Yeah, I was overly simplistic. And I do think it is tragic that anyone who served this country in the military should ever be homeless. But in a way they are in the mentally ill category. Not that all veteran's are mentally ill, just that those with depression and PTSD tend to be the ones that are homeless. What a way to thank these soldiers, huh?

And it's true that more people does not necessarily mean more damage but it's certainly positively correlated. The earth is about 1/3 full based on estimated capacity. If we keep growing at the rate we are it could be full in our lifetime. That will put so much stress on the system that I think the consequences could be drastic. I'm really not much of an environmentalist. But I'm a scientist and I think the fact that population growth and associated demand for resources is severly changing the planet is indisputable.

historically, increases in women's education almost immediately succeeded the availability of birth control. in more recent years, education of young women on their reproductive rights has become a factor in maintaining a low birth date. the "bible belt" and other areas that proclaim strong religious beliefs, which tend to preach abstinence-only, also have above-average teen pregnancy rates, even when the data are adjusted to exclude income factors.



google "mexfam" - the mexican national family planning foundation.



i have no idea where you're getting this from. italy only fairly recently made PhD-level education available, and as such the degree is still extremely rare in the population. as with the US, roughly 50% of PhD candidates are female. for reference, about 1% of the US population holds a PhD or equivalent (excluding JD, MD, other "professional" degrees.)

The statistic about Italy and female PhDs came from a speaker I heard. Alan something. I'll look up the name and let you know if you are interested. It's also the case that many, dare I say most based on my experience, American PhDs are foreign. We probably have the best graduate education system in the world and it attracts the world.

I looked up mexfam - they seem to be doing good.

I think it all goes together. Once you start educating women lot's of good things happen - at least I think they are good. Some people, usually men, see it as the beginning of the end.

Keep in mind that much of that "mental illness" is the result of drug abuse.

Many people confuse the cause-and-effect involved, but the truth is that a huge portion of those "mentally ill" homeless people used to be perfectly healthy people who fried their own brains huffing spray paint and abusing other illicit narcotics. That was their choice.

I agree completely kombat.

I am not unsympathetic to those that have made good choices in their lives and just had bad luck. But I think they are a tiny fraction of the homeless. And it is certainly debateable whether that is evn possible. Part of making good choices involves planning for times when you have bad luck.

i'd be careful when walking that line, kombat. the cause-and-effect of mental disorders and substance abuse is not quite so cut and dried. some pre-existing mental disorders do lead to significantly increased risk of substance abuse.

I think poor family planning is due to a variety of factors: (1) Cyclical, children generally learn from and mimic what their parents do. (2) Poor education and limited opportunities. (3) Lack of access to health care and family planning resources. (4) Lack of sex education in public schools.

Regarding mental health issues and homeless population. Deinstitutionalization which began in the 1950s has greatly reduced the number of hospital beds for mentally ill. The mentally ill were supposed to get community based treatement but sadly community based treatment is vastly underfunded and often community care cannot force people to take medicine or engage in treatment. If you are mentally ill and you think the government is out to get you, do you really think you'd take medicine from people you believe are governement agents? The mentally ill often engage in substance abuse as a form of treatment, self medication. And sadly there is now a form of reinstitutionalization of the mentally ill into the penal system. The mentally ill who are arrested for trespassing are now jailed instead of receiving treatment which is vastly more expensive for the tax-payors and doesn't provide any treatment to those that are ill.

I think you are right on when it comes to the mentally ill. But what can we do about it? Instituionalization led to horrific conditions in many case. Clearly what we have now is not working. Seriously, what would you propose? As you said, if they are not forced into care then they do not receive it because the caregivers are perceived as government agents. It's a tough problem. Ironically, my state, not for any altruistic reasons but to save money, has begun releasing non-violent prisoners including some of the ones you mention. There is little disgreement on the expected effect - more homeless, more petty crime, increased cost for policing and courts for local jurisdictions.

I once knew a schizophrenic quite well. He hated taking his meds because of the terrible side effects. He stopped hearing the voices but also could not enjoy life, was impotent, and quite a bit else. Surprisingly, not taking meds was probably one of the more rational things he would do from time to time.

Although I am in favor of sex education in public schools, I have a very hard time believing that any child (and we are often talking about children here) who is old enough to physically have sex does not know enough to know about birth control and what the consequences are. I think the issue is more about demonstrating that it can happen to them and teaching them how to make good decisions. Too many people think they are invincible. As for access, you are right about health care but condoms cost less than candy bars and are nearly as available!

My mother had me when she was 20. My sister got pregnant at 18. Her daughter, my neice, was pregnant before she was 16. Obviously you are right about cycles. So what happened with me? I had the same educational and other opportunities as my sister. I find the whole situation deplorable. It does no good for the kids and likely puts them on the same path. You are helping support them I think because they are on public assistance. And my neices child was a girl so I would not be surprised if the story has another chapter in about 15 years, give or take.

