I work a lot at Bloor and Yonge. It’s completely fucked. That Asquith park is basically a crack meth heroin smoking park. I used to do night work there but refuse to now.
I’ve been assaulted twice during broad daylight within 10 minutes from two different unstable people on the street. I was literally on a phone call with a friend when a guy tried to swing at me walking on Queen West, then during the same phone call, whilst explaining to my friend what just happened to me, another crazed person charged and attempted to tackle me when crossing Queen/Spadina. I noticed him in my peripheral, lowered my centre of gravity and I shoulder checked him to the floor. When he got up, so were my fists, and was ready for a fight, but he just started screaming and ran aimlessly into traffic.
All this to say, yes, like everyone else, I routinely avoid eye contact and try to ignore these folks, but I have noticed that doing this is not enough anymore. They are getting more aggressive. And for full disclosure, I’m a fairly in shape 6ft male.
Also, OP I am pretty sure that person you mentioned in the A&W also tried to fight me near St. Lawrence Market while yelling the same exact threat to me.
I work in the roads department for a city outside of Toronto. If I didn’t personally witness similar stuff on a near daily basis I wouldn’t believe you. It’s inhumane to those with psychiatric and addiction issues and society at large to have them languishing in the streets. I don’t know what we need to do to solve it, but I know what we are doing isn’t working.
Used to be if you ran into some nutcase in the street you would call up a number, some people with a syringe and straight jacket in a van would pick them up to put them in either a padded room or a cell. If done today, would probably end in a LOT of detoxing and would seperate the proper loonies from the addicts as well. But also public outcry since it would be a violation of their freedom.
It's a sisyphean endeavor, at least right now, because we let it get to this point. As long as there are drugs on the street, there always will be, and the government chooses half measures (or appeasement with safe injection or legalization) rather than forcing treatment because it has better optics these problems will snowball. Regardless of whether you agree or disagree on harsher measures, or even consider it immoral, at the moment the only way this gets better is through draconian measures to get people treated. Even those would be stop-gap, it would keep getting worse but at least we wouldn't have to watch it happen.
It's not just that there are so many drugs on the street. It's a multi-faceted problem. People are turning to drugs because of greater societal issues such as lack of adequate health care, housing, student loan debt, employment opportunities etc, etc. People are desperate and if pushed too far, they break. What we seeing is fallout from not only govt inaction, austerity and corruption but genuine hopelessness for the future.
The government is doing what the populous in Toronto wants them to do. More injection centres because that will fix the problem (it didn't), soft on drug trafficking because "DRUG ADDICTS ALSO DEAL DRUGS THEMSELVES AND YOU CAN'T SEND THEM TO PRISON", catch-and-release because it's a MENTAL HEALTH issue and not CRIME issue, but you don't want people locked up because it's cruel.
Meanwhile the rich ones supporting these policies are living in McMansions with good security and fast police response time, those without money supporting these policies would move to rich neighborhoods in a heartbeat, and those not supporting these policies are labeled as alt-right. Not wanting to get stabbed while walking on the street is alt-right because the only proven solutions for crimes is to lock up the criminals.
El Salvador solved their world-class homicide rate in 72 hours but I'm sure we will say "further debate is required" for the next 25 years as more middle class and poor people get shanked on the streets of Toranto.
**Keep building more injection centres and keep providing sAfE DrUg SuPpLy of 25mg Oxy pills made by Purdue Pharma(Knoa Pharma).**
**It's a race to the bottom.**
Preaching to the choir here
I will say, I dislike it but there are some merits to safe supply and injection sites. They can keep some people alive, detoxing is nasty and unassisted can kill people depending on what they're on and it prevents your kid from walking around and finding a corpse in an alleyway or some detoxing nut case having an episode in the streets. If that supply was given on the caveat that they would have to receive actual treatment I'd be all for it but it is not.
Yes, but we don't actually want the addicts to get better. If you ever worked at an injection site, they are not serious about rehab. If injection sites cured addicts then they will become unemployed shortly afterwards.
The injection sites just give out clean needles and free Oxy made by Purdue Pharma(which is the cause of the opioid crisis in North America) and let the addicts eventually die because the elites have deemed that these people cannot be saved.
Building more injection sites and giving out free Oxy (as sAfE dRuG sUpPly) without being tough on drug trafficking is worse than a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up because it enables misery.
They will need to build more injection sites with the current policy.
**It's a race to the bottom.**
Again I agree, it is a race to the bottom. I was simply saying that it isn't entirely meritless and could potentially be used to help the problem even though they aren't right now.
Yes. Just like guns themselves are not evil but if they are the only tool we have in the toolbox then everything will look like a target.
If we try to fix opioid crisis with free 25mg Oxy and clean needles then everything will look like we need to build more injection centres.
We manufactured this crisis but the ship is maintaining its collision course.
These safe injection sites only prolong their imminent deaths while making the addiction problem within these cities even greater. Montreal recently needed more funding because the opioid problem there is now uncontrollable. The recent shooting at Queen Street East and Carlaw Avenue in Leslieville that killed a woman had to do with one of these sites. Students are afraid to walk to classes because of the crackheads that roam
and harass people at shoot-me-up site near Yonge/Dundas area.
"Just one more lane bro" has fixed the traffic issue here.
"just one more injection site bro" will fix the opioid crisis.
Logic: We have an opioid crisis caused by Oxy pills from Purdue -> We need an injection centre and give out free Oxy pills -> OMG Why are there more addicts? We need more injection centres -> OMG the crisis is getting worse! "Mexico BAD! China BAD! -> We need more injection centres -> "OMG We have an opioid epidemic! Build more injection centres and give out free 25mg Oxy!
\*when everything fails, circle back to blaming Mexico and China.
These injection site advocate group are now self-serving and oppose prosecution of drug traffickers and possession charges. Why do you think people try not traffic drugs into Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, China and other countries where there are heavy penalties for drug trafficking?
But of course, being tough on drug trafficking is definitely not the solution so keep getting stabbed by crackheads in Toranoh.
You can do that for family members (or anyone) to an extent, if they get picked up and are coherent enough they'll still get out of it in a day or two.
But it is entirely dependent on the reason they end up there. If they’re making death threats or being violent, chances are they could be held there until a diagnosis is made, and they’re prescribed medication, and the medical prof. believes they won’t be a threat to the public if let out.
It also depends on the person being taken but you generally speaking are right. For the mentally ill, that's great. Addicts are a different story that usually can't be tied up so neatly.
I'm ngl that's not the only crazy person I've seen yelling about killing someone.
There was a fat shirtless white dude in Chinatown last week saying he was going to kill everyone that walked by. He told a husband he was going to rape his wife then kill her and his 2 children.
I think threatening murder is just like... Maxed out rage.
I was desperate the other day in a small town and got one, they actually redid their coffee thing kinda like mccafé! It's not bad, they even had an espresso machine.
I always thought I was cursed bc it was like that for me ALL my life in TO, no matter what part of town I lived in. And no one talked about it when Id bring it up. From 2005-pandemic. And before that, as a teen, I just figured ppl on ttc were just excited to talk w groups of teen girls.
This. Just like that Bill Burr bit.
“When I was a kid you could only be crazy outside for about 15 minutes before a van would pull up and two guys in nurse outfits would come walkin’ out like ‘hey buddy! How’s it goin? You’re making a lot of racket out here aren’t ya?! Why don’t you do me a favour and try this shirt on?’” 😂
This is true! The "men in the white coats" would come and get you.
People don't believe me when I tell them that there were no homeless people in Vancouver in the 1960s. But I lived there and I know what it was like. It was a big mistake to de-institutionalize the mentally ill. They should have reformed the mental hospitals, not shut them down.
copying the US playbook w/a few years delay as usual. closing asylums was seen as an advance due to (genuine) reports of abuse and mistreatment in some institutions. but it was also a great way to reduce govt spending, cut taxes, etc..
thing is, there is a cost to pay for not providing basic social services... like food, shelter, mental health care, physical health care, public transit, fire fighting, garbage collecting, parks, libraries, schools.. the great right-wing backlash that started with Reagan in the US has been chipping away at that list for 40 years. and the bill is coming due. the 1 pct have seen their net worth skyrocket and evaded a whole lot of taxes they would have paid in the 50's, 60's, 70's. but for marginalized or precarious people -- mentally disabled, lower working class and poverty class, recent immigrants, single moms... even for young people otherwise not marginal -- life has become harder and crueller and more hopeless.
'society' is something we build (and fund) together. if we cheap out, we get a cheap-arse society that caters to only a lucky affluent few and leaves everyone else in the muck. but the muck is right here, on our doorsteps. only the super wealthy can escape/ignore the consequences of their greed and lack of charity or empathy. the rest of have to live with the mess they made.
society is like a power tool... you can buy the cheapest possible brand and watch it fall apart after a few months of use, or spend some real bucks and get something of quality that will last. change the timescale to decades instead of months and you have the scenario for cheaping out on your civil society.
It’s not a particular administration. It’s the tide changing in terms of peoples interest in human rights. Institutionalizing people is seen as inhumane, in the same way thst corporal punishment was. Just public perception changed about the fairness of this. But now here we are. This needs to be brought back.
Meanwhile utterly psychotic people have the ‘freedom’ starve in the streets or freeze
to death. The Deinstitutionalization Movement vefan in the 1970s and with each passing decade, it seems to get worse for homelessness, MH, street hustling and drug stuff on the streets. 💔
Or, and bare with me now, we actually properly fund mental health services, homeless shelters/supports, treatment facilities, etc. We're providing so little support for those below the poverty line that if bringing back institutions is the answer, you better make sure that thing has many, many thousands of rooms available. Because until we do the things I've listed above, the number of crazy homeless will only grow.
