{"id":56447,"date":"2020-08-29T19:14:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-29T16:14:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/compassion-isnt-a-fix-for-homelessness-its-just-virtue-signaling\/"},"modified":"2020-08-29T19:14:00","modified_gmt":"2020-08-29T16:14:00","slug":"compassion-isnt-a-fix-for-homelessness-its-just-virtue-signaling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/compassion-isnt-a-fix-for-homelessness-its-just-virtue-signaling\/","title":{"rendered":"#\u2018Compassion\u2019 isn\u2019t a fix for homelessness \u2014\u00a0it\u2019s just virtue signaling"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#\u2018Compassion\u2019 isn\u2019t a fix for homelessness \u2014\u00a0it\u2019s just virtue signaling<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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August 29, 2020 |<\/span> 12:14pm <\/p>\n

\n Enlarge Image<\/p>\n

\"As<\/img>
\n As concerns rise over the growing number of homeless on the Upper West Side, some residents are more worried about being welcoming than actually helping people.<\/span>
\n William Farrington<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

\n The Upper West Side has been abuzz for weeks about the relocation of a number of homeless men to various hotels in the neighborhood. Many of the men are sex offenders and drug addicts. They aren\u2019t receiving the more intensive services they need and the neighborhood has seen a steep decline in safety.<\/p>\n

But some people \u2014 who feel residents have been insufficiently welcoming to this new cohort \u2014 think they have the answer: not mental health outreach or help with hygiene, but compassion.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re in an era of intense virtue signaling, with ever intense competition to display your progressiveness on social media<\/a>. Conformity of thought is paramount and displaying the right opinions, again and again to your captive audience, is key. And nothing says \u201cI care\u201d more than dismissing the safety concerns of your neighbors. Even discussing crime is suspect.<\/p>\n

Take the newly formed group Upper West Siders for a Compassionate, Safe and Equitable Community, which wrote welcome messages in chalk outside the Lucerne. OK, but surely that can\u2019t be the extent of their \u201ccompassion?\u201d No, of course not. They\u2019ve also started an online petition at Change.org. Though what they are requesting is unclear since the document has no demands other than imploring neighbors worried about their personal safety \u2014 including those who have recently joined the Guardian Angels and, by patrolling the streets to discourage midday open drug use and flashing, are actually doing something \u2014 to stop being so mean.<\/p>\n

In the Daily News<\/a>, Lauren-Brooke Eisen, director of the justice program at the Brennan Center for Justice, proclaimed the hotel-homeless shelter program \u201ca win-win\u201d and said the controversy is \u201ca litmus test for our progressive swath of Manhattan.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eisen doesn\u2019t entertain any of the concerns raised by Upper West Siders \u2014 about public urination, overdoses, open-air shooting up, indecent exposure \u2014 instead noting the \u201cspike in 311 complaints in the area about homeless individuals app<\/a>ears to be alarmist.\u201d Caring about your children being offered crack, something one parent reported happening at Riverside Park, fails the litmus test, apparently.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/img>
Homeless men have been relocated to a few hotels on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, including the Lucerne, upsetting many local residents.<\/span>REUTERS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But who is really being compassionate? It makes no sense to stick people in need of help into a place where they aren\u2019t offered any.<\/p>\n

Actual compassion would mean fighting with the Department of Homeless Services to get these people what they need instead of making chalk drawings. Actual compassion would be challenging elected officials to do something to get the social services in place for these men.<\/p>\n

It would also help if there was anything resembling a public plan. How long will these hotels be in use in this way? A source told The Post the contract is through October but would likely be renewed. The Lucerne shows as fully booked through the end of November but if you would like to visit the first weekend in December it will cost $274.<\/p>\n

The compassion police say they are Upper West Siders, too, and want their views represented.<\/p>\n

The truth about living in New York is that a block is a small town and you may know nothing at all about what is happening just a few \u201ctowns\u201d over.<\/p>\n

The Upper West Side extends from Central Park South to 110th Street and from Central Park West to the Hudson River. The Lucerne, where some homeless men are being temporarily housed is on West 79th Street and Amsterdam. The Hotel Belleclaire on West 77th and Broadway. The Belnord on West 86th and Broadway.<\/p>\n

More than 200,000 people live on the Upper West Side \u2014 during normal times. Those chalking the ground outside the hotel could easily be Upper West Siders who live nowhere near these three hotels.<\/p>\n

Eisen proclaims herself an Upper West Sider but doesn\u2019t note if she\u2019s actually in the vicinity of these hotels. A friend who lives seven blocks south of the Lucerne told me she\u2019s noticed a small uptick in the homeless population but nothing like what people who reside near the hotels are experiencing.<\/p>\n

\"New<\/img>
The group Upper West Siders for a Compassionate, Safe and Equitable Community, wrote welcome messages in chalk outside the Lucerne.<\/span>Rashid Umar Abbasi<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It would help if those arguing forming shelters in hotels is a \u201cnecessary short-term solution that benefits us all\u201d would be specific about how much it actually affects them or their families. It\u2019s easy to be compassionate when the situation isn\u2019t taking place on your stoop.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also easy to call NIMBYism on the neighborhood affectionately referred to as \u201cMoscow on the Hudson,\u201d but the \u201cnot in my backyard\u201d label doesn\u2019t fit perfectly this time.<\/p>\n

Should the city be dumping troubled people in hotels and feeling as if their job is done? Most Upper West Siders wouldn\u2019t want that happening in any backyard anywhere.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re so singularly focused on stopping COVID-19, clearly a worthwhile goal, that we have ignored all of the side problems that come with haphazardly forming policies around it. That has to end if the city will recover from this very dark period.<\/p>\n

There are two groups of proud New Yorkers right now: those who acknowledge the giant problems exploding on our streets and those who shut down any discussion of those problems with labels like \u201cracist.\u201d We have to come together as communities in, yes, compassion and find actual solutions to the problems COVID-19 and its aftermath have wrought.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we want to build a truly just society, we must be willing to stand up for those values in our own neighborhood,\u201d concludes the petition from the YIMBYs.<\/p>\n

But if you want to build a truly just society you must also be willing to do the hard work of finding real solutions and not just dismissing the concerns of your neighbors. What is happening on the Upper West Side is not that.\n <\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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“#\u2018Compassion\u2019 isn\u2019t a fix for homelessness \u2014\u00a0it\u2019s just virtue signaling” August 29, 2020 | 12:14pm Enlarge Image As concerns rise over the growing number of homeless on the Upper West Side, some residents are more worried about being welcoming than actually helping people. William Farrington The Upper West Side has been abuzz for weeks about…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":56448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[61023],"class_list":["post-56447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-compassion-isnt-a-fix-for-homelessness-its-just-virtue-signaling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56447"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56447\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}