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Culture War Roundup for the week of June 24, 2024

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a guy who goes stargazing on a blanket and accidentally falls asleep

The cop would probably nudge him awake and say, "You can't sleep here," and the guy would go home. If the guy instead pulls out a tent and crawls inside to sleep there, he'll probably get told again to leave and, if he doesn't, arrested. This applies whether the guy is homeless or homed, there's no class distinction other than one of obstinate and probably repeat offending.

Sleeping in a park where sleeping is disallowed because you have nowhere else to sleep is no different than stealing fruit from a fruit stand because you have no other food. It's a crime, whether you're scruffy or clean-cut.

Luckily there are beds and food in jail, so the system works when we let it.

This applies whether the guy is homeless or homed, there's no class distinction other than one of obstinate and probably repeat offending.

There's another distinction: If the guy has a home and is just being obstinate, he gets no defense. His lawyer wouldn't fight for his constitutional right to sleep in public; he'd just try to get the level of offense reduced or obtain probation-before-judgement. No left-wing organizations would be jumping to his defense (nor, obviously, right-wing). If he somehow nevertheless got to appeal, the Ninth Circuit would not find that criminalizing sleeping in public for someone who had a home was criminalizing a status. So the Ninth Circuit really was requiring special rights for the homeless.