Of Hauntings and Homelessness

Image Source: Colorado Center on Law and Policy.

A few years ago, when I was living in England, I walked through a back parking lot behind a grocery store on my way home. There were two vagrants there, sharing a bottle of wine, and I heard them talking:

"I never expected this."
"Expected what?"
"To be brought low."

Image Source: RT.

They are in growing company: in November, 2017, The Guardian reported that one person is homeless out of every 200 people in the UK. In London, one person in every 59 people is homeless! The epidemic is masked by unreported situations, people who are sofa-surfing, people living in their cars. The rot is spreading to London's leafy suburbs. Numbers are similar for the UK's other big cities. In Scotland, one household goes homeless every 19 minutes; over 6,000 children will be homeless on Christmas Day this year; and 184,000 families are one paycheque away from losing their home. This is mainly due to high rents, soaring property taxes, and housing benefit cuts.

Image Source: 48 Hills.

You would think after the 2008-2009 recession that housing would be a priority. Theoretically it was, unless you look at the real balance sheets. As I explained in my 2016 post, Abandoned Buildings, Left to Rot, what really happened was that the banks took over repossessed houses and kept them empty and on the books, so that they could get government compensation for the houses as liabilities. That government compensation further impoverished tax-payers, causing more families to fall into homelessness. And those repossessed houses, kept empty, were not maintained until they became unsaleable zombie properties. The consequent pressure on housing drove rents to unprecedented levels, which created more homelessness.

Image Source: Mental Health Association of Portland.

The recession was justified by a 'blame the poor' hypothesis, namely that those who lost their homes did not deserve the mortgages they took on, because they were too poor and had bad credit; all the reckless lending to these undeserving people jeopardized the whole system. In my post, Quid Pro Quo, I maintained that this hypothesis was a lie. Those who defaulted on their mortgages, and all those subsequently impoverished by credit cards, car loans, and debt, came and come from all social classes and income levels.

And the intention in perpetrating this lie - foreseen by managers at large financial institutions, such as the authors of the Citigroup brief, We Worry Less - was to gut and destroy the middle class and create a two-tiered socio-economic system, a mission that is nearly accomplished. Of course, a glance at two-tiered autocratic societies everywhere confirms that destroying the middle classes paves the way for totalitarianism. Did this occur to those who plan to be, or aim to serve, the pluto-technocrats? I think it did.

How I Live In My Car (5 October 2015). As of 2017, this woman's channel is still devoted to this lifestyle. Video Source: Youtube.

Although officially, homelessness is declining in the United States, the extent of the crisis is hidden by couch-surfers and car-dwelling travelers. Major American cities have record-breaking levels of homelessness. New Zealand's story is similar, as is Australia's. We see the same in Germany. And France. And in Italy. And Russia. There are programs either considered or in development - unsurprisingly in the coldest countries like Canada and Finland - to provide housing for free to homeless people first, and deal with their other economic concerns later. Global statistics on homelessness are here, here and here.

Image Source: TNT Down Under.

For communities, homelessness is more expensive than providing people homes for free. In a 2006 case in Reno, Nevada, USA, one homeless person cost tax-payers one million dollars. The person in question was Murray Barr, who gained the nickname 'Million Dollar Murray.' His story illustrated that ignoring homelessness or allowing homeless people to fall into the existing bare-bones charitable system costs much more in terms of social welfare, medical, and police services. In the end, it is cheaper to give homeless people houses immediately, compared to the long-term socio-economic burden if their distress is left to deepen and linger. Other attempted solutions include homeowners opening their spare bedrooms to homeless people, mentioned here and here.

A lot of homeless people were homeowners not so long ago. Their situation shows grave exploitation and mismanagement of the system over the past thirty years. It is incredible that the answer now is to give people homes, when with some financial programs or solutions, they could have just stayed in their original homes or rentals in the first place.

Forget the clichés, the social stigmas that homelessness is about drugs and mental illness, or mismanagement of the criminal justice system, because mental hospitals and prisons have been emptied onto the streets. While that is true, the problem is poverty, urban growth, the destabilization of the jobs, the explosion of credit, and systemic corruption.

And if after all this, you still think that homeless people are crazy, dirty, and poor; that they don't understand money, didn't plan, and don't work hard enough, read this article about a professor at San Jose State University, who is not paid enough to afford rent and lives out of her car. Or this article, When Growing Old Means Living in Your Car, Working in an Amazon Warehouse.

If you think homelessness is the fault of homeless people, then you don't understand money and are not planning enough, because sooner or later, the scourge will come to your doorstep. You are not working hard enough to grasp what has happened to the global economy. Only some plutocrats (as described in this post) have realized that these problems may come home to them, because they have a vested interest in this economy. If it all goes, they have the most to lose. There but for the grace of God go they. Remember that man in that parking lot in the UK who said, "I never expected ... to be brought low."