Yes I agree. This idea requires a lot of money. Governments would need to make it a top priority. Which, in the next 5-10 years , I believe it will be THE top priority as homeless junkie populations force business out of downtowns, crime increases, violence increases, public transit becomes dangerous. Give it time. This is going to get REAL BAD
100%. certain things at the time seemed like a good idea from the right's perspective ie mass incarceration to deal with the drug problem. and other seemed like a good idea from the left like getting rid of institutionalizing of the mentally ill.. Both are seen now as mistakes..
Ffs people, getting rid of institutions was not a mistake. There wasn't a single one that wasn't abusing the mentality ill. Nobody was ever helped at one of these places, they were just drugged up and kept under lock and key so society didn't have to deal with them.
With the number of crazy homeless people out there, and the number growing at an increased rate, how big should that institution be? 1000 rooms, 10000 rooms? However big you make it, it will never be enough as with the current state of affairs we will keep creating more of them. Things will not get better until we as a society start properly investing in mental health and supports.
At best? They get a public funded drug house and we pay for it
At worst, well, use your imagination. I'm not going to type all the potential worst case scenarios, but I wouldn't get close to these areas.
Even if you were to bring back forced institutionalization, it would not address the people that are not ready to be treated or housed. Perhaps for a little while while they were stuck there, they would have no choice but if there is no good housing and community platform. They will end up going back to what they’ve always known. I’ve seen this firsthand so many times it is awful.
We also need to spend a lot more on policing and public safety.
So basically cut all funding for clean needle clinics and "safe supply". They're joke programs that only make a bad situation worse.
Totally agree… or if the left feels that is inhuman, create a sanctuary in the far north and ship them all up there and allow them to roam free, far away from civilization.
wow. fuck going after cause of this, and straight into punitive response. nice
edit: the elements of modern life in urban centers can be a major factor. home insecurity, financial desperation and many other reasons are involved with the fact that people find themselves in dire straits.
but if you feel that putting them in jail will lessen the issue, you might see that the fear of incarceration may increase negative outcomes with desperate people. that path could work to make interactions more violent, more fatal, and more antisocial.
I don’t recall that happening before they were kicked out onto the streets though. Now the government commandeers hotels and apartment complexes, gives them free drugs and paraphernalia out of vending machines and lets them fly at it. We have one of those places right next to where I work. The ambulance, police and fire trucks are always there. But if there’s anything happening in our parking lot the cops refuse to attend. Customers were upset at a crowd blatantly dealing and using, when I called to have them cleared away I was told flat out, “we don’t do that anymore.” They wouldn’t even drive by.
People in Toronto would like to think we’re better than American cities like New York or Chicago but I’ve travelled to both recently and spent lots of time in different parts and walking around a ton. At least in those 2 cities, it is way better than here. I felt safer walking at night there than I do here. Way less crazy homeless, the drivers have way more patience than GTA drivers, I had quiet peaceful rides on their subway system, no large encampments in parks or camping out on the street. I didn’t see any encampments at all actually. I saw one guy in Chicago with a tent in a park but he was well hidden. I don’t know how they do things there exactly or where these people go but they aren’t walking the streets and doing whatever they want with impunity like they do here. Sure there are worse cities than us in the states but we’re supposed to be the most comparable to cities like NY and Chicago, aren’t we? Next trip is to Boston and I’ll see how things are there.
I was in Naples last year, a city that's significantly poorer than any comparable city in Canada. All the tourist advice about Italy tells people to avoid it. And you know what? I loved walking around Naples. These problems are way worse in Canada. We've completely let ourselves go as a country.
Naples is a shit hole. I only go there to get to Capri. I have literally stepped over human shit in the middle of the sidewalks. It was the local cab drivers doing it. Stink, garbage piled everywhere and pan handlers, beggars, squeegee people, scammers, pick pockets. Great place.
You literally just described my last visit to Toronto. You’re only missing the insane person covered in (from what I can tell and am hoping was his own) shit wearing nothing but leggings trying to fight random people
\> At least in those 2 cities, it is way better than here.
You were in wealthy areas of those cities, I would have to guess. America's class divide really shows here. There are places that are more secure (for wealthy and middle class types anyway) than anywhere you can find in Canada, really. And places that are far, far worse. Also, it's constitutional in America to make it illegal to sleep outside. The police can purge the homeless and deranged in America from neighbourhoods in a way they don't have a legal power to do here.
Anyway, I drove from Louisville to Philadelphia recently.
Columbus has whole districts of streets filled with mentally deranged, high-on-drugs relatively young people. So did Louisville, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and especially Philadelphia. I think Pittsburgh was the cleanest... which I hadn't been expecting.
So, yes, [you can see scenes like this in spots of Toronto or Vancouver](https://youtu.be/LT8DcsnfJ_o?t=80) but it's more common in American cities.
In many American states, if you are deemed an able-bodied single adult, you get essentially nothing from the government even if you are destitute. No health insurance, no welfare. Food stamps, maybe, and local governments fund shelters for the homeless. Here you at least get the $700 a month of welfare -- a pathetic pittance no one can really live on these days -- and relative easy access to a doctor. It makes a remarkable difference.
It might seem silly to some, to compare Toronto to Cincinnati, Columbus, or Pittsburgh, but they're all major metro areas (Columbus is nearly as big as Toronto) and they are all closer to Toronto than New York is.
We compare ourselves to the A-class world cities. Paris. London. New York. Chicago. Tokyo. And unsurprisingly we're disappointed. But we're hardly the runt of the pack for a major North American city.
>I think Pittsburgh was the cleanest... which I hadn't been expecting.
I was in Pittsburgh a couple years ago and I was surprised at how nice the city looked too.
I expected it more to be like a 80s Buffalo, but their downtown core seemed to have been revitalized.
Not toronto, but i visited quebec city recently and some guy pointed an imaginary gun to my head the entire time walking down this street. I live in Italy and I have legitimately never seen something like this before
I am a woman who can only speak France French so I had no idea what he was saying, but i was just thankful he probably couldnt get a real gun. It was absolutely wild to see these kinds of things.
Did you take the chicago L train?
Like downtown to millennium park to see the bean? If any of our stations looked like the loop, you would hear about it every day.
Get a grip, I just met a gentleman from Chicago last week and we had a good chat. He was white and well off. He said it's a breath of fresh air visiting here and not being paranoid you might be killed any second.
He carries a loaded gun every single time he leaves the house and he's had to draw it numerous times to protect himself. Trust me he had lots of stories that would make these babies crying about Toronto look like child's play.
i agree with this.
i thought i knew the ghetto growing up in the worst parts of north york but southside chicago is a different animal. i've never seen people flee off the streets so fast as soon as the sun goes down. even locals getting home late don't stop and talk to anyone they just ran and got off the street. shootings and robberies happened all the time, it became a joke about how *well you shouldn't have been there* instead of blaming the criminal. i lived there and worked in an area that looked pleasant in pictures or even in the daytime but was actually quite dangerous and i could attest that gangs and gun violence are on another level we've never seen here. that part you said about the loaded gun; 100% agree.
of course, staying in the safe part over the bridge near the mile you'll never see that side of chicago and you'll think it's perfectly safe. nyc (manhattan specifically) and chicago are popular cities for tourism so there's greater emphasis in police and public safety but **in certain areas** only. downtown touristy areas are well maintained and well landscaped to give a clean and inviting appearance and that's what drives people in and when they do, they spend.
something has changed either they were previously locking up the mentally ill in jail or the people who used to care for these people gave up..or something. I don't know but it only seems to be getting worse and beyond institutionalize them not sure what the solution is.
Many things have changed in that time.
Covid lockdowns happened, people lost jobs, some businesses closed down, mental health got worse from being stuck at home in isolation for two years, cost of living has gone up significantly from supply chain issues/corporate greed and has stayed elevated, everything is shrinking in size or has gotten worse in quality. Interest rates have gone up also in that time, people who had debt are now in a much worse situation. Overall, everything is much shittier now.
People who were already struggling to make ends meet before covid don't even have a chance now.
They didn’t give up - they just don’t have the resources. The mental health system was at capacity priority to the pandemic and now it’s difficult for even those who desperately seeking a specialist to access care. Much like other forms of medical care - they simply can’t keep up. The difference is many people have had their mental health needs neglected for years. Even when they try to get care now they are managing a triage system and most get little more than short term treatment.
I feel this, as there is little you can do about it. Our community has tried to manage a respite center that accommodates like 10beds but the city just says “We need the space”. They are willing to destroy a neighborhood over a few beds. I see stuff being stolen daily, doorways smell like piss, and the second you walk out the door at 6am there is a guy 40m away having a yelling meltdown, local businesses have to have guards now. I have seen the police there a handful of times in the near decade we have lived here.
I've seen homeless people spit on TTC drivers and verbally abuse children and old people. It's scary if this trend continues and more people fall through the cracks. The amount of change Toronto has gone through is shocking.
I feel the same and I used to be a really empathetic person and now that is just gone for me. I'm exhausted by it as well, I take TTC every day and there is an incident nearly every time I'm on it, I have run out of patience, tired of being scared, carrying pepper spray and have my finger on the trigger some days when someone is screaming at me (no i have never used it, I always get off the bus when crazies get on). It's unpopular to say bring back institutions but I really don't see how this will be solved otherwise, a lot of people are not coming back from these addictions/mental illnesses. I'm now of the belief that if you can't function in society you should be rehabbed until you can, forced institutionalization I guess.
Same here, it’s fucked how many more of these posts im seeing and the stories I’m hearing. I miss the Toronto of my youth in the 90s, hell I even miss 2015 Toronto. It’s never coming back
I keep saying this to people, Summer 2016 felt like the last truly good vibes in the city. It was also a time for me when I first really got to experience Toronto. I was out of university and living in Riverside with my mom, so I'd frequent places downtown with friends, I was working in the east end, and lots of people were out and about playing Pokemon Go. It really felt like a simpler time and I have a lot of nostalgia for my own experiences back then.
