https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/alcohol-park-pilot-pro...
A widespread law specific to the USA that doesn't seem to be a thing anywhere else in the world. We can take beers to a picnic in our parks. Shocking i know. Other societies haven't collapsed from allowing this.
This law is probably only enforced against businesses selling booze or people who are being a nuisance.
My parents were charged with this soon after coming to the US - they brought a bottle of wine to a barbecue at a public park; the bottle wasn't even kept in view, but presumably some busybody still noticed and called the police.
if you are drinking from a bag, an officer must look into the bag to know you are drinking alcohol. looking into the bag requires probable cause and a 4th amendment protected search.
And when people are arrested the underfunded overworked public defenders can do a great job defending the rights of the accused.
As much as it may pain a certain someone, Canada isn't the 51st state yet.
I always thought it's strange how it would be considered very Australian to go to the beach or have a beer, but completely illegal to have a beer at the beach.
As we were walking down the road... a Volvo police car comes screaming towards us, lights and sirens going. It stops and - arguably one of the most beautiful police officers I have ever seen - approached me and started to speak in Swedish. I apologized and said sorry I do not speak Swedish, I am a visitor from the US. She chuckled and said, "Your friends are not being honest with you - you cannot drink this on the street - please pour it out". Then as quick as she stopped, she said, "We are hunting for a a shooting suspect, gotta go" and jumped back in and left.
It was the most "American" European experience I have ever had. So we can't drink on the street? And a shooting has happened? Wild.
There is no evidence available that will ever change my mind.
https://digitalcommons.tourolaw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?arti...
Permissive firearm policy, public drinking, free healthcare.
For some reason the US only gets one of those.
Also poop on sidewalks.
It was wild how the vibe changed over the course of 2 or 3 blocks towards or away from Valencia.
But yeah, SF handles homeless issues poorly and spends a tremendous amount of money doing it. And you don't have to be a "get those people out of my sight and that's all I care about them" kind of person to think that SF has been doing a bad job.
I live in Texas, we're typically very hostile to homeless people in our cities. We have anti-panhandling signage everywhere, spikes under overpasses, anti-homeless benches, very few shelters, and we arrest homeless people for panhandling all the time.
The result is that the city appears to not have that many homeless people. But they're all pushed to specific overpasses and highways where they can live without persecution. Many, I'm sure, either move to cities that better accommodate them or die.
Point being, if I was homeless, I'd want to be SF. Not Euless.
In most districts it is not illegal to time travel with a newborn wolf whelp.
All three things were illegal. All three things were frowned upon.
What you are actually saying is that there are many people on the streets of San Francisco who are otherwise excluded from American society and therefore have almost 'nothing to lose.' Those people often break laws, largely because the social contract has excluded them from the benefits of society (for example, knowing you have access to indoor plumbing).
This article is about a change for the fortunate ones like you and me who do feel like we get a fair shake from the social contract and therefore follow most laws (I assume).
Upgrading my windows to be double-paned without city approval should not result in a greater punishment from the government than attacking someone on the street.
What I am ultimately trying to say is that the large majority of people on this forum see the symptom of a broken society (homelessness and drug addiction) and for whatever reason, refuse to believe that a complex network of problems is actually the thing that should draw our 'hacker' focus.
Like sure, you clearly had a negative experience with permitting that caused you to have an expensive fine and feel resentment that other people do 'worse' things 'scot-free'.
Would fining a homeless person more money actually solve your or the city's problems? No. The person would just not pay, because again, they have nothing to lose.
Ultimately, I think where we agree is that the idea of law needs to evolve to include both punishment and state funded / enforced humanitarian care.
The reason that I think this will never happen in America is because we are an inherently vengeful people with a dark history of race-based hatred and a fundamental disdain for paying taxes that fund public goods.
I agree with the statement if you mean that you should be punished more for the latter than for the former. But if you mean that you should be punished less for X and someone else should be punished more for Y (where Y is a greater crime than X), there simply are not enough details to know if I agree. I might think that you should be punished more when you are in a position to profit from the actions and therefore be more willing to continue despite the punishment (e.g. a restaurant owner refusing to make up the minimum wage difference for a server who didn't make enough in tips) whereas the other person committed their crime from opportunism in a desperate situation (e.g. a homeless person who robbed an unfortunate individual for money, including causing some minor injuries). If the same person were to commit both crimes, obviously the latter is worse; if different people commit the crimes, I'd be interested to know more about the perpetrators if I was asked to pass judgement.
> The complaint is that laws are structured in a way that only affect people who have something material to lose.
This is how it should be. Society should be structured such that every member of it has something material to lose.
https://app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary/?BillNumber=1515&Year=202...
“Officially allowed and advertised” means businesses will specifically cater to people with money who will come specifically to do it
If it is really no-enforcement, best to codify it with a law and really make it legal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and-frisk_in_New_York_Cit...
If it is really no-enforcement, best to codify it with a law and really make it legal.
You don't want to be arrested because you have a job, a family, people who care about you. A lot of homeless people are more focused on "how do I make today not the worst day of my life?" Turns out, drugs are really good at that. And, being arrested isn't so bad.
Also, arresting people is expensive. We can fine most people. Can't fine homeless people.
Ugh, I don't want to get raging drunk on a bar crawl, I just want to be able to sip a beer that I brought from my house as I walk down the street.
trillic•1d ago
https://www.rmdlaw.com/blog/california-new-jaywalking-law-im...