True Kindness

What is True Kindness?

Before the pandemic, homelessness was getting out of hand in Oregon, and the best state and city leaders could do was drown themselves in virtue signalling and apathy.

Rather than taking a tough stand against the lawlessness, they pretended to care, and in the end, they grew the problem.

Here we are, years later, and the same thing is still happening.

Oregon dumps millions of tax dollars into “helping” the homeless, but the problem is getting worse.

I read a post from an Oregon restaurant owner who was trying to help by feeding folks, but she has finally had enough and understands the real problem now.

“ We will no longer give free food to the unhoused.

  From now on, we will focus more on donating to people or programs trying to feed the unhoused. We have had some problems this Summer, and it's only getting worse. It just seems it got out that we feed the unhoused, and that's okay. But I feel like I’m feeding people in the grips of addiction and desperation. People who are not trying to change their situation. I feel like we are feeding them so they can go out and steal from people and do drugs. They come and get free food and leave their trash all over, and use drugs. I always find foil with burns on it. They burn and write on my picnic tables, pass out, fight, disassemble bikes, refuse to move on when given free food, and ask to go, lock themselves in our bathrooms.”

I’m not using the name of the business because when the former owner of Elkhorn Brewery in Eugene and I called out this behavior, homeless virtue signalers came after us full force.

Their nastiness was vile, as they tried to make us into the villain.

Turns out they were heartless ones.

All along, our question was and still is, how is allowing people to suffer on the streets of Oregon kindness?

Culture says leave them alone, give them what they need to stay alive, and like a bad parent, you end up encouraging bad behavior.

Shame on us.

Perhaps Oregon’s governor needs to face reality. What she is doing isn’t working, so rather than continuing to fail, cut bait and try something else.

What if you provide mental health services to those who need them and require the “users of the system” to become productive members of society?

Let me state this more bluntly: stop enabling people.

Portland used to be the crown jewel of the Pacific Northwest.

Her highways and overpasses, clean and well-manicured with roses, flowers, and shrubbery.

Now they look like a shit hole.

Garbage, homeless camps, squatters, and debris scorn the eye and take away a civic pride that was once Oregon.

Remember “Keep Oregon Green?”

Perhaps we should change it to “Make Oregon Clean.”

Like the restaurant owner above, you learn that true kindness is not allowing bad behavior but requiring people to show some respect.

Culture has expectations that need to be met.

The horrible truth is that homelessness is a big business in Oregon.

People make a living off allegedly helping folks.

But is their alleged cure feeding the problem, not the people?

Time Oregon voters decide.