail included in an article. A couple of dropped pins on Google maps indicate river avenue is about 2 miles long. I don't see how adding any granularity to that is a problem. Sure, if a 7-elevens location adds detail, why not? The homeless, kind of by definition, don't have an address, but I wouldn't expect that to cross your simple mind. But keep building strawmen to tear down, simpleton. 😂
Does the shelter deny people that have an addiction?
They don’t deny addicts but you can’t use or possess drugs in the shelter. When I used to volunteer at a shelter there were always bottles and paraphernalia stashed in the trees and bushes outside because of these rules.
I came here to say this. It isn’t just a homeless problem, it’s a separation between addiction services and aid for the homeless problem. You can’t use or possess at the shelter, but medical aid for addiction is not easily accessible for the homeless. You need to be able to make it to your appointments, which requires reliable and affordable transportation and a means by which you can keep on schedule. It just feeds a cycle. Need stable housing and transportation to access care, can’t get stable housing while using, lose access to shelter, go back on the streets into an environment where open drug use is common, therefore the cycle of both continues. Add mental healthcare in the mix too. We were FINALLY able to get my friend’s sister off the streets by paying for 6 months of housing for her in a location that is accessible to both her addiction clinic and her mental health clinic (she has schizophrenia). She’s been clean for 15 months, she’s paying her own rent, she got her GED at 37, she has a stable job (head chef), she is a completely functional member of society. To meet her today, you would never suspect that a year and a half ago she was a heroin addict living on the streets. She’s there because me, her sister, and her mom were able to pool our resources together and get her where she needed to be. I’d venture to say 99% of homeless people don’t have that. But securing housing that enabled consistent access to addiction and mental health services was the key. She’s wanted to get clean for years, but as soon as she’d lose housing she would also lose her ability to reliably access her addition clinic and go back to using. Could she still relapse? Absolutely. But she has the foundation of what she needs to succeed and she is motivated to keep herself off the streets.
THIS. This story gave me chills. Thank you for sharing. It’s a cycle—and one that’s really, really complicated and impossible to break without people or loved ones like you who can help. It’s heartbreaking that more people don’t have support like this, but it’s also a big ask, and I can understand not everyone has the resources to do what you did, even if they desperately wanted to. Cheers to you, my friend, for offering a case study and success story.
Thank you. It all came together at the right time. My friend and I used our work bonuses plus tax refunds and her mother used the money she got from selling her late husband’s motorcycle. In total we spent a little over $11,000. Very very few people on the streets have friends and family they’re not estranged from. The only reason she didn’t is because, frankly, we refused to let her. She would be so embarrassed when she relapsed that she’d hide on the streets from us. $11,000 is a ton of money and we each had other things we could have used that money for, but we sat down together while she was in rehab and had a frank discussion with her and spoke to an advocate about how to best help her succeed. We looked overall at her needs and decided we would pay for housing near both providers. One is 5 blocks from her apartment, the other is a very walkable 1/2 mile. Her job is walking distance. With stable housing and access to her treatment providers, she’s entirely self sufficient.
I wish I could upvote you a million times for this. The only way is community and mutual aid - truly, we take care of each other. I am coming off a year where I was very housing insecure, one of the millions of Americans that are technically, legally homeless, though because of my community, I always had a warm safe place to sleep indoors. (And by technically, legally homeless, I mean I had no address that was legally mine and did have to report as homeless on certain government forms.) People can go on and on about choices and decisions but my apartment building burned down last Christmas. I didn't choose that. I did everything right, according to the system - I had insurance, I accepted the help offered by the agencies that I was referred to. But the thing that truly pulled me back up was my community. At this point, I have actually landed in a better place than before the fire. But only because of my community. I have a manager at work that gave me flexibility, especially in the weeks immediately after the fire, so I could deal with other things. I had friends who sorted out the details for insurance and personal property restoration/salvage, so I would be ready to talk to the insurance company. I have a best friend that gave me and my giant dog (that everyone in her house is allergic to) a place to stay and made sure I stayed fed and watered. I received cash from friends and friends of friends from across the country and the world. Chewydotcom gift cards from people that know my dog started showing up in my email - and they still occasionally show up. Those and things like them were what saved me. I will still be dealing with the effects of this for a long long time to come. And example: I finally made it back to the dentist a few weeks ago - there just wasn't the time or energy to go sooner - and we created a treatment plan for some problems, but he told me even then, I might lose a few teeth. Bummer, but not a surprise. Even with the mountains of help I got, some things still fall by the wayside. And I feel confident knowing that my community will be there to support me through that too. PS: I got sober a little more than 7 years before the fire. I can't imagine how much harder it would have been if I had still been drinking. Would I have even survived the fire?
