The Street Kids of San Francisco

Like another commenter on this thread, I've lived in the Haight for the past nine years. And while the article is interesting and informative, it doesn't quite paint a full picture (literally—the pictures aren't representative, that girl is not a typical street kid by a long shot, she hasn't slept a day outside in her life. Think camo and combat boots and pit bulls, not peace signs and hacky sacks) of the underside of the street kid scene. There is also a quite a bit of violence and a lot of negativity to be had, both to each other, and to the community that they're visiting.<p>I see the street kids as guests in our extended home. When everyone is peaceful and respectful I don't really have an issue. But when they are violent, or a health risk (defecation on the sidewalk and on the stoops is a real concern, and it happens all day every day), or harass my family or my neighbors, I do take issue, and believe we need to set and enforce limits for the safety of everyone.<p>As far as it being a lifestyle _choice_ for some. Indeed it is. But not for all. It's a spectrum. Overall it's a good article, but it's not the whole story.<p>Edit: And to the author, try walking around and doing those interviews after dark some night. The perspective would be ... different.

I'm a 23 year old with purple hair, but I'm also a PhD student at a top 10 university for computer science. I've hung out in tons of squats and punk houses, and briefly been a street kid, but I got a 2380 on my SATs. I lived in a non-residential warehouse for months - months when I was taking Physics, Linear Algebra, Computer Science and Sociology 321 - Class and Inequality. I've dug through dozens of dumpsters, and I've hiked hundreds and hundreds of miles on the Appalachian Trail. I've been in jail and won the prize for Best Undergraduate Research at my university.<p>I fell out of touch with the anarchopunkier half of my friends when I got serious about artificial intelligence and computer science - I love these things and they're very important to me, and in the coffeeshops we always talked about how to get rid of tyrants and inequality. I have always believed in technology. OLPC, Ubuntu, Khan Academy, Coursera, solar panels, cell networks - the list goes on.<p>Startup folks and street punks have a lot of similar ideas about what we want, but really different aesthetics. The punks I've known are much more well-read and just as bright as the grad students I spend time with now. On the other hand, they're in denial about capitalism. Both groups have a lot to learn from each other, if only they can look over the other's smarminess/smelliness.

This article should really be titled "The Street Kids Of Hippy Hill." By going to one place in order to get a feeling for "street kids," they've gotten an extremely myopic view of that scene.<p>The full picture is much more varied. Traveler kids who go to hobo gatherings would never be caught dead at a rainbow gathering. Rainbow family kids don't drink, and alcohol is even forbidden at gatherings (where <i>nothing</i> else is forbidden). Gutter punks live to spange for 40s. Anarcho punks would rather starve than fly a sign.<p>Each has its own music scene, its own values, its own social norms. For this article to suggest that most street kids don't have a political analysis might be true for hippy hill, but isn't true at all for the squatter scene (see 'homes not jails' and 'food not bombs' for instance).

The one question that I always ask (and instantly makes me unpopular) of the hippie/transient/counter-culture types, is, "Do you realize you would all likely be dead of hunger withing two to three weeks without a massively efficient capitalist system supporting you?"<p>They are able to exist because of people who are willing to work to support them. Even the communes rely on fertilizer, fuels, metals, foodstuffs from 2000+ years of increasingly efficient capitalists economies.<p>Don't get me wrong - I love spending a week to ten days out on the playa, and have never had such a wonder experience of "community" anywhere else - but I never, ever kid myself into believing that such a lifestyle is sustainable.<p>I don't like to use the word, "parasite", but I can't really think of a better word to describe the Haight street pan-handlers/garbage divers. They can't survive without people providing for them.

