Canadian homeless encampments have become increasingly visible in recent years, and those residing within them have faced a fair bit of variation in how local governments react to their presence. Today, let’s look at a remarkable legal case that may change the game regarding how homeless encampments are considered under Canadian law and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

  • TerkErJerbs@lemm.ee
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    4 days ago

    Fuckers can try. I wasn’t directly involved in this but I grew to know personally David Arthur Johnston over (?) a decade ago who spent years in Victoria viscerally protesting right-to-sleep laws/anti-laws and finally won. Due to his tireless efforts, hunger strikes in jail, and community support he helped pave the way for homless people to pitch and sleep in tents for the night on any public property.

    Don’t like seeing poor people on public lands? Okay… be part of the solution.

    That was his message. And here we are still working on the questions involved, and solutions. Good. As long as the convo is still active and we haven’t given up.

    • cheese_greater@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Fucking good, our “housing policy” is complete Boomer bullshit and needs to be dismantled and rebuilt. Housing needs to be a human right, if you get it for doing bad things, you should get it for being normal or good and incentivize people to at least have or get their shit together in the comfort of their own place.

      So much of that self-reinvention can only happen when one can get away from their previous life and social graph

      • jerkface@lemmy.ca
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        3 days ago

        I know the rhetorical point you are making, but prisons are not free housing. In Ontario, they are terrifyingly outdated, under regulated, unsupervised hellholes.

        • cheese_greater@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          The point I’m making is housing is going to cost us no matter what so it just depends if we want to incentivise crime and desperation or incentivise economic productivity and improved mental health/resillience among the population.

        • Soup@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          Man, I’m 100% sure that your interpretation was correct but I read it at first as how fuckin’ parasites seem to be able to buy up all kinds of housing but good, or even just normal people, are constantly struggling to even pay rent. We’ve built the rules so that cheating is how to win and it’s fuckin’ bullshit.