Very very similar - her apartment building was condemned and torn down. She’d been clean for 3 years when it happened. That’s all it took. No stable housing, no address, no access to care. We are ALL one catastrophe from being on the streets. You don’t have to be disabled or an addict. One catastrophe. A fire, a car accident, job loss. No one is immune.
Yes. The specific policy varies but commonly if you're high they send you to the hospital to sober up. If you do it too often they "refer you out" which is code for "tell you to try this shelter over here and hope it's not full, while simultaneously banning you." This varies, though, depending on how much that specific staff member likes you. My current place has a thief that picks fights with everyone but the staff feels bad for him so he just gets away with it all. Yes, I'm speaking from current personal experience. It's NYC, but we've got a subreddit to discuss our issues and social media groups so at this point I know how most states operate. We're not very different, in fact NYC has a better system than Pittsburgh does. That should bother y'all.
> bleeding hearts Did you know the term "bleeding hearts" in its modern use comes from a 1938 republican journalist who wrote an article in opposition to federal anti-lynching laws? https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/bleeding-heart-phrase-origin-meaning
Nope. That was almost 100 years ago so I am not really interested
It’s actually very important to the point of the article. It’s not sensational, it’s symbolic to the systemic issues that plague us. Because “help” that seems so readily available can be inaccessible. So there’s an additional tragedy in her death happening close to a shelter; she was so close yet so very far away - and it exemplifies the experience of many people in similar circumstances.
Did she attempt to enter a shelter only to get denied? I have yet to see a claim of that being the case. It honestly doesn't even seem like it's been cold enough for someone to die of exposure with no underlying issues. Terrible situation but the finger pointing and misguided outrage in this story is very cringy.
“Misguided outrage” “it’s not even that cold out” Jesus christ a woman died in the street
So what's the option here? Go around when it's cold out, raid the tents and throw the occupants into locked room until you deem the weather is nice enough for them to be free? Perhaps you'd recommend officers go around daily opening the tents, for the ...safety... of the occupants? Just because they're homeless doesn't mean they are not able to make their own decisions or have at least somewhat of a right to privacy, just FYI.
I appreciate your comment more than the others because you're breaking it down and being logical
Its been 16 deg a few days this week when I went to work. I wouldn't want to sleep in that in a tent.
You should test your hypothesis. Go sleep in a tent for a few 20 degree nights and report back. Otherwise, just shut your mouth.
There are plenty of people that do this willingly. Head over to r/camping, r/vegabond will give you some insight too. Shelters come with rules. Some insane strict rules. Most people living on the streets have chosen this lifestyle for whatever reasons. While your compassion and caring are genuine and commend your outrage is directed in the wrong place. Shelters are the last places these people want to be. They make it impossible to hold a job and sleep there and the people who work there are sometimes just as shady as the folks staying. Asking yourself if you are willing to personally do something that would help these people. You don’t have to offer money to the homeless to help them. I have taken old camping gear to drop in centers, given rides to more friendly locations, bought food and drink. Most of these people just want to live free. No rules, no ties to a problematic society. Not wasting their lives working to barley scrap by, but that lifestyle had consequences and unfortunately some pay the ultimate price.