I would have written a different story. I lived 2 blocks from Haight and Stanyan for a long time and I was connected to street kids by skateboarding and guitar and being someone who talks to anyone (e.g I gave away a lot of Dunlop jazz3 guitar picks). While there may be a few people on the streets willingly (the new arrivals), and some are talented musicians/artists/artisans, the author chose to ignore the violence and the scourge of alcoholism and meth, the ones who have no family or safety net or options. He didn't look in the backpacks and see pepper spray, sawed off baseball bats, golf clubs and rocks (Skateboards are capable weapons also), he didn't see people lose most of their teeth in a year, or the armed guards at Whole Foods, stuff like that. The homeless are in the Haight becuase they wouldn't last long in the Mission, South of Market, Potrero, places like that

As someone who has lived in the Haight-Ashbury for 9 years now, I can say this is a well-written and balanced perspective. Although, it glosses over the additional crime (mainly property theft, occasional assault) brought by the street kids. The key thing noted here is that the vast majority of street kids in the Haight are there by choice, up to and including the choice to panhandle to make enough for $18 bags of organic dog food.<p>It's refreshing to read, because I'm tired of the two extremes usually presented, either that the street kids are people to be pitied or trash to be thrown out. The street kids are more just a fixture. Like the trees in Buena Vista, they were not here originally, but they're a fixture now, and they'll be here for quite some time to come.

U sed to work at the Round Table in Albany. It is quiet and not much happens there. At that time the same owner owned my store, and the one in downtown Berkeley. One night I was asked to fill in at the Berkeley store.<p>Tacked on the wall where you give your order is an "86" list. These are the homeless that are asked to leave the instant they appear. All others are allowed to stay as long as they don't disrupt the business.<p>I saw that list and laughed, but 10 minutes later a homeless man stood outside the window and screamed obscenities at me as I worked. He was on the list, so 911 was called.<p>A little while later a "street kid" walked in and asked if we had spare slices. I was about to say no, when the manager said sure, and handed over a slice. When I asked I was told that when they made mistakes, put onions on a pizze that called for no onions, they saved them and handed out slices to those that asked nicely.<p>I guess it all depends on who and how you act.

I don't want to be insensitive, but some of these individuals' behavior smacks of privilege. When I think about the fact that someone whose family "owns a major medevac company" is taking up space at a shelter or panhandling on the street, I get really frustrated. These are resources that should be used by those who are really down on their luck and have no other option, not someone/some group who wants to live out their bohemian fantasy.<p>If I knew I just gave five bucks to someone whose familial net worth trumps mine 100 fold, I'd be irate.

hi-- Haight St shop owner and resident (Buyer's Best Friend Wholesale &#38; Mercantile, Haight @ Cole, bbfdirect.com), member of the Haight St Merchants Association, own two other shops around town, happy to answer any questions. Some FAQs: - no, the street kids don't steal or bother us much, but also not especially helpful. They and the shopowners largely keep to themselves. - yeah, the filth is unpleasant and bad for business. - SIT/LIE hasn't been abused much AFAICT-- it's gone into the cops' "tools" for dealing with people who cross the line. Plenty of people sit on the sidewalks still, but now you can get them to move if being polite doesn't work. As with any enforcement tool, I'm sure there's some abuse and I won't defend it. The cops I've met are thoughtful. - we've had to call the cops only a handful of times - not bad for a big city. - cyclical/seasonal business and cost of living are bigger annoyances than the kids. - the Haight Ashbury merchants are as crazy as anybody-- half of them want to kick out the bums, the other half feed them, half want to legalize pot, the other half get more cops. The issues are complex.<p>I second Dewitt's comments btw -- we know each other both from the 'hood and from work.

The legalization of marijuana will utterly destroy this community. From the article, it sounds like weed facilitates a significant part of the economy as both a trade good and a consumable while LSD is a luxury item and hard drugs are not tolerated. Cheap weed will probably induce a net loss of value (that being the value of knowing how to procure it, and trading that value).

"Our initial hypothesis was that life on Haight Street would be a grim, Dickensian hellhole. Instead, we discovered a world of misunderstood, modern-day nomads, blithely toeing the line between poverty, drug dealing, and hippy nirvana."<p>We had to interview homeless people in DC as part of a college project, and found something similar. I think the common perception is that homeless people are just people like you and I who hit hard times, but almost everyone we talked to was homeless by choice (and some probably had mental illness). Talk to homeless people sometime, it may change your ideas.

