General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Activists poured concrete all over some "anti-homeless spikes" this morning [View all]Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)And why the absolutism on property rights? Nobody's talking about having the state forcibly collectivize this place.
People should obviously be able to protect their belongings(including the homeless themselves, which is why I've always opposed things like Gavin Newsom's insistence on demolishing tent cities in San Francisco without giving the homeless the chance to even gather up their stuff and prevent it being trashed), but the people sleeping rough in front of this place and also on the streets of Montreal weren't harming the property at all. They weren't harming anyone at all. They were just trying to get some sleep, on a cold night, in the only places they COULD get it.
And the business they were camped in front of wasn't a hardscrabble mom-and-pop operation, it was a Tesco(the British equivalent of a 7-11-I bought stuff at a few of them when I visited the UK a few years back). Tesco is a soulless corporate behemoth that pushed a lot of independent shops out of business by undercutting them on prices. Why would you ever feel sorry for them?
And my point about what happens in society puts property rights before people is born out by the sharp turn towards relentless selfishness, arrogance and human devaluation this country has taken since 1980-driven by the exaltation of property and profit above all else. Property fetishism is eroding the soul of this country and this world, leaving nothing but a gold-plated shell behind.
THAT is what you are defending by going on and on and on about property rights-and if your view prevails, nothing generous, positive, inclusive, joyous or even moderately non-brutal can come to the vast majority of the human race. Property, in the
end, becomes the enemy of life itself.
People should be able to have some things of their own, but having things shouldn't outweigh the need to be decent to all.