Suella Braverman says rough sleeping is ‘lifestyle choice’
The home secretary, Suella Braverman, has described rough sleeping as a “lifestyle choice” while defending her decision to restrict the use of tents by homeless people on the streets of Britain.
According to Whitehall insiders, Braverman plans to crack down on tents that cause a nuisance in urban areas such as high streets – amid growing numbers of rough sleepers and what the government considers a rise in antisocial behaviour.
The home secretary has also proposed the introduction of a civil offence, which could lead to charities being fined if they provide homeless people with tents, the Financial Times reported.
Writing on X, formerly Twitter, Braverman defended her proposals, saying: “The British people are compassionate. We will always support those who are genuinely homeless. But we cannot allow our streets to be taken over by rows of tents occupied by people, many of them from abroad, living on the streets as a lifestyle choice.
“Unless we step in now to stop this, British cities will go the way of places in the US like San Francisco and Los Angeles, where weak policies have led to an explosion of crime, drug-taking, and squalor.
The UK has one of the most vile governments in the industrialized world.
Yeah. The fact that so many people are ok with this mask off cruelty is astonishing. No one sees the connection between the cost of living and sky high rents leading to an increase in homelessness. No one sees until they are on the streets themselves.
It's a worldwide phenomenon unfortunately.
A bunch of populist shite riling up the masses against people that have it even worse than them, to take away any and all focus from the people that are actually causing all these issues.
Eventually the poor will find a leader
And never will they think to stop waiting for one and to help themselves. 🤷
Most people are NOT ok with this. The problem is we have no way to remove the vile cow until a GE.
Sunak is so weak he has to keep her in place to shore up support anyone else would have got rid of her already.
Try living in NI and no matter who you vote for in a GE makes fuck all of a difference. In fact even the MPs that do get voted into Westminster can be told to do one and laws can be passed affecting us without our representatives agreeing to it. See the troubles legacy bill which had no support in NI from either community but was passed regardless.
If most people are not ok with this then explain why the tories have such a death grip on the electorate. Most people in the UK will just shrug their shoulders few will actually have the balls to say they support this. These same people are outraged with Corbyn doesn't sing God save the queen but are alright with literally making giving homeless people tents illegal. Try to suggest any social programme and grandpa will break out the fucking abacus but fuck the homeless I guess.
All you need to know is most people don't give a shit about anything not directly threatening their way of life in immediate terms. Once you understand how pathetic people are, it becomes all the more obvious why things are allowed to be this way and not change. A lot of people don't even care to put in the effort to learn or expand their knowledge of things at all.
But they were when they voted these people in. I still maintain that if Boris came back, the Tories would probably win again.
Gastroendoscopy finds the virulent pustule butt I think they do something else to remove it
Edit: ooh, General Election, my bad
If you think Starmer's neoliberal lot will actually be any different, besides having the mask on more often, I've got a bridge to sell you..
Even if Starmer and the Labour party were pretty much the same except they kept the mask on, that would still be a step in the right direction. Normalising the racism, bigotry, corruption and general inhumaneness that fuels the Tory party is absolutely something we should try to avoid.
However, I don't think Labour is like this. I don't think they're perfect, but I think they're much, much better. They're not going to fix everything overnight, but I do think them getting into power would be an important first stepping stone in moving the country and politics towards being a better place in in 10-15 years. They may not be your ideal party but, if you're pragmatic and have any kind of long-term vision, you'll likely vote for them (or the Liib Dems, depending on which constituency you're in) to make sure the Tories are eliminated.
The Overton window is far too far to the right at the moment and Labour getting into power is important for helping to gradually shift it leftwards. People simply aren't going to vote in a "radical" socialist in the current political or economic climate; they want someone they can see as a safe pair of hands who can work on stabilising things somewhat. Right now, that's Starmer - the boring man who's politically central (by current standards) with a fairly clean record and an air of competence. When, in most constituencies, the options are Labour and Tory, you working to put everyone off Labour is just going to benefit the Tories.
Stop letting perfect be the enemy of good.
People are just too stupid for democracy I´m afraid.
People don't want to learn or debate anything. They form an opinion and from that point on stop giving a shit. It's no surprise things end up like this.
We're not.... Don't expect this woman to be in charge at the next election ..