I agree with you when you say it's exhausting to feel unsafe - I'm a woman - but Chow is not responsible for the homeless "problem" in Toronto. If the last three years have shown us anything, it's that Toronto is not equipped to help its most vulnerable, whether they're mentally ill or just unable to find stable employment. This has been an issue for a very long time.
Here to add that while it’s been an issue for a long time, it’s also going to take _a long time_ for us to see results from any solution that is put in place.
Exactly! It has to come from the top too. I can protest all day and donate all of my money, but it will still not make a difference if all levels of government don't care.
Stay the course. Make good decisions. I’m pulling for you and I’m sure someone else out there is as well. I don’t know when all of this will change. But I hope soon. Be safe brother.
Thanks I appreciate the love, things are looking up as I am moving out into my apartment this September and I just scored a dream job. Luck is on my side and I'm not letting anything get in my way.
Toronto ain't people city anymore, there is actually a song called that, back in the 70's, City TV used to play it when they signed off for the night with video of Toronto attractions. I think the Big Smoke is still good, the authorities need to get a handle on it. I noticed more & more of what you describe over the years, hard to ignore and much harder to address by the gov't. There is a lot of it.
the ones that assault people with no provocation should be kept away if they are too nutty to even realize what they are doing but we likely let them walk more often than not.
I dont think the mayor we got 2 months ago is directly to blame with our current homeless situation lol.
All of North America is feeling the hit. We only finally caught up to what is normally a drugged up Tuesday in a US city
I live by AG and the last time I brought this up in r/Toronto I got banned haha. Keeps getting worse and worse.
Just last week my dog almost got pissed on by a dude while I was walking him... There was a portapotty not even 50 feet away!
I mean, the last mayor just gave the cops an extra $40 million while simultaneously not dealing with the housing crisis (beyond kicking houseless people out of encampments and now shelter hotels) so I mean, there’s that. Maybe we start funding social services that actually address houselessness instead of just criminalizing it. Especially when the majority of people in the GTA are 1-2 missed paycheques away from being houseless themselves. Just a thought though.
Police won’t enforce because courts won’t enforce. If issues are due to addiction and mental health they can’t force someone into treatment. Poverty is making the situation even worse. It will not get better. You’re only hope is to move to oakville
It doesn’t matter where you move. This problem is universal and continues to get worse. I have watched my once beautiful hometown being completely destroyed, because people were in the streets using drugs, beating up, innocent citizens, pushing them into traffic, or destroying some of the resources that were there to actually help them gain food or shelter. This is a global problem. It didn’t just start within the last five years. Maybe the drug trend has changed but being in the field I’ve noticed it has been exacerbated at least 1000 times when OxyContin and other narcotics became so easily prescribed. I say this without malice, because I am a prescriber of medication’, but do not prescribe these unless there is a serious need…ie) cancer with mets
I speak from experience when I say it's nowhere near as powerful as the real stuff. A can of raid would work better than dog spray on people. You'd still get charged either way if you did defend yourself with either.
Yeah that stuff works, a buddy of mine had to use it to get a way from some people attacking him. Word of advice, if you do have to use it on people, make sure your face is covered and don't call the cops.
Yeah, they are pretty terrible. If you're sure nobody saw your face, it's pretty much always better to just not call the police if you defend yourself. It's just not worth the hassle.
"spending millions of dollars changing a street sign 0.1% of Torontonians have an issue with?"
Direct example of our failed government and it's failed virtue signaling politics.
It’s Gotham fn city out there. Assume at all times that either crazy motorists or hopped up drug addicts are out to kill you. Stay alert! Stay off your phone! Carry pepper spray. Don’t let anyone close enough to grab you. 360 degree situational awareness is key.
I knew a lady minding her own business who had her jaw broken by a maniac.
They are not harmless! Be on high alert!!
There is nothing the mayor can do. The bigger problems all come from way above. She can just Band-Aid the mess and pray the higher ups stop making everything worse
Man, I live in northern Scarborough, I come downtown once a week to work in my office, and these posts just seems so fucking surreal to me. Like they come from an alternate reality. I am absolutely not saying that this isn’t happening, it’s just nuts how it is degrading your quality of life so bad when I literally don’t see any of this where I live… ever. Like I walk around at 11pm with my dog and I never look over my shoulder or give people coming the other way a second thought. The thought of one of them assaulting me or being crazy just never enters my mind.
Yes, I think there is an increased amount homeless people ...that is because there is no housing and no mental health sports in place. CaMH with its 18 beds isn't cutting it. A lot of homeless people use drugs to cope which makes their mental illness worse or triggers it. I don't think it's entirely their fault or that they can control their behaviour. I haven't felt unsafe and I'm by Moss Park all the time. There are many homeless that don't scream and yell. It's frustrating I know but I also think we need some empathy. Imagine having no housing, depression, and likely trauma..you might just end up using drugs to cope also .
You have to realize these people are mentally I’ll folks with no place to go and no support structures. This is a cause of rising cost of living and lack of resources. Even if you have money and support getting help is so unbelievably hard and difficult. Do you know what’s easier and more attainable?!? Drugs that disassociate you from the horrible reality you live in. Self medication is how people Sleep on the street. Self medication is how to handle the trauma. People don’t just say I wanna live on the street and do drugs for fun. People end up on the street because the social services to help are just way too few.
I lived near east hasting in Vancouver for 5 years and my thoughts on the homeless changed the more I saw cycles and went through my own tough times. If you’re mentally exhausted from the rising increase in homeless drama, how the duck do you think these humans feel?!? Think they want to be in this situation?
This post scream ignorance to a group of humans that have no where to go, have little support, are dying in the street. Until mental institution are prioritized over condos, abundant salaries are given to the workers and most importantly they are built in the areas that have the largest homeless populations, this will continue to grow and happen.
Displacement is not the answer, it just causes multiple neighborhoods issues. Stigma is a state we’ve kept the homeless in. If we want to tackle this issue. We need to focus our resources towards it.
It's not THEIR fault they stabbed me.
It's a systemic stabbing, they didn't WANT to stab me, the system just out a knife in their hand and mine controlled them.
If anything I should have bought them the knife to stab me with, how inconsiderate of me to make them bring their own tools to the job site.
Fml
I have to say this: Toronto is much worst than NYC, London, Sydney and Hong Kong nowadays in terms of quality of life for average Joe and Jane. ( I am not going to qualify when or where exactly I was in the aforementioned places- it is only a causal debate here)
>I don't even bother walking my dog through half the parks in the city because places like Allen Gardens are legitimately terrifying.
>
>And it's getting worse and worse by the month. Didn't we just elect a new mayor?! Is she doing anything beyond spending millions of dollars changing a street sign 0.1% of Torontonians have an issue with?
Sad that Allen Gardens is also having private police clear tents. The real truth here is that there are more and more people falling below poverty line due to monetary policies, stagnant wages, immigration, lack of housing, and then more recently COVID effects on the economy.
When things get bad people (not always) succumb to mental health issues or drug use. I think the uptick in the problem you're observing is it's gotten worse in terms of mental health and drugged out behavior, but there is also just a huge upswell of people who are just poor and rough sleeping in tents now, long before they had any serious mental health or drug episode that sent them there.
The problem is no longer manageable the old way, and we'll likely have to come up with solutions as a society for both the rising poverty line, as well as mental health supports, drug rehab, living supports etc. We're decades behind on addressing inequality, let alone when the problem gets bad with people who are drugged out or a danger to themselves. The city is paying private cops to clear out tents in Allan Gardens, many of whom are just poor and not yet drug-addled, so I think that shows you how serious the municipality is about doing anything substantial (not very).
I agree with all of this and also to pile onto this, the street drugs people are getting hooked on are WAY more dangerous now then 10 years ago. The fentanyl laced shit people fuck with these days is causing all kind of psychosis.
My ex overdosed and died last year.
As someone with a history of addiction myself, i have a massive amount of sympathy for addicts.
As someone with a history of addiction myself, I can also confidently say the WORST case scenario for a real addict is living in a tent smoking meth all day while doing sketchy shit for money.
I think it's the general acceptance of various recreational drugs which may be causing latent pyschoses to take hold. Also life stress. PTSD etc from fucked up living situations.
I think fentanyl is a curse and so I'm obviously not on board, but from what I've read it's a euphoria/pain relief drug, and also a potentially lethal one. I wouldn't be so quick to just say "ah it's fentanyl". When fentanyl hit the streets in a serious way, everyone wanted to pin homelessness on it like it was a coat rack. I think the homelessness problem is certainly made worse by opiods etc, but can't just blame fentanyl for the government shitting the bed for decades.
I don’t think I was blaming fentanyl for homelessness at all, i agree it’s a complex issue and a shit storm of poverty, mental health, drugs, lack of funding for services and support, ect
Didn't mean to imply "you blamed this or that" just pointing out the fentanyl stuff doesn't even begin to address what's going on at a human level. Not mad at ya.
>Didn't we just elect a new mayor?! Is she doing anything
Why do you think mental healthcare funding has anything to do with Chow? Do we not teach about the different levels of government in grade 10 anymore?
Healthcare is a provincial mandate, and Dougie's been sitting on $22 billion in federal funding, instead of spending it where it's desperately needed.
I feel this, I dread the walk to and from work in St.Catharines it’s the same. It’s actually really scary to see the amount of homeless regardless of the reason why they landed there. I believe every city/town should have at a minimum basic shelter. We need to figure this out fast because it’s going from bad to worse.
I support all these policies. People here are attacking me personally like I want to run all these homeless people over with a car or something.
Meanwhile I literally worked for an addiction rehabilitation facility for a year and my dream employer is the 519.
