This is Wesley Flowers. He’s been camping out outside Nordstrom tonight along with 25 other homeless people in protest at the city’s anti-camping ordinance. He just came over to see us for a s’more, and handed us a “ticket.” Sorry for the lame-assedly whopping sideways image, it’s late, but you get the idea:
The purpose of the ticket, Flowers says, “is to draw attention to a double standard. It’s alright for regular people to be out here tonight camping, before a parade. But for us homeless folks, we get a $250 ticket just for trying to take care of our basic needs. These laws are starting to look like social cleansing solutions. It’s alright to come out and campe before a parade, but what if you’re homeless.”
“The ridiculous thing is, after you hit 24, you don’t qualify for a lot of the housing for homeless youth,” says 28 year old Hasan Cross. “I’m 28, and there are very limited services for someone like me.”
Flowers is also pretty pissed off with responses to a recent article quoting him calling the camping ordinance “economic apartheid” in the Portland Tribune. For example, one commenter wroter this:
For god’s sake people get a clue!! the homeless do absolutly nothing for this city. they beg on the streets, pay no taxes, soak up social services, don’t spend any money (cause they dont have any), and do nothing to give back or repay the city for their generosity. portland dosent want you people here any more so either get a job or move on. we owe you nothing… you owe us. get off your collective behinds and be a positive force in the community or get the hell out. no more free rides for you losers!
“shoot em all and let god sorte em out”
“If you’re gonna call me a bum,” Flowers says, “You might as well make the words nigger, kyke, and chink okay again. And we should start having segregated water fountains so the regular people don’t have to dirty their lips with my homelessness.”
Nice, light-hearted conversation around the campfire. That’s what we like.
I’ve been watching Welsey get trashed at the Trib. It’s very sad. Their readers – at least their post-article posters – are a bloodthirsty craven lot which remind me of the old homily, “There’s Portland, and then there’s Oregon…”
We are still on a island surrounded by hundreds of miles of cultural desolation and spiritual ignorance.
Somehow the Trib has attracted goons which now infest almost every article. Their policy is fairly unique, I think. 1. There’s no “blog” section, instead they allow posts after news stories (which compares the journalism to the lowest common denominator), and 2. the authors of the articles don’t defend themselves or straighten out mess as it accumulates.
Too bad. What sort of exterminator sweeps out bad posters?
“shoot em all and let god sorte em out”
that had to have been written by some turd of
joke that has double-digit IQ that waddled to
the keyboard and before striking first key,
this “thing” had to lift a leg to cut a very
stinking fart…which symbolizes the life of
one like this…a very shitty one at best!
count me as one who loves his fellow man and
seeks justice for ALL…and one who believes
that…
Thanks for posting this information Matt. After Street Roots you write the most articles about the homeless but you don’t have to pay the dollar to read the Mercury. Lately I think you have been the most effective at communicating the issues involved. Hears to keeping it real.
He’s absolutely right. That’s as clear a double standard as you can get. Either everyone gets a camping ticket, or no one does. That’s just fair. You know, after working in parks for the last couple of years I’ve noticed my attitude towards the homeless has gone from more to a little less tolerant. Simple points like this, are just what I need sometimes to not become another judgmental prick.
PDX 921…: I think the Trib’s editors actually like the little hate mob. It gives their reporters a sense of purpose. The comments policy IS unusual, but I like it. I’d like the Merc to run comments on news stories, too…it can create “debate,” if the authors are allowed on there to defend their work.
Dan: You’re welcome. And thanks for your support. If you read this week’s Street Roots you’ll find me compared to a squirrel 🙂
Jason: I think it’s natural for a person to veer between supporting the homeless’ rights and, occasionally, resenting some of the advocates’ attitudes. It’s not a sin to be intolerant of bad behavior, but I think it’s important to check oneself. Asking “where does that reaction really come from” when one thinks “get a job,” etcetera, has been a good start for me, but I still have moments where I think people are lazy and entitled. Just as I do when I’m interacting with people who are housed…
Buncha bums
”If you’re gonna call me a bum,” Flowers says, “You might as well make the words nigger, kyke, and chink okay again. And we should start having segregated water fountains so the regular people don’t have to dirty their lips with my homelessness.”
Yeah, not the same as all.
”If you’re gonna call me a bum,” Flowers says, “You might as well make the words nigger, kyke, and chink okay again. And we should start having segregated water fountains so the regular people don’t have to dirty their lips with my homelessness.”
Yeah, not the same at all.
This is slightly off-topic, but I would like for someone to tell me if I’m a jackass. When I’m downtown and need to use a restroom, I know of a few options. But some of those options are less reliable than others. For example, the Central Library has bathrooms on each floor, but the last time I visited, each men’s bathroom stall was occupied by someone who was there for the entirety of the ten minutes I was. I went up to a security officer at a desk and let them know that all the stalls were occupied by what I gathered to be people using them for reasons other than their intent, such as as living quarters, and I was informed that they get that complaint regularly, and that the county health department told them that different people take different amounts of time to use the restroom, and that they can’t enforce a time limit. He spoke in a manner that suggested we both knew he didn’t believe people at the library have particularly deliberate elimination processes. I noticed the same situation at the downtown M&F before it was Macy’s, but, frankly, I didn’t care, given that the bathroom was so nasty I only visited once. Although I did find it amusing that less than a minute after a friend and I entered that bathroom, another person came in less than a minute later, transparently a store security agent making sure we weren’t in there to have gay sex. So a tip to gay people who want to have sex in filthy bathrooms: wait a minute for the security guard to come in, stare at you weirdly, wash his hands, then leave, and then you can have your gay sex. As long as the stall isn’t already occupied by a homeless person.
As for whether I’m an asshole, that pertains to my having been perturbed that multiple homeless people had chosen the locations most encumbering to others as their living quarters. Being upset that my most basic human needs were being obstructed doesn’t make me as bad as someone who just doesn’t want to see on the sidewalk the their society’s homeless, right? Or should I be more understanding that homeless people are not simply “objects in my way,” and that they are people who are going through a lot worse than me not being able to use the restroom? Because commandeering a restroom seems like kind of a dick move to me.