kevin nye

How (Not) to Write about Homelessness 3 Rule #3: Who is the *villain* of the story?

Part 3 in my ongoing series, "How (Not) to Write about Homelessness."

People don't "fall" into homelessness, they are pushed. Our stories about homelessness should reflect that, and refuse to allow the pushers to remain invisible.

Read more: kevinmnye.substack.com/p/how-not-to...

Walgreens pill bottles are like snowflakes, no two are ever exactly alike

Genuinely upset it took me so long to hear it

"From the halls of power to the fortress tower not a stone will be left on stone Let the king beware for your justice tears every tyrant from his throne The hungry poor shall weep no more for the food they can never earn There are tables spread, every mouth be fed for the world is about to turn."

can't stop thinking about this verse from Canticle of the Turning, which I only just heard for the first time recently.

Dedicating my vocation to ending homelessness is not some form of ascetic martyrdom. I'm not sacrificing. I'm not brave.

Unhoused people are awesome, actually. They're wise, funny, spiritual, vulnerable people who make my life better.

If they're not in your life, you're missing out.

See end of thread

I don’t talk about it because I don’t really talk about my students, but unhoused people are people I see every day. I’m continuously astonished by the strength and generosity of people who have every reason to give up.

I'm really proud of this piece I wrote for @sojo.net , which couldn't have released at a more apt time for its subject matter.

"No human is expendable, and wherever society’s castoffs forge community is where the gospel finds its most generative soil."

congratulations, you have now fully crossed over into dehumanization. you will be blocked.

work on yourself.

If you know them, what are their names?

This is objectively false. All of these are full in Minneapolis, and “safe” is debatable for many of the shelters that do exist. You are just wrong regarding your assumptions and prejudices about unsheltered people, and I know that because they are my friends, and you don’t even know them.

They aren’t the solution, but until we build the housing infrastructure to solve this, we can’t punish people for our incompetence.

I also don’t believe we should “watch people suffer”. It’s actually very easy to deploy restrooms, outreach, and other supports to ease suffering while we do our job.

You cannot criminalize survival from a problem we have caused. Encampments keep people alive. It’s not romanticization, it’s basic empathy. It shouldn’t be illegal to do what you need to live.

We do ourselves an injustice when we only focus on the extreme right wing violence against unhoused people and ignore the Democrat darlings like Frey, Newsom, Wheeler, and so many others who are just as vile.

Getting unhoused people killed is a bipartisan effort.

Fox News’ host Brian Kilmeade says ‘just kill ‘em’ about mentally ill homeless people Comments met with outrage online and calls for him to resign

Many have made the connection to the Fox & Friends clip where Brian Kilmeade suggested murdering unhoused people. I dont discount that, but the political reality for unhoused people is actually even bleaker.

www.the-independent.com/news/world/a...

Furthermore this violence against encampments is the direct result of the language of Mayor Frey, who even in the midst of multiple shot and killed has the audacity to say, "This is way worse that just a nuisance. This is a danger to the community."

Unhoused people get shot, and still get vilified.

The investigation has not revealed the shooter's identity or motivations, but statistically we know that it's more likely the unhoused were the victims, not the antagonists.

'We're shutting this thing down': Minneapolis starts clearing homeless encampment hosted by landlord after 7 shot That shooting came less than 12 hours after another shooting just two miles away that left five others injured.

A homeless encampment remains the only place in America that gets bulldozed because a crime happens to them, near them, or within them. Imagine a shooting in your apartment building and the response is to destroy your entire community?

kstp.com/kstp-news/to...

An MSNBC correspondent lost their job for accurately describing Charlie Kirk.

Meanwhile…

both reduce real violence against marginalized people into an imaginary platonic form, to be overcome through enlightened ideas devoid of any embodied reality. Klein, like so many white pundits, thinks politics is about abstract ideas because they are far from the people who live or die as a result.

I don't have time to explain this right now, but the way that this take sucks is *deeply* related to how Klein's ideas in "Abundance" also, deeply, suck.

What a lovely surprise to see this today!! Thanks to @uwfaith.bsky.social for having me on the list. Let me know if you’d like to have a virtual Q&A with readers, I’d be more than happy!

This is a lovely surprise! What an honor.

Reading a chapter from David A. deSilva for hw tonight, and this paragraph about purity codes and homelessness made me think about you, @kevinmnye.bsky.social ! It's just so succinct and descriptive- wow. ⚓

screen shot of a tweet reading: "Bluey and Daniel tiger are so revolutionary because they imagine a world where adults (especially but not exclusively parents) treat kids with curiosity, patience, wonder, and unconditional love. Basically... they imagine a world without James Dobson."

dusting off this old tweet for no particular reason

This means the world. Thank you so much!

😭😭😭

This isn’t about purity it’s about standards. As it stands, the vast majority of democrats want Medicare for all, to not criminalize homelessness, etc, but continually we are forced to nominate leaders who cave to their interest groups instead.

Yall I posted this same thing on Thread and WOW is the vibe different over there

I’m ok with him being on the train, but we shouldn’t make him the conductor. Electing people slightly left of Trump is how we’ve turned the “opposition party” into a bunch of spineless losers who betray us whenever the temperature rises a single degree.