Don't underestimate Labour's ability to self-sabotage themselves
I dunno, don't forget Netanyahu and his judicial reforms. Not even to speak of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
I think UK is, for better or for worse, fairly middle of the pack, and it's the world that is seeing a rising tide of authoritarianism and reactionary positions. Heavily enabled by instantaneous digital communication, which essentially turned each individual authoritarian faction in each individual society into something of a broader, more cooperative front.
Thus giving them the numbers to start getting shit done in certain places where they have an advantage, and pressing to create advantage in places where they don't have it yet.
Most of the folks swept up in it are just along for the ride. A little mistaken idea over here, a little willful ignorance over there, and normal, good people can get convinced they need to take radical actions against, basically, themselves.
Right, and it just so happens that more and more people are "choosing" to be homeless since the cost of living has deepened (never mind over a decade of Tory enforced austerity that came before it), and despite the fact that hundreds of rough sleepers die every year, mostly due to freezing temperatures and/or related illness..
It's also a classic Tory projection move how in California the problem is due to policy, but where she makes the policy, it's anything but.. 🙄
San Diego passed a camping ban a few months ago. We are challenging it in court, but they're doing the same hateful shit out here too.
Not so much a dog whistle, as a dog fog horn.
Hateful woman. Each time I think her policies can’t get any more evil she outdoes herself.
“Genuinely homeless” lol
"If you see a homeless person with a funny sign, they probably haven't been homeless very long." - Chris Rock
Cunt.
Just in case anyone is concerned, Bretherman is insane and has absolutely no idea or indeed any interest in what the "British people" want. And her and her useless excuse for a government are just biding their time until they get unceremoniously kicked out of office.
She has repeatedly claimed that "the people" are interested in immigration despite the fact that polling data shows that most people couldn't give a flying rats backside about immigration.
The only people who care about immigration are the sort of people who get upset if somebody with slightly different coloured skin walks past them in the street. Or they hear previously unknown language that they suspect might be foreign or possibly Welsh. I.e morons
Unfortunately for everyone large swaths of the British public support her and her insane racist bullshit and will no doubt support this because they are lead poisoned narcissistic scum
Let me guess, she's a Tory.
She’s as Tory as you can get
You misspelled cunt. It's ok, i won't hold it against you.
"They're the same picture."
The Tories used to be a bunch of out of touch weirdos who were obsessed with financial prudence above all else. Never giving any money to anybody. Unless they were already rich obviously
They were unpleasant for sure, but at least their political philosophy was fundamentally understandable even if it was undesirable.
This current lost are just awful for the sake of being evil. They don't have any policys, they don't have any concept of financial prudence, they're just racist. That's it at this point, that's the entirety of their political image. Racism. They're not Conservative anymore, they've managed to morph into something worse.
Edit, added a word
As it becomes more obvious that the right wing has nothing to offer ordinary people, right-wing politicians retreat into incendiary populist rhetoric. The easiest way for them to generate votes without offering anything positive is to select minority groups to blame for people's problems and to offer to oppress these minorities. It's part of how conservatism lurches towards fascism when the going gets tough.
Of course the going is only tough because the conservatives mismanage the economy. Which is hilarious in a kind of depressing way because they're supposed to be the party that is all about the economy. They essentially believe in corporate self-regulation. If the corporations will regulate themselves then the government barely even need to exist.
That ideology seems to have gone out the window. Not that was ever any good but it did at least mean that they would probably leave minority groups alone, they wouldn't be supported in any particular way, but then again no one was supported.
Of course at this point a minority group is anybody who doesn't have six figures in their bank account
Cunts are my favourite animals! Your derogatory language is an insult to them.
My apologies. I hope to not confuse that cunt with any of the fairer sex. I mean no disrespect to women, just that one cunt.
They call it the Nasty Party for a reason.
Its a line that worked well for blair, i don't know why Starmer doesn't make use of it, it's apt.
Cunt. To go after people that have already lost everything. She probably wants to freeze them to death this winter. Instead of being human and helping them.
Great! So we will build tons of public housing, right?
Oh- Oh... Oh....................
Wow, this heifer really has zero concern for possible repercussions to her actions or her words.
Shall the Brits return to the days of the houses that lent you a rope to drape over for the night before you go back to your wandering homelessness? At least a rope to drape over at night wouldn’t be as much of an eyesore as a tent, right?!?