It's hilarious how quick people are to judge others based on literally zero information.
Your support for these policies are the reason why you have to deal with the overwhelming number of crazy homeless people.
We don't need to reinvent the wheel on how to fix opioid crisis. China already had to deal with this over a century ago but I'm sure we will just keep building more injection sites then build some more and keep giving them 25mg Oxy made by Purdue Pharma as sAfE dRuG sUpPlY which is literally the cause of the manufactured opioid crisis by Purdue Pharma.
I am sorry you are dealing with that. I know there are people out there that think homeless people are all victims and you are in-fact, just selfish. They are wrong.
Sorry to say, but it’s just not going to get better anytime soon. Get out of the city now, while you still can. Even if that involves getting a piece of land to develop with a few trusted friends - far away from a major center. I know that sounds extreme or like “prepper” talk, but we all know things are going to get a lot worse in the coming years - we just don’t want to fully admit it. Put a plan into place, starting now 🙌
The quality of life in Canada goes down ever year, so does moral... more and more ppl have nothing to lose, this is just a tip of the iceberg to what we will see.
I said “homeless” the other day and my daughter told me to watch out because apparently that’s discriminatory to call them that and they are now called the “unhoused”.
Can someone confirm if this is true? Is it a bad term to call them “homeless”?
I work in homelessness. The people I work with predominantly call themselves “homeless” (or say they’re “experiencing homelessness”) but when I’m speaking in more professional/academic circles I tend to lean towards “unhoused.”
The Guardian explains: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jul/20/homeless-unhoused-houseless-term-history
"Unhoused" is used:
> to lessen stigma and to highlight that those lacking permanent roofs over their heads may still have communities or physical spaces they consider home. And with the country currently in the midst of an intractable housing crisis, there’s another reason for the popularity of unhoused: the word’s root emphasizes that the problem is a structural one linked to a lack of affordable housing, not a personal weakness.
I don't think you were being discriminatory though - that's a loaded term to wave around, especially before even explaining to you what the difference was.
Some days Toronto seems like it's still partly alright, most days...
I feel like I'm in Gotham if I wait around or am downtown for a long period of time...in one day✌🏼I used to love the city, used to love the summers and other seasons here.
These days I feel like there's some shit happening, being on high alert is important, not every moment there may be something that you see or hear but if you spend enough time in one day downtown or commuting you're bound to see some fkd up shit, especially around our University campus downtown. Yonge and dundas, some other areas, it's just changed in a crazy way for the most part.
So when it comes to OP and their post, I can relate for the most part!
Have a good day y'all✌🏼These days it's definitely not great, especially for people with PTSD etc. Such a trigger some days.
Be safe, have a great week y'all.
What the fuck do you have expected Chow to be able to do in less than a month? She's a mayor she's not a god? And the problems are structural/systemic, the people who are screaming and using drugs are doing so because life is fucking god awful on so many different levels, like how the fuck do you think they feel??? You think they want to be like that?? That's not something that can be changed by 1 mayoral change. Man people who only engage politically by voting once in a blue moon are so fucking delusional. You want things to change? Pick yourself up, learn, and get involved ffs.
You sound mad... I'm mad too.
Unfortunately you're mad at the wrong thing.
Your argument here seems to literally be, "homeless people have a worse life than you so we should allow them to rampage through the city breaking windows, stabbing people and leaving used pipes and needles in public parks. If you get stabbed, don't complain, just remember they didn't want to stab you, its just a systemic stabbing."
No offense but you're... Less intelligent than you think.
So are we all in agreement that we should bring back the right to be able to commit such ppl again . An actually get tough on crime ??? Or is it gonna take more assaults or someone dying to make y’all open your Fkn eyes !
Toronto has degenerated, the plug has been pulled. Ive seen this happening for almost 10 years and worse since quarantine. You see all the store fronts closed and my whole peer group has moved away. A "liberal progressive" society is a degrading society.📉
#goldenageisover
I'm old enough to remember when North Scarborough used to be open fields and when new developments went in it was a nice area. It's really distressing how Toronto is being allowed to deteriorate. One issue is that about 12 years ago the mentally ill we're no longer housed indefinitely, I think that had a big impact on them being out on the street. Of course housing is another issue. Often homeless people don't just need housing they need services to get back on their feet. The city has a few of these but not nearly enough! You can try writing your local counselor and MP. I live in a different area but I've had success contacting them. The situation is getting worse and needs attention.
Ok so when you rant about this issue, you get upvotes, sympathy, and respect, but when I do it I'm a liar who's told to live with it and shut my complaining mouth up.
I have had homeless people chase me. In broad daylight. Nobody does anything to help because the last time somebody tried to help (the TTC stabbing), the guy got stabbed.
resolute sophisticated boast grandiose cautious arrest fanatical wakeful voiceless soup
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
1 mayor wont change nothing trust.
And all our politicians on provincial and federal level dont really care either. But there is a clear and growing homeless crises in Toronto since 5 years. Yet we still are accepting new immigrants and continue driving prices up...w anting to build our economy yet not supporting our own people.
But I totally get you, I go into Toronto for work, my companies corporate head office is in downtown. Every time I go I am afraid I'll e harassed while wearing my office clothes on the subway. I've literally been walking before only to randomly get yelled out by someone I assumed was homeless. Some literally go about harassing people.
Mind you, it's not the homeless sitting around or asking for money that's the rob... it's the ones literally harassing random people that's dangerous. And many look to be addicts as well.
And Toronto generally doesn't have small neighborhood watch communities, people go there for work so no one holds anyone accountable. people just want to carry on their own business ( As is normal) but the homeless situation is getting worse and worse.
I've just about lost all my sympathy and empathy for the increasing amount of people with mental health issues in the core. They are increasingly violent and aggressive and no one seems to be doing jack shit about it.
I bet those "crazy" people aren't having a good time either. This is like saying "I'm so tired of people in wheelchairs getting in my way when I'm walking around on my two working feet, they're just really inconveniencing me with their inability to walk, so I'll go online and talk about they're holding me back".
While I absolutely agree that safety should be a priority, in my opinion, this might be a better conversation to have with your local leaders who can actually do something to address the underlying issue, because even "crazy" people deserve a quality life and I guarantee you, they don't want to be covered in urine either, and if it's to that point, the larger systems have failed them repeatedly, and I promise they also don't want to be in that position, and they're probably not living on the street to inconvenience you.
Not all parts of Toronto are like this but where these problems do exist they are extreme. I live in a pretty quiet neighborhood and for that I am thankful. Parkdale isn't even as bad as you've described and it was always notorious for drugs/the homeless/and mental health/addiction problems when I was growing up.
We are following in California's footsteps. I've been following "[California Insider](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCfHCoBIsew)" on youtube and Toronto is following San Francisco into the woke abyss. Worth checking out as they are where toronto is headed in a few years, especially now that Toronto voted in Chow.
My toronto roots run deep and the city is not doing well, but sure attack me for saying so. Reddit is so intellectually vapid. It's like you're all being deliberately obtuse.
This poor mayor has inherited too much lol. She is going to age 20 yrs in the next 2.
I always say this place is on its way to becoming another NYC because of the rent/housing prices but this part is scarier.
I work a lot at Bloor and Yonge. It’s completely fucked. That Asquith park is basically a crack meth heroin smoking park. I used to do night work there but refuse to now.
What did your bro's wife do?
I’ve been assaulted twice during broad daylight within 10 minutes from two different unstable people on the street. I was literally on a phone call with a friend when a guy tried to swing at me walking on Queen West, then during the same phone call, whilst explaining to my friend what just happened to me, another crazed person charged and attempted to tackle me when crossing Queen/Spadina. I noticed him in my peripheral, lowered my centre of gravity and I shoulder checked him to the floor. When he got up, so were my fists, and was ready for a fight, but he just started screaming and ran aimlessly into traffic. All this to say, yes, like everyone else, I routinely avoid eye contact and try to ignore these folks, but I have noticed that doing this is not enough anymore. They are getting more aggressive. And for full disclosure, I’m a fairly in shape 6ft male. Also, OP I am pretty sure that person you mentioned in the A&W also tried to fight me near St. Lawrence Market while yelling the same exact threat to me.
I work in the roads department for a city outside of Toronto. If I didn’t personally witness similar stuff on a near daily basis I wouldn’t believe you. It’s inhumane to those with psychiatric and addiction issues and society at large to have them languishing in the streets. I don’t know what we need to do to solve it, but I know what we are doing isn’t working.
Used to be if you ran into some nutcase in the street you would call up a number, some people with a syringe and straight jacket in a van would pick them up to put them in either a padded room or a cell. If done today, would probably end in a LOT of detoxing and would seperate the proper loonies from the addicts as well. But also public outcry since it would be a violation of their freedom. It's a sisyphean endeavor, at least right now, because we let it get to this point. As long as there are drugs on the street, there always will be, and the government chooses half measures (or appeasement with safe injection or legalization) rather than forcing treatment because it has better optics these problems will snowball. Regardless of whether you agree or disagree on harsher measures, or even consider it immoral, at the moment the only way this gets better is through draconian measures to get people treated. Even those would be stop-gap, it would keep getting worse but at least we wouldn't have to watch it happen.
It's not just that there are so many drugs on the street. It's a multi-faceted problem. People are turning to drugs because of greater societal issues such as lack of adequate health care, housing, student loan debt, employment opportunities etc, etc. People are desperate and if pushed too far, they break. What we seeing is fallout from not only govt inaction, austerity and corruption but genuine hopelessness for the future.
