Reason #817 I don't give change to homeless people (Fresno, Oakland: rent, how much)

[dalparadise]

Originally Posted by bmw335xi

The others should be in prison or shipped to Alcatraz.

I'm sure one of the appeals of Alcatraz to tourists is its lack of homeless people. This idea would ruin that.

[marilyn220]

Originally Posted by Nicegurl

Hi Jade,

The same thing happened to me a while back! I was leaving the Rockit Room with some friends and we were walking a couple of blocks down the street to have dinner at a Chinese restaurant when a crazy homeless black guy singled me out and asked me for some change. When I politely refused to give it to him, he began yelling the same types of venomous obscenties at me, stating that I was a bi$ch, a traitor to my race and accused me of sleeping with the white guys that I was with (the were five of us: 2 white guys, 1 hispanic guy, myself and another black woman). He even followed me inside the restaurant yelling and screaming obscenities at me! I was terrified, but kept my cool and remained quiet. One of the gentlemen in the group that I was with stood in between me and the crazy guy and acted as a shield to keep him from hitting me.

You know what?!

And this is no disrespect to you or Jade, but I swear on all that is holy that these bastards know exactly who to pull that crap with.

It's one thing to be yelling crap in the street, but FOLLOWING ME INTO THE RESTAURANT TOO??!!

Hell no!! I would have stopped, turned around with my iphone (or whatever sharp edged object I had in my hand), cussed that fool out something fierce and waited for any act of what could be termed as potential violent aggression and I would have went to town on his ass. I would just pray and hope he didn't have AIDS or anything cause of the blood that will be on my clothes.

You were walking with some punk ass dudes and he KNEW that. Trust me, men KNOW when they're going to be dealing with REAL MEN, especially lifelong street dudes and convicts. This would have made it worse for me, because after that day, I would have looked at all three of those fools as p___sies and would have treated them as such.

It wasn't until I yelled for help that the waiter came over and ran the guy out.

San Francisco might as well change its name to "San Fran-sissyco", because that's what it seems to be full of - sissies.

Just some straight *******. No wonder the dating scene is horrible for women. All the REAL MEN are outside the city in Oakland. LOL!

[jade408]

^I have this horrible habit of smiling at people when I walk by. Some people mistake this for openness. I don't respond to provocation unless I am in physical danger. It isn't worth my energy to respond to someone who is attempting to curse me out. I'd rather remove myself from the vicinity.

[marilyn220]

Originally Posted by jade408

^I have this horrible habit of smiling at people when I walk by. Some people mistake this for openness. I don't respond to provocation unless I am in physical danger. It isn't worth my energy to respond to someone who is attempting to curse me out. I'd rather remove myself from the vicinity.

Gurl, I completely understand, but I have witnessed bums in the subway acting the fool, but as soon as a group of teenagers or an officer walks on ALL OF THAT NOISE CEASE!! Like I said, they KNOW who to do that crazy mess too.

I'm gonna assume you and the previous poster are pretty and the smiling thing doesn't help. I know Cali folks like to do this for some reason and I learned to get with the program living in LA, but we usually don't smile at people we don't know in NYC. We just don't.

I also read a crazy story like the above in the NYC forum too. Some homeless dude followed some people in a deli/restaurant screaming his freaking head off. When they went to go sit down, homeless dude supposedly started BANGING ON THE WALL screaming at the same time.

I just KNEW this happened in MANHATTAN. No freaking way could this bullcrap go down in the outerboroughs are above 116th street (where black and hispanics still live). No freaking way!

Again, I would have taken this as an act of major aggression and let him have it! But to be honest, the black and hispanic homeless don't pull that mess on other minorities here, because they know we don't play that no matter how "well dressed" we are. They know the transplants in Manhattan are scared to death of everything, so they try it with them and know there's a 99% chance that nothing will happen.

[bigdumbgod]

Originally Posted by marilyn220

I would have stopped, turned around with my iphone (or whatever sharp edged object I had in my hand), cussed that fool out something fierce and waited for any act of what could be termed as potential violent aggression and I would have went to town on his ass. I would just pray and hope he didn't have AIDS or anything cause of the blood that will be on my clothes.

That's why you don't give in to hand-to-hand violence with the crazy homeless: You have to assume they DO carry a nasty virus or disease. You can beat them up all you want, but is it really worth it after you contract HIV?

[mayorhaggar]

Originally Posted by jade408

^I have this horrible habit of smiling at people when I walk by. Some people mistake this for openness. I don't respond to provocation unless I am in physical danger. It isn't worth my energy to respond to someone who is attempting to curse me out. I'd rather remove myself from the vicinity.

A lot of people smile and say hi when you're walking on the sidewalk in an Oakland neighborhood. In SF it will just get you in trouble tbqh. Honestly you never know who is crazy in SF, I've seen so many people who looked totally normal start spazzing out on Muni, talking to themselves or yelling at other people.

[DocGoldstein]

I've found that it depends. In S.F, you get more druggies. So you will get more crazies overall. In Oakland, you really have the down-and-out desperate types who will resort to theft, or outright violence to survive. I've been physically attacked in Oakland during a volunteer activity. In S.F, I've dealt with weird smells.

[wrcousert]

"Sorry, I don't carry cash. It's too dangerous these days".

[rkwalton]

Originally Posted by wrcousert

"Sorry, I don't carry cash. It's too dangerous these days".

Yeah, that's my usual reply. I leave out the dangerous part, but I really don't carry cash around a lot anymore.

[shooting4life]

Another good one is "I was going to ask you if you had any extra change"