People should just start camping out on her property by the thousands just on principle.
Sleeping on clotheslines was the source of the term "hungover".
Lifestyle choice, see?
Well in that case being hungover is practically a British institution.
The whole point of drinking is to do it to excess. If you can remember your name at the end of a night out it's a failure.
This fucking pariah of an mp needs to be taken out of office now.
Guillotines, what we need are Guillotines.
Blatant cruelty and using xenophobia to mask it. Thats some vile shit.
I'm not up to date with the online discussion of British politics. Is Cruella Braverman a thing already or do we need to make it happen?
That and "Suella de Ville". And she's fully deserving of either title. I mentioned elsewhere in the thread, but where other politicians I dislike feel like they're either doing the wrong things for the right reasons, or they're selfish, corrupt or incompetent, Braverman feels like she gets off on the cruelty and is a genuinely evil person.
Definitely already a thing, she is a real piece of work..
If you want to ruin your weekend, hers is a rabbit hole to go down..
The world is literally being run by a bunch of psychopaths.
Run by and voted for by.
Psychopaths have a way to coerce or convince people to take their side. They must have control over others. It's all about power and doing whatever it takes to get it. Lie, cheat, gaslight, play the victim, whatever.
One ones ruthless enough to win I guess. And only the worst yearn for power enough to go to the trouble.
So fine already poor people to make them less poor? And how do you decide "lifestyle" poor? This is exactly the stuff the GOP is spreading and the want "camps" that would be fenced in areas for tent cities way outside the cities that the poors could live in
Is this woman Satan?
Yes. Literally the only truly evil senior British politician I have come across in my lifetime.
There are plenty of politicians in my lifetime who I have disagreed with quite severely on certain things - Thatcher, Blair, Corbyn, May, for example. But in each of their cases I honestly believe they were pursuing a course that they believed would improve the lot of the British people and bring about a better, fairer and more prosperous society - I might have disagreed with them (in some cases a lot!) about how to get there, but I never doubted their hearts were ultimately in the right place. Boris Johnson was the first who left me thinking he had no redeeming qualities - selfish and egotistical, heart very much in the wrong place. Boris was only in it for Boris.
But Suella is something else. Suella isn't in it for the public good, but Suella isn't in it for Suella either. Suella is in it to hurt people. That's her overwhelming motivating goal in life and politics. She gets off on undisguised cruelty. She is genuinely evil.
My idea is that this kind of people are deliberately chosen by their superiors to act as "lightning rods" for all kinds of unpopular measures.
Then they often fade away into relative obscurity and reappear in a next election cycle, as needed.
After they leave politics, they inevitably end up running a board of directors or a committee or a think tank somewhere...
Historically yes, although I don't think there's been one as bad as Suella before, and certainly not one who is now among the betting market favourites to be the next Tory leader once they're in opposition.
I see her more as a symptom of the nihilism that has overtaken British conservatism since the 2016 referendum. They've become obsessed with fighting meaningless symbols and vibes, and fixated on pulling down their opponents rather than building something up themselves. Nothing positive matters to them, it's all about destruction.
In the 1980s, Thatcher's Tories sold the British lower middle-class on a vision of home-owning, share-owning popular capitalist democracy, in which entrepreneurs and small-business owners would guide us all into a prosperous future. What positive vision like that do Tories have to offer to voters today? Single-sex toilets and criminalising the homeless? Suella literally has said that her 'dream' in politics is to deport refugees to Rwanda. They have nothing positive to offer and Suella's rise is a symptom of that.
"Oh you're homeless? Name the top three ways to cook beans over a hobo campfire so I know you're not a poser." - Suella Braverman
"No true homeless..."
Love how there's only one 'Lifestyle Choice' available for billions of people on God's Green Earth: Work or Die.
Wow. She sounds like a real shit human being.
If she pulls herself up and really tries hard at itself improvement she might elevate herself to being a really shit human being.
The US cities have those issues largely because they priced out ordinary people and have a climate survivable outside all year.
Where is the compassion.
Fascists will be Fascist...
Did y'all really need the Second Coming of Maggie?
I think calling her the "second coming of Maggie" really undersells Braverman's cruelty and capacity for evil. I think Thatcher really fucked up this country, and we're still feeling the effects of some of her policies to this day. But Thatcher did genuinely think she was doing things for the right reasons - that she was making tough but necessary decisions.