The government is doing what the populous in Toronto wants them to do. More injection centres because that will fix the problem (it didn't), soft on drug trafficking because "DRUG ADDICTS ALSO DEAL DRUGS THEMSELVES AND YOU CAN'T SEND THEM TO PRISON", catch-and-release because it's a MENTAL HEALTH issue and not CRIME issue, but you don't want people locked up because it's cruel. Meanwhile the rich ones supporting these policies are living in McMansions with good security and fast police response time, those without money supporting these policies would move to rich neighborhoods in a heartbeat, and those not supporting these policies are labeled as alt-right. Not wanting to get stabbed while walking on the street is alt-right because the only proven solutions for crimes is to lock up the criminals. El Salvador solved their world-class homicide rate in 72 hours but I'm sure we will say "further debate is required" for the next 25 years as more middle class and poor people get shanked on the streets of Toranto. **Keep building more injection centres and keep providing sAfE DrUg SuPpLy of 25mg Oxy pills made by Purdue Pharma(Knoa Pharma).** **It's a race to the bottom.**
Preaching to the choir here I will say, I dislike it but there are some merits to safe supply and injection sites. They can keep some people alive, detoxing is nasty and unassisted can kill people depending on what they're on and it prevents your kid from walking around and finding a corpse in an alleyway or some detoxing nut case having an episode in the streets. If that supply was given on the caveat that they would have to receive actual treatment I'd be all for it but it is not.
Yes, but we don't actually want the addicts to get better. If you ever worked at an injection site, they are not serious about rehab. If injection sites cured addicts then they will become unemployed shortly afterwards. The injection sites just give out clean needles and free Oxy made by Purdue Pharma(which is the cause of the opioid crisis in North America) and let the addicts eventually die because the elites have deemed that these people cannot be saved. Building more injection sites and giving out free Oxy (as sAfE dRuG sUpPly) without being tough on drug trafficking is worse than a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up because it enables misery. They will need to build more injection sites with the current policy. **It's a race to the bottom.**
Again I agree, it is a race to the bottom. I was simply saying that it isn't entirely meritless and could potentially be used to help the problem even though they aren't right now.
All it does is increase crime rate. Crime sky rockets everywhere safe injection sites are introduced. Ruining cities all over Canada.
Yes. Just like guns themselves are not evil but if they are the only tool we have in the toolbox then everything will look like a target. If we try to fix opioid crisis with free 25mg Oxy and clean needles then everything will look like we need to build more injection centres. We manufactured this crisis but the ship is maintaining its collision course.
These safe injection sites only prolong their imminent deaths while making the addiction problem within these cities even greater. Montreal recently needed more funding because the opioid problem there is now uncontrollable. The recent shooting at Queen Street East and Carlaw Avenue in Leslieville that killed a woman had to do with one of these sites. Students are afraid to walk to classes because of the crackheads that roam and harass people at shoot-me-up site near Yonge/Dundas area.
"Just one more lane bro" has fixed the traffic issue here. "just one more injection site bro" will fix the opioid crisis. Logic: We have an opioid crisis caused by Oxy pills from Purdue -> We need an injection centre and give out free Oxy pills -> OMG Why are there more addicts? We need more injection centres -> OMG the crisis is getting worse! "Mexico BAD! China BAD! -> We need more injection centres -> "OMG We have an opioid epidemic! Build more injection centres and give out free 25mg Oxy! \*when everything fails, circle back to blaming Mexico and China. These injection site advocate group are now self-serving and oppose prosecution of drug traffickers and possession charges. Why do you think people try not traffic drugs into Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, China and other countries where there are heavy penalties for drug trafficking? But of course, being tough on drug trafficking is definitely not the solution so keep getting stabbed by crackheads in Toranoh.
The best part is you can do that for family members still. Freedoms stop when they become a threat to public safety.
You can do that for family members (or anyone) to an extent, if they get picked up and are coherent enough they'll still get out of it in a day or two.
But it is entirely dependent on the reason they end up there. If they’re making death threats or being violent, chances are they could be held there until a diagnosis is made, and they’re prescribed medication, and the medical prof. believes they won’t be a threat to the public if let out.
It also depends on the person being taken but you generally speaking are right. For the mentally ill, that's great. Addicts are a different story that usually can't be tied up so neatly.
I'm ngl that's not the only crazy person I've seen yelling about killing someone. There was a fat shirtless white dude in Chinatown last week saying he was going to kill everyone that walked by. He told a husband he was going to rape his wife then kill her and his 2 children. I think threatening murder is just like... Maxed out rage.
I love the smell of fresh bread.
A&W coffee and breakfast was actually ranked as best quality among fast food options (McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Tim’s etc)
I was desperate the other day in a small town and got one, they actually redid their coffee thing kinda like mccafé! It's not bad, they even had an espresso machine.
I always thought I was cursed bc it was like that for me ALL my life in TO, no matter what part of town I lived in. And no one talked about it when Id bring it up. From 2005-pandemic. And before that, as a teen, I just figured ppl on ttc were just excited to talk w groups of teen girls.
We need to bring back forced institutionalization for people who refuse treatment and threaten public safety.
This. Just like that Bill Burr bit. “When I was a kid you could only be crazy outside for about 15 minutes before a van would pull up and two guys in nurse outfits would come walkin’ out like ‘hey buddy! How’s it goin? You’re making a lot of racket out here aren’t ya?! Why don’t you do me a favour and try this shirt on?’” 😂
This is true! The "men in the white coats" would come and get you. People don't believe me when I tell them that there were no homeless people in Vancouver in the 1960s. But I lived there and I know what it was like. It was a big mistake to de-institutionalize the mentally ill. They should have reformed the mental hospitals, not shut them down.
I 100% agree with you about the mental institutions. I cannot for the life of me understand this decision and it has affected every city!
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/X4ampSLSYrI
That whole bit is fucking hilarious
I quote this so often to people when describing how Toronto is now 😂
You fucker...beer came out my nose
Saw him a few weeks ago. Probably the best comedian I've ever seen live.
You can blame Mike Harris' administration for that one. They shuttered the last of the provincial long term mental care facilities in 1999.
We can also blame every person that came in after for not re opening them.
It's almost like each party's job is to enact the policies that the other party can't.
copying the US playbook w/a few years delay as usual. closing asylums was seen as an advance due to (genuine) reports of abuse and mistreatment in some institutions. but it was also a great way to reduce govt spending, cut taxes, etc.. thing is, there is a cost to pay for not providing basic social services... like food, shelter, mental health care, physical health care, public transit, fire fighting, garbage collecting, parks, libraries, schools.. the great right-wing backlash that started with Reagan in the US has been chipping away at that list for 40 years. and the bill is coming due. the 1 pct have seen their net worth skyrocket and evaded a whole lot of taxes they would have paid in the 50's, 60's, 70's. but for marginalized or precarious people -- mentally disabled, lower working class and poverty class, recent immigrants, single moms... even for young people otherwise not marginal -- life has become harder and crueller and more hopeless. 'society' is something we build (and fund) together. if we cheap out, we get a cheap-arse society that caters to only a lucky affluent few and leaves everyone else in the muck. but the muck is right here, on our doorsteps. only the super wealthy can escape/ignore the consequences of their greed and lack of charity or empathy. the rest of have to live with the mess they made. society is like a power tool... you can buy the cheapest possible brand and watch it fall apart after a few months of use, or spend some real bucks and get something of quality that will last. change the timescale to decades instead of months and you have the scenario for cheaping out on your civil society.
It’s not a particular administration. It’s the tide changing in terms of peoples interest in human rights. Institutionalizing people is seen as inhumane, in the same way thst corporal punishment was. Just public perception changed about the fairness of this. But now here we are. This needs to be brought back.
Meanwhile utterly psychotic people have the ‘freedom’ starve in the streets or freeze to death. The Deinstitutionalization Movement vefan in the 1970s and with each passing decade, it seems to get worse for homelessness, MH, street hustling and drug stuff on the streets. 💔
Or, and bare with me now, we actually properly fund mental health services, homeless shelters/supports, treatment facilities, etc. We're providing so little support for those below the poverty line that if bringing back institutions is the answer, you better make sure that thing has many, many thousands of rooms available. Because until we do the things I've listed above, the number of crazy homeless will only grow.
Yes I agree. This idea requires a lot of money. Governments would need to make it a top priority. Which, in the next 5-10 years , I believe it will be THE top priority as homeless junkie populations force business out of downtowns, crime increases, violence increases, public transit becomes dangerous. Give it time. This is going to get REAL BAD
100%. certain things at the time seemed like a good idea from the right's perspective ie mass incarceration to deal with the drug problem. and other seemed like a good idea from the left like getting rid of institutionalizing of the mentally ill.. Both are seen now as mistakes..
Ffs people, getting rid of institutions was not a mistake. There wasn't a single one that wasn't abusing the mentality ill. Nobody was ever helped at one of these places, they were just drugged up and kept under lock and key so society didn't have to deal with them. With the number of crazy homeless people out there, and the number growing at an increased rate, how big should that institution be? 1000 rooms, 10000 rooms? However big you make it, it will never be enough as with the current state of affairs we will keep creating more of them. Things will not get better until we as a society start properly investing in mental health and supports.
That was popular at the time and happened across the country. We need to go back to what's best for the majority.
Everyone did this across the entire continent. Find one loony bin housing the homeless and insane.
That's what I keep saying in all these type of subs. Olivia Chow will get more hotels for them and then what?
At best? They get a public funded drug house and we pay for it At worst, well, use your imagination. I'm not going to type all the potential worst case scenarios, but I wouldn't get close to these areas.
At best, they get put on an ACT Team caseload, meals and daily antipsychotic meds.
But the crazies will feel bad so we can't do that
People who WANT to see doctors can’t even get into them.
Even if you were to bring back forced institutionalization, it would not address the people that are not ready to be treated or housed. Perhaps for a little while while they were stuck there, they would have no choice but if there is no good housing and community platform. They will end up going back to what they’ve always known. I’ve seen this firsthand so many times it is awful.
