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San Fransicko

Why Progressives Ruin Cities

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About this listen

National bestselling author of APOCALYPSE NEVER skewers progressives for the mishandling of America’s faltering cities.

Progressives claimed they knew how to solve homelessness, inequality, and crime. But in cities they control, progressives made those problems worse.

Michael Shellenberger has lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for thirty years. During that time, he advocated for the decriminalization of drugs, affordable housing, and alternatives to jail and prison. But as homeless encampments spread, and overdose deaths skyrocketed, Shellenberger decided to take a closer look at the problem.

What he discovered shocked him. The problems had grown worse not despite but because of progressive policies. San Francisco and other West Coast cities — Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland — had gone beyond merely tolerating homelessness, drug dealing, and crime to actively enabling them.

San Fransicko reveals that the underlying problem isn’t a lack of housing or money for social programs. The real problem is an ideology that designates some people, by identity or experience, as victims entitled to destructive behaviors. The result is an undermining of the values that make cities, and civilization itself, possible.

 Civics & Citizenship Economics Environmental Economics Homelessness Politics & Government Sociology Urban Social justice
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Published in 2021, this book nails San Francisco!
I was there in 2001, and it hasn’t changed in those 20 years. I thought the city was a rotten dump full of misfortunate people, and this book describes their lives.
I was there in 1989, and it was just a crummy.

People love to say, “ah, that’s just the Tenderloin”, but the truth is that every mile of this city is miserable.

The only place I’ve every witnessed someone defecating into a urinal is San Francisco! Twice!!
There is a lot about public defecation in this book. It’s probably the biggest spectator sport in SF.

A True Guide to San Francisco, “Everybody’s Favourite City”.

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..this is it. A brilliant and pretty balance run through the history, present and possible future of how we manage living with the mentally ill.

If you really want to understand homelessness..

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This book is a great summary of the broken Western civilisation that cares more for self righteousness of indivials rather than their tangible accountability

Scary and inspiring story

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A good, fairly balanced book. Kind of lost me about two thirds in and then pulled me back towards the close. A few sweeping rather subjective statements aside this was worth the read.

Thoroughly researched

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Considering it’s such a niche topic, it’s not surprising that Shellenberger relies on a lot of statistic-led information - this can be hard to follow in the audio format. Still, it makes for a fascinating listen that is thoroughly researched in order to reach, what I believe to be, a satisfying solution to a serious problem.

Fascinating but fact-heavy

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