Great post!<p>I lived right next to the park for the better part of a year. I feel like there are two more aspects to the street kids lives that deserve more attention:<p>(1) Their pets: Most of these kids have a dog (or sometimes a cat), love their pets and for the most part seem to treat them well. One night, after finding a dog with a collar roaming alone in the park, I helped her find a temporary home. The next day I saw some really worried street kids posting hand written signs with a photo of the dog and reunited them. It was a sight to behold. Homeless with pets are controversial but at least amongst the street kids, the pets seem to have a net positive effect on them.<p>(2) Mental illness: OP alluded to this, but mentally ill homeless who live in the same area are a huge issue for people who associate them with the street kids. There is no easy fix for this problem and I have always wondered what the street kids think about the mentally ill amongst them and what should be done to help them.

I became homeless at the cusp of 14, escaping from sleeping with mice on a bare mattress from a Sunset District garage - where my crack-addicted mother (she, a Stanford engineering graduate) put me. I lived on the streets of San Francisco, almost exclusively the Haight until I was 17 1/2. The horrors of my story paled in comparison to the kids I crewed up with in Upper/Lower Haight, and there were a <i>lot</i> of us.<p>There still are. For many years I have done active outreach work to the homeless youth there as well as risk reduction community mediation meetings between homeless kids, their outreach service workers, and local residents (some of these meetings have taken place at The Booksmith).<p>I am currently very successful in the tech arena, despite never having returned to school after having to find a place to live and food to eat when I was halfway through ninth grade; I never graduated and have no formal education. I am a very lucky exception.<p>Why do I tell you this? So you can begin to understand why I have to tell you that if this article is claiming to be about life for, or about, homeless youth in the Haight, the article is so inaccurate it ought to be considered harmful.<p>This article is the biggest lie and mischaracterization of homeless youth in the Haight I have ever read. I'm too astonished at the moment to be outraged.

Went for a walk through this area about two weeks ago. As you near the park, lot of dealers pop up. In the park, on every corner of the paths people offered to sell me drugs. Marijuana, LSD, Mushrooms were all offered. I could sense different groups competing for territory in the park. I felt uncomfortable.

<i>But in a city that lionizes entrepreneurs who sacrifice everything to create the next big thing, there is something admirable about the street kids’ total embrace of drugs, freedom, and a lifestyle that society scorns.</i><p>This. In an isolated society of highways and McMansions where it's taboo to converse with random strangers, what the world needs now is not the next big social iPhone app, but a stronger sense of community, which we could learn a thing or two from these 'kids'.

This story reminds me a lot of this old "Hipster Animals" gag.<p><a href="http://hipster-animals.tumblr.com/post/5609675345/raccoon" rel="nofollow">http://hipster-animals.tumblr.com/post/5609675345/raccoon</a>

I would like to know what you can get in the Haight for $1500 / month. Not much I'll bet.

Anybody remember the article a few days ago with the author complaining about the Google bus and the invasion of tech folks into the Bay Area and how they weren't improving the community?<p>And how a lot of people were like "Hey, well, it's putting wealth into helping San Francisco!".<p>Well, how's this fit into that calculus?

A lot of people read this and this kind of story and they want to talk about the morality or value systems of these kids, themselves, and so forth.<p>I propose that there is a much more important reading:<p>Youth unemployment is extraordinarily high (effecting minorities even worse than these mostly-white kids, of course). Youth incarceration rate / engagement with the justice system is very high.<p>The numbers of people "dropping out" of legitimate society altogether look to be high and growing.<p>People's personal feelings about all this aside, it pays to notice when society starts to fray so badly as this.

Sounds like fun for about 1-2 weeks, and then it would be a sucky life. Gotta have mental stimulation sometime.