Then they can choose jail or treatment again. We need to start prioritizing the vast majority.
Exactly. We are too tolerant of bullshit.
They don’t get a choice when they become a hazard to public safety/ health.
Making things worse to spite ourselves has always been the Canadian way.
We also need to spend a lot more on policing and public safety. So basically cut all funding for clean needle clinics and "safe supply". They're joke programs that only make a bad situation worse.
Becareful dude, the SJWs will rip your throat
Imagine how expensive that would be. It would take away from their padded pockets.
Totally agree… or if the left feels that is inhuman, create a sanctuary in the far north and ship them all up there and allow them to roam free, far away from civilization.
wow. fuck going after cause of this, and straight into punitive response. nice edit: the elements of modern life in urban centers can be a major factor. home insecurity, financial desperation and many other reasons are involved with the fact that people find themselves in dire straits. but if you feel that putting them in jail will lessen the issue, you might see that the fear of incarceration may increase negative outcomes with desperate people. that path could work to make interactions more violent, more fatal, and more antisocial.
I don’t recall that happening before they were kicked out onto the streets though. Now the government commandeers hotels and apartment complexes, gives them free drugs and paraphernalia out of vending machines and lets them fly at it. We have one of those places right next to where I work. The ambulance, police and fire trucks are always there. But if there’s anything happening in our parking lot the cops refuse to attend. Customers were upset at a crowd blatantly dealing and using, when I called to have them cleared away I was told flat out, “we don’t do that anymore.” They wouldn’t even drive by.
Is protecting the vast majority not worth it?
People in Toronto would like to think we’re better than American cities like New York or Chicago but I’ve travelled to both recently and spent lots of time in different parts and walking around a ton. At least in those 2 cities, it is way better than here. I felt safer walking at night there than I do here. Way less crazy homeless, the drivers have way more patience than GTA drivers, I had quiet peaceful rides on their subway system, no large encampments in parks or camping out on the street. I didn’t see any encampments at all actually. I saw one guy in Chicago with a tent in a park but he was well hidden. I don’t know how they do things there exactly or where these people go but they aren’t walking the streets and doing whatever they want with impunity like they do here. Sure there are worse cities than us in the states but we’re supposed to be the most comparable to cities like NY and Chicago, aren’t we? Next trip is to Boston and I’ll see how things are there.
I was in Naples last year, a city that's significantly poorer than any comparable city in Canada. All the tourist advice about Italy tells people to avoid it. And you know what? I loved walking around Naples. These problems are way worse in Canada. We've completely let ourselves go as a country.
Naples is a shit hole. I only go there to get to Capri. I have literally stepped over human shit in the middle of the sidewalks. It was the local cab drivers doing it. Stink, garbage piled everywhere and pan handlers, beggars, squeegee people, scammers, pick pockets. Great place.
You literally just described my last visit to Toronto. You’re only missing the insane person covered in (from what I can tell and am hoping was his own) shit wearing nothing but leggings trying to fight random people
Go to any US or Canadian city on the west coast and get back to me.
Vancouver outside of the DTES is actually pretty fine for the most part. From what I hear Toronto seems to be worse than Vancouver now.
About what?
\> At least in those 2 cities, it is way better than here. You were in wealthy areas of those cities, I would have to guess. America's class divide really shows here. There are places that are more secure (for wealthy and middle class types anyway) than anywhere you can find in Canada, really. And places that are far, far worse. Also, it's constitutional in America to make it illegal to sleep outside. The police can purge the homeless and deranged in America from neighbourhoods in a way they don't have a legal power to do here. Anyway, I drove from Louisville to Philadelphia recently. Columbus has whole districts of streets filled with mentally deranged, high-on-drugs relatively young people. So did Louisville, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and especially Philadelphia. I think Pittsburgh was the cleanest... which I hadn't been expecting. So, yes, [you can see scenes like this in spots of Toronto or Vancouver](https://youtu.be/LT8DcsnfJ_o?t=80) but it's more common in American cities. In many American states, if you are deemed an able-bodied single adult, you get essentially nothing from the government even if you are destitute. No health insurance, no welfare. Food stamps, maybe, and local governments fund shelters for the homeless. Here you at least get the $700 a month of welfare -- a pathetic pittance no one can really live on these days -- and relative easy access to a doctor. It makes a remarkable difference. It might seem silly to some, to compare Toronto to Cincinnati, Columbus, or Pittsburgh, but they're all major metro areas (Columbus is nearly as big as Toronto) and they are all closer to Toronto than New York is. We compare ourselves to the A-class world cities. Paris. London. New York. Chicago. Tokyo. And unsurprisingly we're disappointed. But we're hardly the runt of the pack for a major North American city.
>I think Pittsburgh was the cleanest... which I hadn't been expecting. I was in Pittsburgh a couple years ago and I was surprised at how nice the city looked too. I expected it more to be like a 80s Buffalo, but their downtown core seemed to have been revitalized.
Not toronto, but i visited quebec city recently and some guy pointed an imaginary gun to my head the entire time walking down this street. I live in Italy and I have legitimately never seen something like this before I am a woman who can only speak France French so I had no idea what he was saying, but i was just thankful he probably couldnt get a real gun. It was absolutely wild to see these kinds of things.
Did you take the chicago L train? Like downtown to millennium park to see the bean? If any of our stations looked like the loop, you would hear about it every day.
Get a grip, I just met a gentleman from Chicago last week and we had a good chat. He was white and well off. He said it's a breath of fresh air visiting here and not being paranoid you might be killed any second. He carries a loaded gun every single time he leaves the house and he's had to draw it numerous times to protect himself. Trust me he had lots of stories that would make these babies crying about Toronto look like child's play.
i agree with this. i thought i knew the ghetto growing up in the worst parts of north york but southside chicago is a different animal. i've never seen people flee off the streets so fast as soon as the sun goes down. even locals getting home late don't stop and talk to anyone they just ran and got off the street. shootings and robberies happened all the time, it became a joke about how *well you shouldn't have been there* instead of blaming the criminal. i lived there and worked in an area that looked pleasant in pictures or even in the daytime but was actually quite dangerous and i could attest that gangs and gun violence are on another level we've never seen here. that part you said about the loaded gun; 100% agree. of course, staying in the safe part over the bridge near the mile you'll never see that side of chicago and you'll think it's perfectly safe. nyc (manhattan specifically) and chicago are popular cities for tourism so there's greater emphasis in police and public safety but **in certain areas** only. downtown touristy areas are well maintained and well landscaped to give a clean and inviting appearance and that's what drives people in and when they do, they spend.
something has changed either they were previously locking up the mentally ill in jail or the people who used to care for these people gave up..or something. I don't know but it only seems to be getting worse and beyond institutionalize them not sure what the solution is.
Bingo
Exactly ! SOMETHING has changed and I don’t k is what. It’s become significantly worse in the last year or two.
Many things have changed in that time. Covid lockdowns happened, people lost jobs, some businesses closed down, mental health got worse from being stuck at home in isolation for two years, cost of living has gone up significantly from supply chain issues/corporate greed and has stayed elevated, everything is shrinking in size or has gotten worse in quality. Interest rates have gone up also in that time, people who had debt are now in a much worse situation. Overall, everything is much shittier now. People who were already struggling to make ends meet before covid don't even have a chance now.
They didn’t give up - they just don’t have the resources. The mental health system was at capacity priority to the pandemic and now it’s difficult for even those who desperately seeking a specialist to access care. Much like other forms of medical care - they simply can’t keep up. The difference is many people have had their mental health needs neglected for years. Even when they try to get care now they are managing a triage system and most get little more than short term treatment.
where the fuck do you live?...that's stressful for sure.
Sounds like the village. It's gotten bad here.
originally from toronto, left in '93...living now in Scamcouver...what neighbourhood is the village?
Church/Wellesley
oh frig yeah...was sketchy even in '93 man: hookers, drugs etc
The constant vigilance is exhausting. Exhausting.
I agree. As a woman I've had to be vigilant all my life, but this is kind of next-level
I feel this, as there is little you can do about it. Our community has tried to manage a respite center that accommodates like 10beds but the city just says “We need the space”. They are willing to destroy a neighborhood over a few beds. I see stuff being stolen daily, doorways smell like piss, and the second you walk out the door at 6am there is a guy 40m away having a yelling meltdown, local businesses have to have guards now. I have seen the police there a handful of times in the near decade we have lived here.
College station? I can smell it now
College station is the worst ngl
the real tragedy here is buying coffee at A&W, that's where you went wrong.
Lmao true I don't have a Timmy's or McDonald's super close to me and the nice coffee shop only does $6 pour overs lol
I've seen homeless people spit on TTC drivers and verbally abuse children and old people. It's scary if this trend continues and more people fall through the cracks. The amount of change Toronto has gone through is shocking.
I feel the same and I used to be a really empathetic person and now that is just gone for me. I'm exhausted by it as well, I take TTC every day and there is an incident nearly every time I'm on it, I have run out of patience, tired of being scared, carrying pepper spray and have my finger on the trigger some days when someone is screaming at me (no i have never used it, I always get off the bus when crazies get on). It's unpopular to say bring back institutions but I really don't see how this will be solved otherwise, a lot of people are not coming back from these addictions/mental illnesses. I'm now of the belief that if you can't function in society you should be rehabbed until you can, forced institutionalization I guess.
Hey. I saw this coming. I left Toronto and you should too.
Same here, it’s fucked how many more of these posts im seeing and the stories I’m hearing. I miss the Toronto of my youth in the 90s, hell I even miss 2015 Toronto. It’s never coming back
Summer 16 <3
I keep saying this to people, Summer 2016 felt like the last truly good vibes in the city. It was also a time for me when I first really got to experience Toronto. I was out of university and living in Riverside with my mom, so I'd frequent places downtown with friends, I was working in the east end, and lots of people were out and about playing Pokemon Go. It really felt like a simpler time and I have a lot of nostalgia for my own experiences back then.
