So I lurk the Seattle Subreddit a lot to keep up with how things are going in my old home town and I saw there was another sweep of a homeless camp. The sweep was criticized because all the homeless did was move to another place. In the comments there was a big disagreement of how to deal with the homeless with some saying “we should just give them housing” while another group saying “They don’t want it because they don’t want to give up their drugs and anytime they have been given a place without the stipulation of being clean, they end up trashing it with drugs.”
One of the issues with addicts though is that often they CAN’T quit. They are so chemically morphed by drugs that they need special rehab to slowly come off in a controlled manner… which requires rehab. But most addicts will refuse voluntary rehab. Often the only fix is forced rehab with teeth (not the “forced rehab” that you often see get issued in court).
So what are your thoughts on the issue? Should we just give them free housing without the stipulation of being clean? Or should institute forced rehab? And what if the mentally ill who cannot take care of themselves? Should we reopen asylums? How do you think they should be handled if they cannot take care of a place on their own?
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So I lurk the Seattle Subreddit a lot to keep up with how things are going in my old home town and I saw there was another sweep of a homeless camp. The sweep was criticized because all the homeless did was move to another place. In the comments there was a big disagreement of how to deal with the homeless with some saying “we should just give them housing” while another group saying “They don’t want it because they don’t want to give up their drugs and anytime they have been given a place without the stipulation of being clean, they end up trashing it with drugs.”
One of the issues with addicts though is that often they CAN’T quit. They are so chemically morphed by drugs that they need special rehab to slowly come off in a controlled manner… which requires rehab. But most addicts will refuse voluntary rehab. Often the only fix is forced rehab with teeth (not the “forced rehab” that you often see get issued in court).
So what are your thoughts on the issue? Should we just give them free housing without the stipulation of being clean? Or should institute forced rehab? And what if the mentally ill who cannot take care of themselves? Should we reopen asylums? How do you think they should be handled if they cannot take care of a place on their own?
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I think that you are missing something kind of important. The argument that we should just give them housing is inherently arguing we shouldn’t worry about trying to restrict their drug use while doing so. That’s the whole innovation behind housing first is that if you worry about assuring someone has stable housing it’s a lot easier to address all their other issue than trying to address all their other issues before getting them stable shelter. When this is implemented it turns out a lot of people are eventually able to transition back to being able to maintain shelter for themselves eventually, especially when this is done shortly after becoming homeless before they’ve experiences a lot of the trauma that inherently causes.
The problem in Seattle and most other places where homelessness is a real issue is that there isn’t enough housing available to do that and we need to build a lot more for it to even be an option, which is especially hard to do when it’s purpose is to rehouse people who are currently homeless.
It’s my understanding that rehab for people who want to do it isn’t always successful much less for people who don’t so I think it’s probably not worth while to force people into it. I do think that we should probably reconsider asylums for people who’s mental illness is so extreme that they are unable to take care of themselves, but I wouldn’t include drug addicts in that category, and reconsidering doesn’t necessarily mean believing it would be a good idea, just acknowledging the status quo isn’t obviously better.