I would argue that in this respect, no matter what the experts say, the concerns of the recession were never solved, and the recession never ended. Count consumer debt and household-debt-to-income ratios in this mix, and the true picture of the economy is apocalyptic.

SPCA Hypocrites Now Using Robots to Scare Away Homeless People (13 December 2017). Video Source: Youtube.

This week, Truthstream Media published two videos about homelessness and the economic state of America, not as the pundits would have you see it, but as it really is. Melissa and Aaron Dykes of Truthstream Media are making a documentary and embarked on four road trips over the past two years across America; they also traveled up into Canada. What they saw diverged drastically from the official view of the economy in these developed nations: they found impoverished towns, unrepaired homes and shops, crumbling roads and infrastructure, and haunted people desperately trying to keep up appearances from a more prosperous past: "Everyone is trying to continue to make 'now' fit their ideal of ten years ago."

America Is Haunted (12 December 2017). Video Source: Youtube.

Aaron and Melissa Dykes tend toward an alt-media attitude (fear of Bilderbergers, etc.). But the spread of these opinions, especially 'fake news' and conspiracy theories, are direct outcomes of the crisis. This is why it is wrong for tech giants and the mainstream media to silence and suppress these views. These grievances need airing and compassionate consideration. Censoring them makes everything worse.

In December 2016, a medical student went homeless for a month in London for charity. He was spat upon and ignored. The only help he received was from other homeless people. Image Source: Londonist.

The New Age guru, Eckhart Tolle, tells a personal story about a relative who was hospitalized for delusions of persecution. She thought shadowy men were following her and believed in extreme conspiracy theories. Tolle found that when he spent time with this woman, gave his full attention to her, and really listened to her worries, the conspiracy theories subsided and her looped perception of paranoia, isolation, and victimization began to heal.

At the same time, even those who have been endangered by this system must take immediate personal responsibility for themselves and the world around them. It is easy to descend into the victim mentality, to be quasi-empowered negatively by blaming the banks, the financiers, the plutocrats, the politicians, and the whole capitalist establishment for mismanagement and exploitation. Many people now attack other ethno-cultural and religious groups, and those of opposing politics, for serious problems and economic transitions. It is even easier to seek solace in conspiracy theories.

It is easy because it is partly justified. There are many instances of crime and corruption. The strife between political, religious and ethnic groups is often driven by real complaints. The Citigroup brief, We Worry Less, is absolutely real and unforgivable: it coolly foresaw the middle and working classes transformed into underclasses.

#SpikeGate was a hashtag on Twitter which exposed the installation of spikes around properties in the UK to keep out homeless people. Image Source: Timeout London.

The wrong attitude: anti-homeless spikes installed in London. Image Source: The Mind Unleashed.

Yet conspiracy theories are not the answer. Systemic malaise requires us to rethink our values and how we respond to these stresses. First, technology ensures that we are all one. The idea of money in the old system was one of separation: regular people live divided from the élites, world leaders, and celebrities. This is an illusion. The precariousness of the old money system means that even those with vast wealth could be homeless tomorrow. And technology is a great equalizer. Net neutrality concerns notwithstanding, we are all just people with computers. Similarly, the belief that different cultures are divided is also incorrect. In unprecedented ways, we are all connected. If one part of global society suffers, we all suffer. If the transgressions are kept secret, it does not matter, the social fabric is still damaged and we all suffer.

Second, the greater challenge lies in scaling down general perception of the system to the individual level and bringing sympathy and humanity to innovation. As individuals, this crisis asks us to shift our whole understanding of money and its potential. Money does not have to be a negative instrument of survival, separation, division, judgement, greed, exploitation, hierarchies, inequality, and lack.

This is why I have previously written on cryptocurrencies. The homelessness issue shows why they were invented. How can you get your banking done if you have no address? Cryptos solve this challenge, and should not be considered in terms of 20th century economics. But old habits die hard, confirmed by the fact that a lot of people buy into the crypto craze to get rich.

We should begin to think about prosperity and money in wholly new ways. Cryptos offer a unique opportunity. While the old system is destabilized and decrepit, we have the chance now to rethink the whole concept of money, a possibility not enjoyed by our ancestors.

Given the surge in Bitcoin, it seems time to revisit the subject of cryptocurrencies, which I will do in the new year. I will also take a deeper look at other issues - poverty, the economy, political attitudes, technocratic totalitarianism, artificial intelligence, and cryptocurrencies - because they are all related.

This post is dedicated to a friend, D., out of concern for her, and in light of her blog post, here.