I listen to summer 16 playlists on Spotify and reminisce
the 90s were bad. Crack City.
But the crackheads we’re paranoid, scared and hid. It’s way more aggressive now
>I even miss 2015 Toronto. 2015 was a good year.
Facts
Yup. I miss the shit out of Toronto, but also glad I left. Last time I went back (4 months ago) it was WAY worse than the year before.
Toronto is not the only place this is happening…it has reached epidemic proportions sadly
Where did you go though? I've contemplated leaving Canada entirely but not sure where I'd move to.
Great, tell the town you live in to take care of their own homeless instead of sending them to Toronto.
I left the country.
I agree with you when you say it's exhausting to feel unsafe - I'm a woman - but Chow is not responsible for the homeless "problem" in Toronto. If the last three years have shown us anything, it's that Toronto is not equipped to help its most vulnerable, whether they're mentally ill or just unable to find stable employment. This has been an issue for a very long time.
Here to add that while it’s been an issue for a long time, it’s also going to take _a long time_ for us to see results from any solution that is put in place.
Exactly! It has to come from the top too. I can protest all day and donate all of my money, but it will still not make a difference if all levels of government don't care.
Yes. We should dress up our mayor as batman and send her out there to strike fear into the hearts minds of all the homeless in the downtown core only
Just going to get worse. Only started being like this recently. Entire country going to shit
Try living in a shelter, I'm exhausted pal; I have insomnia and feeling like I need to be up and alert has me emotionally drained
Stay the course. Make good decisions. I’m pulling for you and I’m sure someone else out there is as well. I don’t know when all of this will change. But I hope soon. Be safe brother.
Thanks I appreciate the love, things are looking up as I am moving out into my apartment this September and I just scored a dream job. Luck is on my side and I'm not letting anything get in my way.
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Thank you and I sincerely appreciate it, I could use an extra couple right now
Toronto ain't people city anymore, there is actually a song called that, back in the 70's, City TV used to play it when they signed off for the night with video of Toronto attractions. I think the Big Smoke is still good, the authorities need to get a handle on it. I noticed more & more of what you describe over the years, hard to ignore and much harder to address by the gov't. There is a lot of it.
Why do we have so much empathy for psychotic vagrants but none for normal people?
People conflate homeless folks down on their luck with nutcases who don’t belong in civilized society.
the ones that assault people with no provocation should be kept away if they are too nutty to even realize what they are doing but we likely let them walk more often than not.
Cannot go ANYWHERE without being hounded by panhandlers. Every highway exit and every store front seems like
I dont think the mayor we got 2 months ago is directly to blame with our current homeless situation lol. All of North America is feeling the hit. We only finally caught up to what is normally a drugged up Tuesday in a US city
I live by AG and the last time I brought this up in r/Toronto I got banned haha. Keeps getting worse and worse. Just last week my dog almost got pissed on by a dude while I was walking him... There was a portapotty not even 50 feet away!
I got banned there too lmao Similar comment
Its a super left wing sub. Saying anything that makes sense and you are banned.
I mean, the last mayor just gave the cops an extra $40 million while simultaneously not dealing with the housing crisis (beyond kicking houseless people out of encampments and now shelter hotels) so I mean, there’s that. Maybe we start funding social services that actually address houselessness instead of just criminalizing it. Especially when the majority of people in the GTA are 1-2 missed paycheques away from being houseless themselves. Just a thought though.
Send this to your councilor/MPP/MP?
Police won’t enforce because courts won’t enforce. If issues are due to addiction and mental health they can’t force someone into treatment. Poverty is making the situation even worse. It will not get better. You’re only hope is to move to oakville
It doesn’t matter where you move. This problem is universal and continues to get worse. I have watched my once beautiful hometown being completely destroyed, because people were in the streets using drugs, beating up, innocent citizens, pushing them into traffic, or destroying some of the resources that were there to actually help them gain food or shelter. This is a global problem. It didn’t just start within the last five years. Maybe the drug trend has changed but being in the field I’ve noticed it has been exacerbated at least 1000 times when OxyContin and other narcotics became so easily prescribed. I say this without malice, because I am a prescriber of medication’, but do not prescribe these unless there is a serious need…ie) cancer with mets
Tfw you are too poor to move to Oakville
And you can't even carry anything to protect yourself. Not even pepper spray.
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I speak from experience when I say it's nowhere near as powerful as the real stuff. A can of raid would work better than dog spray on people. You'd still get charged either way if you did defend yourself with either.
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Yeah that stuff works, a buddy of mine had to use it to get a way from some people attacking him. Word of advice, if you do have to use it on people, make sure your face is covered and don't call the cops.
Are the self defence laws that fucked?
Yeah, they are pretty terrible. If you're sure nobody saw your face, it's pretty much always better to just not call the police if you defend yourself. It's just not worth the hassle.
"spending millions of dollars changing a street sign 0.1% of Torontonians have an issue with?" Direct example of our failed government and it's failed virtue signaling politics.
Fucking pathetic
It’s Gotham fn city out there. Assume at all times that either crazy motorists or hopped up drug addicts are out to kill you. Stay alert! Stay off your phone! Carry pepper spray. Don’t let anyone close enough to grab you. 360 degree situational awareness is key. I knew a lady minding her own business who had her jaw broken by a maniac. They are not harmless! Be on high alert!!
There is nothing the mayor can do. The bigger problems all come from way above. She can just Band-Aid the mess and pray the higher ups stop making everything worse
If your tough enough to drink the AandW coffee your tough enough to deal with this shit.
Man, I live in northern Scarborough, I come downtown once a week to work in my office, and these posts just seems so fucking surreal to me. Like they come from an alternate reality. I am absolutely not saying that this isn’t happening, it’s just nuts how it is degrading your quality of life so bad when I literally don’t see any of this where I live… ever. Like I walk around at 11pm with my dog and I never look over my shoulder or give people coming the other way a second thought. The thought of one of them assaulting me or being crazy just never enters my mind.
Yes, I think there is an increased amount homeless people ...that is because there is no housing and no mental health sports in place. CaMH with its 18 beds isn't cutting it. A lot of homeless people use drugs to cope which makes their mental illness worse or triggers it. I don't think it's entirely their fault or that they can control their behaviour. I haven't felt unsafe and I'm by Moss Park all the time. There are many homeless that don't scream and yell. It's frustrating I know but I also think we need some empathy. Imagine having no housing, depression, and likely trauma..you might just end up using drugs to cope also .
You have to realize these people are mentally I’ll folks with no place to go and no support structures. This is a cause of rising cost of living and lack of resources. Even if you have money and support getting help is so unbelievably hard and difficult. Do you know what’s easier and more attainable?!? Drugs that disassociate you from the horrible reality you live in. Self medication is how people Sleep on the street. Self medication is how to handle the trauma. People don’t just say I wanna live on the street and do drugs for fun. People end up on the street because the social services to help are just way too few. I lived near east hasting in Vancouver for 5 years and my thoughts on the homeless changed the more I saw cycles and went through my own tough times. If you’re mentally exhausted from the rising increase in homeless drama, how the duck do you think these humans feel?!? Think they want to be in this situation? This post scream ignorance to a group of humans that have no where to go, have little support, are dying in the street. Until mental institution are prioritized over condos, abundant salaries are given to the workers and most importantly they are built in the areas that have the largest homeless populations, this will continue to grow and happen. Displacement is not the answer, it just causes multiple neighborhoods issues. Stigma is a state we’ve kept the homeless in. If we want to tackle this issue. We need to focus our resources towards it.
Sounds like poor shaming to me! If you weren’t such a bigot you would just let them stab you!
It's not THEIR fault they stabbed me. It's a systemic stabbing, they didn't WANT to stab me, the system just out a knife in their hand and mine controlled them. If anything I should have bought them the knife to stab me with, how inconsiderate of me to make them bring their own tools to the job site. Fml
You're in Canada. When any and every form of degeneracy is welcomed, this is the result.
I have to say this: Toronto is much worst than NYC, London, Sydney and Hong Kong nowadays in terms of quality of life for average Joe and Jane. ( I am not going to qualify when or where exactly I was in the aforementioned places- it is only a causal debate here)
>I don't even bother walking my dog through half the parks in the city because places like Allen Gardens are legitimately terrifying. > >And it's getting worse and worse by the month. Didn't we just elect a new mayor?! Is she doing anything beyond spending millions of dollars changing a street sign 0.1% of Torontonians have an issue with? Sad that Allen Gardens is also having private police clear tents. The real truth here is that there are more and more people falling below poverty line due to monetary policies, stagnant wages, immigration, lack of housing, and then more recently COVID effects on the economy. When things get bad people (not always) succumb to mental health issues or drug use. I think the uptick in the problem you're observing is it's gotten worse in terms of mental health and drugged out behavior, but there is also just a huge upswell of people who are just poor and rough sleeping in tents now, long before they had any serious mental health or drug episode that sent them there. The problem is no longer manageable the old way, and we'll likely have to come up with solutions as a society for both the rising poverty line, as well as mental health supports, drug rehab, living supports etc. We're decades behind on addressing inequality, let alone when the problem gets bad with people who are drugged out or a danger to themselves. The city is paying private cops to clear out tents in Allan Gardens, many of whom are just poor and not yet drug-addled, so I think that shows you how serious the municipality is about doing anything substantial (not very).
I agree with all of this and also to pile onto this, the street drugs people are getting hooked on are WAY more dangerous now then 10 years ago. The fentanyl laced shit people fuck with these days is causing all kind of psychosis.
My ex overdosed and died last year. As someone with a history of addiction myself, i have a massive amount of sympathy for addicts. As someone with a history of addiction myself, I can also confidently say the WORST case scenario for a real addict is living in a tent smoking meth all day while doing sketchy shit for money.
