In solidarity with squatting movements and homeless people
Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of land or a building, usually residential, that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have lawful permission to use. The United Nations estimated in 2003 that there were one billion slum residents and squatters globally. Squatting occurs worldwide and tends to occur when people who are poor and homeless find empty buildings or land to occupy for housing. It has a long history.
The majority of squatting is residential in nature. As a phenomenon it tends to occur when a poor and homeless population makes use of derelict property or land through urban homesteading. According to an academic, Kesia Reeve, "squatting is largely absent from policy and academic debate and is rarely conceptualised, as a problem, as a symptom, or as a social or housing movement."
In many of the world's poorer countries, there are extensive slums or shanty towns, typically built on the edges of major cities and consisting almost entirely of self-constructed housing built without the landowner's permission.
Squatting can be related to political movements, such as anarchist, autonomist, or socialist. It can be a means to conserve buildings or a protest action. Squats can be used by local communities as free shops, cafés, venues, pirate radio stations or as multi-purpose autonomous social centres. Dutch sociologist Hans Pruijt separates types of squatters into five distinct categories:
• Deprivation-based – homeless people squatting for housing need
• An alternative housing strategy – people unprepared to wait on municipal lists to be housed take direct action
• Entrepreneurial – people breaking into buildings to service the need of a community for cheap bars, clubs etc.
•Conservational – preserving monuments because the authorities have let them decay
•Political – activists squatting buildings as protests or to make social centres
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Nope. Private property owners have expenses and legal responsibilities for their property. I have been without a vehicle but that don’t give me the right to find one parked somewhere and hot wire it and drive it around.
@cherokeepatti In many cases those houses are abondoned and not well kept to begin with. Comparing it to a car is not a very good argument. Housing and shelter is a right and basic human need... driving is not.
@RebelliousSpirit An elderly man here went into the hospital for 3 weeks a couple years ago and when he returned he found his little frame home broken into and trashed. There were several men squatting in it while he was gone. It was infested with bedbugs and 💩 smeared in the walls. His personal possessions had been ransacked etc. His daughter came and got him and he started living with her. I don’t know why people feel entitled to do this to people who have worked hard for ebverything they own.
@cherokeepatti That's terrible and I also do advocate to treat occupied buildings well and create a quality of life. Actively used living areas and inhabitated spaces are much less likely to be subject to squatting. Most cases are empty buildings or empty apartments or campments on private property.
@RebelliousSpirit You can advocate all you want but someone who doesn’t respect boundaries won’t respect their property either. A bout a half mile away a group of 20 homeless took over a vacant densely trees lot that another elderly man owned. It was next to a residential neighborhood. He would have the police clear the property but they would come right back gain. He couldn’t keep them away from his property.. There is a homeless shelter and meal kitchen down the road but apparently not everyone wants to abide by the rules. Some of these people also had dogs. It got in such bad shape that the man signed it over to city. The city spent $50,000 and got a bulldozer and dump trucks to clear out more than 70 tons of trash, human & dog waste, rotted food, discarded furniture etc. Social workers identified the campers and offered all of them help to get their birth certificates, , Social Security cards, IDs made etc so they could sign them up for a housing list and food stamps etc. Nearly half of them refused the help. They just moved onto other wooded read including one about 4 blocks from my neighborhood.
@cherokeepatti That's terrible yet not as black and white as you depict it. Shelters and soup kitchen are no proper solution and only temprory or even bad places. The stigma is huge which makes it difficult to accept help. Especially in the US one who is not productive and possesses no property is basically seen as worthless.
I also know plenty of nice and sweet squatting places where also more priviledged people who have a stable life help out.
@RebelliousSpirit Eleven of those people refused any kind of help. They are polluting the land and waterways. This is a public health hazard among other things.