I was one of those kids. And I can tell you that the article is pretty accurate. I am female, small and skinny. At the time, I was 19 years old and I had given up a one-way ticket to Hawaii, where I was going to transfer to another Dave and Buster's. I decided that even in paradise, I didn't want to work for those assholes anymore. So I packed up about 1/10 of my belongings (what I considered valuable: my violin, some clothes and a ton of beads). When I got to SF, I instantly made friends. I was drawn to the ones who didn't like begging- the buskers and merchants. I slept in the park every night for months. I wandered Haight &#38; Ashbury- at night. Yes, I got robbed by the Fillmore Kids once, but I deserved it for selling on their turf. I never got in any fights, nor did any of the kids I was hanging with. I never even had anything stolen (not that I had anything to steal). The whole point is to be totally detached from society. Looking back, I think it should have been scary, but it wasn't. It was fun. I got to play my violin all day and sing Janice Joplin to the gypsies at night by campfire on Ocean Beach. I met some fascinating characters. One kid had joined a cult. When they refused to let him play jazz piano, he decided that working in a vegan-bakery-sweat-shop run by jesus freaks wasn't for him. He collected rocks and must have been really fucking strong because he had the heaviest pack I have ever held. At least he could be sure that no one would steal that thing! There were a lot of kids with psychosis there, too. One kid wrote poetry all day and occasionally sang to himself. When I asked him what he was saying, he'd say, "a song I wrote for you." Though the sentiment was sweet, he didn't write it. It was 'Tangled Up in Blue' by Bob Dylan. It was ALWAYS 'Tangled Up in Blue'. I thought the comment about "respecting the spot," was interesting, too. We really do that. No one is greedy. If we feel we've made enough cash for beer or cigarettes, we leave. I've even had other kids tell me about a good busking stop they had just left vacant. "Warmed it up for ya." It's easy to see why this lifestyle is so appealing. However, the same cannot be said of why it's a lot less dangerous than most would think. But I lived it and I can tell you, I never felt unsafe in the HAIGHT (I emphasize Haight because I did venture to a soup kitchen near Polk and Geary and that was fucking terrifying). Despite any negative feelings some of the gypsies might have toward the cops, the police generally go easy on the stray kids because they know they keep the real crime out of the tourist area. In the end, I got bored of that life and moved to Austin to pursue music. I'm still a gypsy at heart, but I also care a lot about the real world. These kids don't have any opinions on real events and feel no sense of loyalty to society. They're not dangerous, they're just just freeloaders. Plain and simple.

I too enjoyed the article having volunteered at HAFMC and seeing so many on need. That was decades ago, but I've often wondered when the wandering quest winds down, what became of their experience? The article hints at the Elders but I suspect that is the minority. Would be interesting to see a Up series a la Micheal Apted

Thanks Rohin! Your blog is one of my favorite things to read. Quite a change from the normal hacker news articles.

Wondering many make the move from GG park to Market Street... Where the homeless are a whole different breed.

I can't see a community like this surviving if a lot more people join in. The article describes someone refraining from 'panhandling excessively', but if you have more people, there will always be those who think less for the benefit of others

"and have limited options when they get too old for the lifestyle"<p>That's what would sour me. Guess I am showing my age... I like hot showers, clean clothes, and warm beds too much.

Slightly related is this documentary, Skid Row (<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0795381/" rel="nofollow">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0795381/</a>), in which a guy goes and lives in Skid Row in Los Angeles for 9 days. It's free to watch on hulu and probably other video sites.

I picked two up (well they're not kids, they're in their late 20s) and they've been working with me ever since. Can't wait until they move out, but at least they learned some electronics!

OFF-TOPIC: is there a good reason the sidebar repositions itself on every windows.scroll instead of just setting position:fixed in the CSS? It's jittery and distracting when scrolling.

It was a little weird that the author felt they had to give the definition of 'panhandling'.

This is actually pretty fascinating - I would have never thought to ask. Thanks!

&#62; In many ways, the street kids seemed to be having a lot more fun than us.<p>This is key.

Does anyone else find this really sad? It's not abject poverty, but it's a loss of talent to the world, and I'm old and honest enough to know that it's the world's fault.<p>I liked one of the signs. "You don't have to fuck people over to survive." That's what our positive-sum technocracy is <i>supposed</i> to represent: a world in which you can focus on getting work done and making society better. That's what it actually <i>is</i> if you have a degree of freedom, autonomy, and comfort that is (alas) very rare. Yet most of these "street kids" face a world of soulless, zero-sum, corporate status-grubbing where they <i>do</i> have to make that choice, and they're making the less approved but perhaps morally nicer one.