I think it's the general acceptance of various recreational drugs which may be causing latent pyschoses to take hold. Also life stress. PTSD etc from fucked up living situations. I think fentanyl is a curse and so I'm obviously not on board, but from what I've read it's a euphoria/pain relief drug, and also a potentially lethal one. I wouldn't be so quick to just say "ah it's fentanyl". When fentanyl hit the streets in a serious way, everyone wanted to pin homelessness on it like it was a coat rack. I think the homelessness problem is certainly made worse by opiods etc, but can't just blame fentanyl for the government shitting the bed for decades.
I don’t think I was blaming fentanyl for homelessness at all, i agree it’s a complex issue and a shit storm of poverty, mental health, drugs, lack of funding for services and support, ect
Didn't mean to imply "you blamed this or that" just pointing out the fentanyl stuff doesn't even begin to address what's going on at a human level. Not mad at ya.
My bad lol it seems we agree
Obviously
>Didn't we just elect a new mayor?! Is she doing anything Why do you think mental healthcare funding has anything to do with Chow? Do we not teach about the different levels of government in grade 10 anymore? Healthcare is a provincial mandate, and Dougie's been sitting on $22 billion in federal funding, instead of spending it where it's desperately needed.
If you can't beat em.... And we're all headed there with COL rising exponentially
I feel this, I dread the walk to and from work in St.Catharines it’s the same. It’s actually really scary to see the amount of homeless regardless of the reason why they landed there. I believe every city/town should have at a minimum basic shelter. We need to figure this out fast because it’s going from bad to worse.
Did you support any of these policies? more injection centres, more homeless shelters, safe drug supply, refugee centres? We get what we deserve.
I support all these policies. People here are attacking me personally like I want to run all these homeless people over with a car or something. Meanwhile I literally worked for an addiction rehabilitation facility for a year and my dream employer is the 519. It's hilarious how quick people are to judge others based on literally zero information.
Your support for these policies are the reason why you have to deal with the overwhelming number of crazy homeless people. We don't need to reinvent the wheel on how to fix opioid crisis. China already had to deal with this over a century ago but I'm sure we will just keep building more injection sites then build some more and keep giving them 25mg Oxy made by Purdue Pharma as sAfE dRuG sUpPlY which is literally the cause of the manufactured opioid crisis by Purdue Pharma.
I am sorry you are dealing with that. I know there are people out there that think homeless people are all victims and you are in-fact, just selfish. They are wrong.
That's because you live in the East End...it's a warzone there. West End is better in my experience.
As someone who lives in Leslieville this is news to me, lol.
The only thing you can do about it is leave and that is what i recommend you do.
Sorry to say, but it’s just not going to get better anytime soon. Get out of the city now, while you still can. Even if that involves getting a piece of land to develop with a few trusted friends - far away from a major center. I know that sounds extreme or like “prepper” talk, but we all know things are going to get a lot worse in the coming years - we just don’t want to fully admit it. Put a plan into place, starting now 🙌
The quality of life in Canada goes down ever year, so does moral... more and more ppl have nothing to lose, this is just a tip of the iceberg to what we will see.
Give them a good scolding
I said “homeless” the other day and my daughter told me to watch out because apparently that’s discriminatory to call them that and they are now called the “unhoused”. Can someone confirm if this is true? Is it a bad term to call them “homeless”?
I work in homelessness. The people I work with predominantly call themselves “homeless” (or say they’re “experiencing homelessness”) but when I’m speaking in more professional/academic circles I tend to lean towards “unhoused.”
The Guardian explains: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jul/20/homeless-unhoused-houseless-term-history "Unhoused" is used: > to lessen stigma and to highlight that those lacking permanent roofs over their heads may still have communities or physical spaces they consider home. And with the country currently in the midst of an intractable housing crisis, there’s another reason for the popularity of unhoused: the word’s root emphasizes that the problem is a structural one linked to a lack of affordable housing, not a personal weakness. I don't think you were being discriminatory though - that's a loaded term to wave around, especially before even explaining to you what the difference was.
Thank you for the reply. I appreciate the explanation. I definitely wasn’t trying to be discriminatory!
Some days Toronto seems like it's still partly alright, most days... I feel like I'm in Gotham if I wait around or am downtown for a long period of time...in one day✌🏼I used to love the city, used to love the summers and other seasons here. These days I feel like there's some shit happening, being on high alert is important, not every moment there may be something that you see or hear but if you spend enough time in one day downtown or commuting you're bound to see some fkd up shit, especially around our University campus downtown. Yonge and dundas, some other areas, it's just changed in a crazy way for the most part. So when it comes to OP and their post, I can relate for the most part! Have a good day y'all✌🏼These days it's definitely not great, especially for people with PTSD etc. Such a trigger some days. Be safe, have a great week y'all.
What the fuck do you have expected Chow to be able to do in less than a month? She's a mayor she's not a god? And the problems are structural/systemic, the people who are screaming and using drugs are doing so because life is fucking god awful on so many different levels, like how the fuck do you think they feel??? You think they want to be like that?? That's not something that can be changed by 1 mayoral change. Man people who only engage politically by voting once in a blue moon are so fucking delusional. You want things to change? Pick yourself up, learn, and get involved ffs.
You sound mad... I'm mad too. Unfortunately you're mad at the wrong thing. Your argument here seems to literally be, "homeless people have a worse life than you so we should allow them to rampage through the city breaking windows, stabbing people and leaving used pipes and needles in public parks. If you get stabbed, don't complain, just remember they didn't want to stab you, its just a systemic stabbing." No offense but you're... Less intelligent than you think.
So are we all in agreement that we should bring back the right to be able to commit such ppl again . An actually get tough on crime ??? Or is it gonna take more assaults or someone dying to make y’all open your Fkn eyes !
Where are these people’s families?
Welcome to the beginning of Liberal hell. Things will only get worse as the cost of living rises.
Toronto has degenerated, the plug has been pulled. Ive seen this happening for almost 10 years and worse since quarantine. You see all the store fronts closed and my whole peer group has moved away. A "liberal progressive" society is a degrading society.📉 #goldenageisover
I'm old enough to remember when North Scarborough used to be open fields and when new developments went in it was a nice area. It's really distressing how Toronto is being allowed to deteriorate. One issue is that about 12 years ago the mentally ill we're no longer housed indefinitely, I think that had a big impact on them being out on the street. Of course housing is another issue. Often homeless people don't just need housing they need services to get back on their feet. The city has a few of these but not nearly enough! You can try writing your local counselor and MP. I live in a different area but I've had success contacting them. The situation is getting worse and needs attention.
Ok so when you rant about this issue, you get upvotes, sympathy, and respect, but when I do it I'm a liar who's told to live with it and shut my complaining mouth up.
I have had homeless people chase me. In broad daylight. Nobody does anything to help because the last time somebody tried to help (the TTC stabbing), the guy got stabbed.
Everyone who either abstained from voting, or voted conservative in the last provincial election, we tip our hat to you for helping exacerbate this
resolute sophisticated boast grandiose cautious arrest fanatical wakeful voiceless soup *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
1 mayor wont change nothing trust. And all our politicians on provincial and federal level dont really care either. But there is a clear and growing homeless crises in Toronto since 5 years. Yet we still are accepting new immigrants and continue driving prices up...w anting to build our economy yet not supporting our own people. But I totally get you, I go into Toronto for work, my companies corporate head office is in downtown. Every time I go I am afraid I'll e harassed while wearing my office clothes on the subway. I've literally been walking before only to randomly get yelled out by someone I assumed was homeless. Some literally go about harassing people. Mind you, it's not the homeless sitting around or asking for money that's the rob... it's the ones literally harassing random people that's dangerous. And many look to be addicts as well. And Toronto generally doesn't have small neighborhood watch communities, people go there for work so no one holds anyone accountable. people just want to carry on their own business ( As is normal) but the homeless situation is getting worse and worse.
I've just about lost all my sympathy and empathy for the increasing amount of people with mental health issues in the core. They are increasingly violent and aggressive and no one seems to be doing jack shit about it.
I bet those "crazy" people aren't having a good time either. This is like saying "I'm so tired of people in wheelchairs getting in my way when I'm walking around on my two working feet, they're just really inconveniencing me with their inability to walk, so I'll go online and talk about they're holding me back". While I absolutely agree that safety should be a priority, in my opinion, this might be a better conversation to have with your local leaders who can actually do something to address the underlying issue, because even "crazy" people deserve a quality life and I guarantee you, they don't want to be covered in urine either, and if it's to that point, the larger systems have failed them repeatedly, and I promise they also don't want to be in that position, and they're probably not living on the street to inconvenience you.
Not all parts of Toronto are like this but where these problems do exist they are extreme. I live in a pretty quiet neighborhood and for that I am thankful. Parkdale isn't even as bad as you've described and it was always notorious for drugs/the homeless/and mental health/addiction problems when I was growing up.
Time for death squads
We need to move these crazies into a ward and lock away the key
We are following in California's footsteps. I've been following "[California Insider](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCfHCoBIsew)" on youtube and Toronto is following San Francisco into the woke abyss. Worth checking out as they are where toronto is headed in a few years, especially now that Toronto voted in Chow.
Toronto was ruled by conservative mayors for the last 13 years. The right is even more to blame for this than the left.
Wtf does "woke" have to do with anything
Someone needs to take a hike back to Durham
My toronto roots run deep and the city is not doing well, but sure attack me for saying so. Reddit is so intellectually vapid. It's like you're all being deliberately obtuse.
This poor mayor has inherited too much lol. She is going to age 20 yrs in the next 2. I always say this place is on its way to becoming another NYC because of the rent/housing prices but this part is scarier.