It may be technically true that such policies as urban "camping bans" do not constitute the "criminalization of homelessness." What these policies criminalize are people's efforts to substantially alleviate their homelessness. And since people who are homeless are going to be inclined to make such efforts, these policies should perhaps be described as criminalizing the homeless, rather than criminalizing homelessness.
Homelessness, in fact, continues to be a key structural component of the political-economic regime that generates, and is maintained by, these policies. We should recognize that prohibitions on the erection of structures amount to the *manufacture* of homelessness. By manufacturing homelessness, power structures wield the threat of complete destitution in order to induce us to serve them.
Some may feel that this arrangement is necessary in order to keep civilization from descending into utter chaos and ruin, but we can at least make this assumption more conscious and explicit, and then examine whether other arrangements, perhaps involving less bureaucracy and less brutality, could as effectively, or more effectively, provide for our security, health, and flourishing. It's obvious that certain agendas are served when the current arrangement is characterized as necessary, and that these agendas have exerted outsized influence over our discourse. So plotting an optimal course may require some deep critical thinking. And when we dig into these questions in connection with the full range of world issues that confront us, we may conclude that it's the status quo power structures themselves that pose the greater risk of precipitating a (further) slide into planetary catastrophe.
I think all of this can, and preferably would, be expressed not in any kind of judgmental way, but rather in a way that reflects deep understanding of the impulses and factors behind the criminalization policies. Within the current civilizational context in which we coexist, these criminalizations readily emerge. They're often presented as ways of addressing very real, and highly visible, ills and depravities. We do have some people (both homeless and otherwise) who have deteriorated to such a degree that emergency intervention is warranted for their own well-being and that of others. There's often been a strong reflexive tendency to attribute such problems to excessive leniency or permissiveness, but this kind of analysis lacks context. Our societies have included varying sorts of mutual assistance and tolerance, but they've also included a hierarchical superstructure that consistently neutralizes all but most rudimentary attempts to build a decent life outside the hierarchy. (In 2017, I managed to secure a place to live in a self-organized urban homesteading village. I lived there for four years and it was of incalculable value, but such opportunities have been extreme exceptions, almost unheard of anywhere in the world.)
A new kind or degree of civilization seems important in this potentially burgeoning metaversal era. More refined ethical standards may be important in order to successfully assimilate such powerful new technology. Moving beyond the suppression of solutions for homelessness, beyond the use of the threat of homelessness as a way to keep us in line, could be a key step.
