[Noisebridge-discuss] [drama] Frantisek is going to stop living at Noisebridge starting tonight.

[Jacob Appelbaum]

On 11/16/2010 01:41 PM, hep wrote:
> 
> On Nov 16, 2010, at 10:18 AM, Jacob Appelbaum wrote:
>>
>> Personally, I think it's pretty fucked up that he doesn't have other
>> options; part of the general Noisebridge goal is to provide an
>> alternative to the rest of the world for people in our community.
>> Frantisek is part of our community and has been for quite a while. I
>> wonder what will happen? Will someone step up and help him as he has
>> helped the Noisebridge community? Will we change some things at
>> Noisebridge to deal with a specific issue in our community that people
>> care about? Or will we turn our backs and tell him to get fucked?
> 
>>
>> With that said, we have long since agreed not to live in the space but I
>> will personally not ask Frantisek, a member of our community, to sleep
>> on the streets.
>>
>> I understand the principles at play and I can't fucking live with myself
>> if I'm pushing him into the winter rain. I really dislike your appeal to
>> economics as a reason for your lack of compassion. If you really care
>> about Noisebridge and money issues, why don't you kick in some more
>> money?
> 
> 
> people in san francisco have more options for emergency or shortterm
> housing than almost any other city in the us. glide offers emergency
> housing placement services every day of the week (glide.org), there are
> more SROs per capita than in any other city on the western seaboard,
> often running anywhere from 80-150$ for a week's stay. some places offer
> discounts if you are disadvantaged, and you can always apply for HUD
> which will help place you. there are a variety of emergency housing
> solutions, one of which is of course THC (tenderloin housing clinics,
> which offer both longterm housing placement and short term emergency
> shelter placement). it is also trivially easy to sign up for care not
> cash and get shelter vouchers.

Yes, I believe that Frantisek might use some of these services - I'm not
sure though, if someone wants to create a safe space for him, I bet he'd
be open to help.

> 
> it is pretty disingenuous to claim classism in this single case, when
> there are thousands of people sleeping on the streets of sf, often right
> outside the space.

No, it isn't. You can claim it in general and you can claim it in
specific. I'm claiming it in specific and it seems pretty valid to me.

We can disagree about it if you'd like, I suspect we will. But I think
that not being upset about someone missing BART and then being upset
about sleeping on a sofa for other reasons is pretty lame.

> or is it that it's only sad if someone is homeless if
> they know how to use computers? unless people are down with opening up
> the space as a night shelter, in which case i know hundreds of people
> that i work with daily at glide who would be quite overjoyed with
> another housing alternative in sf, and  i would be happy to start the
> process of passing out keys among the disadvantaged in san francisco.
> otherwise  you were just using classism as a ploy in this single case
> and you honestly don't actually care about other homeless people in sf.
> 

They're not members of our community. In any case, I'm am not advocating
creating a homeless shelter. I advocate creating a specific alternative
for a specific person that someone specifically called out on a public
mailing list.

> pretending that the only solution a person who is housing disadvantaged
> in sf has is to sleep at noisebridge is disingenuous at best, and at
> worst outright malicious and insulting to the plight of the truly
> disadvantaged.
> 

It sounds like you should lead a workshop or directly help Frantisek.
You're clearly knowledgeable about how some help can be achieved; I bet
he would appreciate it.

You know a lot about the topic, respect.

All the best,
Jake