A viewer writes: “California apparently is planning to make homelessness a crime. If this becomes the norm, you lose your job, you lose everything. Plus, if you’re interned in a camp and you can’t leave, how do you find a job? And if everything was taken from you and sold to pay for your internment, your car, etc., how can you ever recover? What is behind this? Is this leading to concentration camps being made a reality in the United States?”

This indeed is the game being played here, to plant this idea within the state officials as a potential answer to the problem of the homeless, and is in keeping with their general philosophy that government knows best, that they can be the ultimate nanny by being the would-be caretaker of the homeless, to put them under the wing of the government agencies and their minions, assuming they will be better off and all will go swimmingly, when the reality will prove otherwise. Many of these individuals are deeply troubled. Many of them are hardcore drug addicts who will not change their ways simply with a change of venue in where they might be housed. Many will prove to be incorrigible and will force the issue concerning potential incarceration. In effect, any attempt to house and guide, however meaningfully, such troubled people will cause them to rebel at being confined or maneuvered in any way of this sort, and they will chafe under the constraint and resist it, even to the extent of committing violence in some cases. It is very likely that this will not proceed at this time because it will be seen as being unconstitutional with the restriction of liberty of the citizens affected, ultimately dooming the legislation to its withdrawal. That is not to say things won’t change in the future and out of desperation create a bending of the rules to fit the circumstances of the moment, to get things under better control in ways of interest to the government. After all, it is the government that holds the power and ultimately, corruption develops under such circumstances. Human welfare should not be trusted to a government agency. It is that simple. It is inviting harm to come to individuals, because such agencies are ill-equipped to carry out humanitarian functions. The bureaucratic mind is not a good nurse or guardian, so there will be a perception of insensitivity and dehumanization experienced by the recipients of the state largesse, seeking to provide a better environment to save the homeless from themselves, in effect, when in actuality, they will be robbing the individuals of their individuality, their free agency and free will to some extent. This will never go well. It may suit some individuals but will draw the ire of many others and will likely backfire. There is a potential for large-scale internment, depending on the numbers of people who would qualify to be in such a facility. As these numbers grow, which is certain to happen given the failings of human institutions as a whole, the likelihood of greater crime and particularly, the ravages of more and more drug use with legalization of cannabis, there will be a burgeoning population of troubled people who will not be able to provide for their own welfare. So this is a disaster in the making. The state is simply not equipped to take care of such people effectively. So there will be many inequities, many individual acts of wrongdoing, missed opportunities, and traumas inflicted on the downtrodden. This has happened over and over again through human history, and will not likely change.