Braverman seems to get off on the cruelty. A lot of her policies and ideas seem cruel for the sake of cruelty. There are plenty of politicians I've disagreed with and disliked, but they've all tended to feel like it's either because they were doing what I'd consider to be the wrong things for the right reasons (ie, they thought it would help, different approaches to what I'd want but with positive outcomes in mind, etc) or they've just been selfish, corrupt or idiotic. Braverman is a whole different thing entirely. The purpose of her policies is often the cruelty, with no tangible benefits that even she can list. She's a genuinely evil person.
Thatcher did not care about your country, just the ultra rich.
Is "rough sleeping" a UK term, or is that as tone-deaf as it sounds to my American sensibilities?
Stand UK term. Used by charities and the voluntary sector as well as government. Not particularly tone deaf. What is your preferred term?
I dunno, but I feel like even "homeless" is a more-encompassing term, since it affects more than just your sleep situation. I feel like "rough sleeping" is really downplaying what homelessness entails.
Homeless people are called homeless. But not all people sleeping rough are homeless. For example someone ejected from their home by an abusive partner might be sleeping rough, but wouldn’t be homeless. It’s a question of being precise and not assuming things about someone’s circumstances
If i got ejected from my home.. I would consider myself homeless..
I imagine you’d actually be pretty pissed ofc that someone had ejected you from your home. I doubt you’d just shrug and say ‘I don’t have a home anymore. Legally it’s still your home. You’d want help to get back into it.
That's assuming we are talking about getting evicted from a place I own. Majority of people don't own a home for whom homelessness is just what happens if they can't find a place to rent or afford it.
And not all homeless people are sleeping rough, some are in temporary accommodation etc
Americans call it homelessness, sleeping on the street, and homeless camping. To us it would sound like a euphemism. Just a confusion in language though.
Here "homeless" is more of an umbrella term, since many people are homeless and not sleeping rough (housed temporarily by the council, staying with friends, staying in a shelter).
Sounds insensitive alright and I’m not American.
I'm Canadian and the phrase "sleeping rough" is definitely in use here. Many homeless people sleep in shelters or cars or someone else's place, if they have the option. "Sleeping rough" is useful for differentiating those who are sleeping in bus shelters, tents, etc. I most frequently hear it used by people advocating for the homeless.
c/noahgettheboat
"Let them eat cake."
I feel like she has her head so far up her ass that she can taste her hair.
Oooweee, can't wait to see that get shot down for first amendment violations.
Oh wait...
I live in San Francisco. Here, we have a large homeless population that comprises a number of subcategories. One of the major subgroups could be reasonably described as recreationally or perhaps volitionally homeless; they prefer life on the streets and the possibility of moments of fleeting drugged joy, to a grinding, dull, depersonalized life in state-provided shelter. All of them, however, the result of neoliberal and reactionary political, economic, educational, and carceral policies that allowed people to become disconnected and disaffected to the point where they rocked up on SF’s streets for its mild environs, lax legal system, and plentiful meth and fenty.
What you describe as "voluntary" homelessness sounds to me like the devastating physiological effects of drug addiction.
Sure, and lack of opportunity, support systems, affordable housing, mental and physical health services, etc.
Most hard drug addiction has its roots in systemic failure(s).
It sounds like the feds are starting to step things up on the drug enforcement side. I'm curious to see what happens with that.
Also in the bay area and have walked past a number of situating that aren't normalized elsewhere (e.g. People bent over at the waist passed out, people passed out/blissed on the side of a major sidewalk (into embarcadero), etc.)
I like a balance approach to enforcement and ensuring shelter for everyone. A few things, here, aren't working.
All of that said, I'll go into SF any ol' day and have a good, safe time. I'll drive or I'll take Bart. There's a lot of undeserved SF hate. It isn't perfect, but it sure is good to be in.
There is a feral quality to SF that is starting to remind me of NYC in the late-‘70s and ‘80s.
You can see the establishment of other ways of being that assume zero input or oversight from organized systems. For example, the red-light running is legion and increasing. I regularly pop out for a single errand on my bike and witness three different drivers blowing through solid red lights.
The SFPD decided they want paid, but not to do the usual. So here we are.m and that's why the feds and state police are getting to do the work.