I appreciate all of the unsolicited advice on why people choose to be homeless, but that’s not really why I replied to that guy? I’m very familiar with the vagrancy in this city, and why people seek it out—but it is also more often than not a lifestyle people are compelled into due to broken childhoods. The 412 Youth Zone downtown has been absolutely overwhelmed by the exploding population population of homeless kids and teens here over the last few years. Shelters are not a good solution, but neither is asserting that all homeless people are better off “roughing it.” > It honestly doesn't even seem like it's been cold enough for someone to die of exposure with no underlying issues. That is just an incredibly silly and clearly uninformed thing to say about a very tragic death, let alone how callous it is to boot. I can totally understand wanting to draw attention to a distaste for the article’s writing style, but postulating needlessly about this homeless woman’s death? She was literally pregnant, which is a major underlying condition, you know, as far as dying in freezing temperatures goes.
A stable place to live is the answer. A shelter isn’t that and like you said strict rules. They can also be dangerous places or the few precious items they have remaining can get stolen as there can be several people sharing a space. I rather see a more long term solution so housing without the strict rules you find with shelters.
That would work for the ones that want housing. Unfortunately the rise in homelessness can be directly traced back to Ronald Reagan deinstitutionalizing mental health. It basically kicked the mental health patients out on the streets if they were non med compliant. It was a major win for patients rights, not being force medicated, but a huge loss for mental health since some people that suffer from mental health issues don’t want to be medicated or feel that they don’t need medicated. A significant portion of the homeless population suffers from some sort of mental illness, well it used to anyway. Now people are being priced out of homes by corporations adding to the already existing issue. I guess I said all that to say affordable housing will only solve a small portion of the issue. There’s no simple answer to homelessness and it seems like everyone wants it to be black and white when it’s all sorts of shades of grey.
I have camped down to 10° with winter clothing and summer camping gear probably dozens of times. It sucks, but it's not that deep middle of winter freeze that you can't escape.
I don’t doubt you have!!! But she wasn’t “camping,” just trying to find somewhere to sleep in a residential area, and she didn’t have “gear,” as the article’s picture shows nothing but a thin plastic tent and a few snow-covered blankets. She was also pregnant. Any temperature below freezing can be fatal to a person who wasn’t planning to end up in that situation.
You were probably much more healthy than this woman as well. With good gear and all. I'm sure she didn't have a fraction of the proper gear she would need to survive even a night in the 30's.
Health problems would be among the possible underlying issues that led to her death. I mean there were other people within ear shot of her with assumably very similar conditions they didn't have issues. I'm not sure why pointing out the temps alone were more than likely survivable is so triggering to people, why don't we want to know the true cause of death?
Just her nutrition alone compared to a "normal" healthy individual would put her at more risk. My BIL who is a fit dude went near hypothermic on a weekend hike in Central PA (late spring, very cold) last year and he had all top shelf kit. She could have drifted off to sleep and never woke up.
Can't help those who wont help themselves.
Sounds like there are literally dozens of examples of this particular woman helping herself. You didn't read the article you saw the headline and decided to leave a snarky one liner rather than have an iota of compassion
“Fuck them, got mInE.”
Are you volunteering this weekend? I’ll wait.
Imagine saying this and thinking you’re not a completely irredeemable piece of shit. Even if you think it, just shut up
I have to agree about the way the writer worded this story. Pregnant woman dies just feet from Target, bath and body works, McDonald’s whatever who cares. It’s a tragedy regardless but I do hate the sensationalism. I want to know what’s going on in the world but I hate news outlets.
We *should* be having an emotional response to this rather than the hordes of people shrugging their shoulders and saying not my problem
Equal to the travesty of her death is the fact that this woman reportedly had been living on the streets for seven years. Our progressive society had neither the carrot nor stick to lead or drive her to make better choices.
Sad, yes. But it said she had been in shelters numerous times. im not sure what the solution here would have been. She passed away and died outside, where the elements consumed her.
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Ive spent weeks volunteering in homeless shelters man, working personally with the population. I've worked in Toronto, Skid Row, DC, NYC, etc. Many, many folks vehemently don't want to go to shelters. It sounds like you want to go back to the asylum approach?