I don't disagree with your list. But in the end I think it comes down to poor decisions. Having children you cannot support for 20 years is a bad choice. It does not really matter whether you choose to have them or choose not to protect against accidents.

Most parents are terrible parents because they don't inspire success in their children. These children make more such children and yes, like someone already wrote, it is cyclical.

If one thinks objectively, and uses reason, they will not make babies they can't afford.

Not sure if it is lack of education, wanting to feel loved, wanting to create something or sheer stupidity. If you are going to have sex, fine. Is it that hard to use a condom? You really do not need an education to figure how that works.

As for the military, my heart goes out to them. However, there are programs for them as well. Though, they are not well promoted by the gov't. Its a toss-up. I think people's priorities need to be better in check. Plus, the religious zealots pushing abstinence over sex education are not really hitting it out of the ballpark.

Perhaps a gov't enforced mandate for sexual education for all schools accepting federal funding should be enforced. Start in middle school and continue through college..

Again, lack of logic and thinking things through - "No one loves me, not even my parents. I hate my mom. So I am going to have a baby that will always love me no matter what." Huh?


So I have said elsewhere that I am an atheist. But I don't have any problem with people who want to be religious. The problem with the zealots pushing astinence is that they are right...in theory...Abstinence, when perfected, is a pretty darn good family planning method. But it usually fails in practice. Sad that they can't see that a god that made "being fruitful and multiplying" a priority would not also endow people with an irresistable desire to do so. I prefer to think it is nature and evolution that have done the work but the arguement is the same. Telling people to abstain is just silly and pointless.

adolescence and presence of logic are rarely co-occurring events. when it comes to teenagers, you really do have to drill it into their heads. the abstinence-only programs are not based in reality. perhaps idealism, which is cute and all, but useless.

I'd rather see mandatory birth control for the populus, with applications for baby permits/licenses.

Knowing how much unneccesary pain and anguish babies would avoid would make all the nuisances with such a program worth it (babies born addicted to drugs, babies born into a world of abuse and neglect, babies born with avoidable medical conditions if the mother had proper prenatal care, etc).

Of course, that doesn't answer the financial question you posed. However, a simple 5 or 50$ application fee would certainly deter a large percentage of would-be parents (like the 18 year old I know of who thought she would get pregnant because 'being a mom is easy, finishing high school is too hard. She also didn't have 2 nickles to rub together.')

Yes, it is radical and socialist, but IMO, it beats the alternative.

Wow, at risk of being flamed I'm going to have to offer an opposing opinion:

Re: homelessness

There are two categories of homeless, the temporarily homeless and the permanently homeless. The temporarily homeless typically partake of homeless services for one night to two weeks and use aid to get their feet under them. Then there are the semi to permanently homeless and has been pointed out the vast majority of these people have substance abuse and mental illness issues. You can't force them into treatment as it violates their civil rights, so if they don't want treatment there isn't much to do. Some of these people are veterans, but not nearly as many as claim to be. They simply know the deep respect most of us have for those that serve and take advantage of it. Kinda like the 'will work for food' signs. Many WON'T work, but they know it sounds good so they use it.


Re: single parenthood (and poverty)

I disagree with the poster that said that many of these people likely planned for problems and couldn't outlast them. I know too many people who are on the 'okay' side of disaster and know that they won't likely start to make better choices, so when the disaster inevitably hits they risk ruin.

I think a big part of the problem with single parenthood is a double sided dilemma. As has been shown here, we as a society want to provide for those that can't care for themselves. But reality also shows us that the more you 'reward' a behavior the more you get of it. Making it easier to get a divorce helps those that really need it and can't provide the documentation also makes it easier for people who would be better off if you didn't have 'no-fault' divorce. Subsidizing single mothers with welfare and other government money and tax breaks makes it easier to be a single mother and you will find more people making that choice. Many conservative voices call this "making fathers/husbands obsolete". And as another poster pointed out this has an echo effect. If children see single motherhood as normal they are more likely to make decisions that lead to that. If children don't know what a healthy adult romantic relationship looks like, they are less likely to have them. If girls don't have a man at home they are more likely to have low self esteem and engage in risky sexual behavior. Boys are more likely to have self control issues, and once again engage in risky sexual behavior.

It's a complicated problem, but it bothers me that so many seem to toe the party line of "abstinence isn't the answer". Considering how infrequently abstinence is taught in "sex ed" (at least as more than a 'oh yeah, you could also decide not to. That's a cool choice too.') and the problems were getting worse until the last couple years I doubt the problems can be summed up quite so neatly. It would be nice if they could be, because then we could just stop/start doing *that* and everything would be better.