FSTDT Forums
Community => Society and History => Topic started by: Askold on April 25, 2015, 12:29:24 am
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http://www.rawstory.com/2015/04/texas-woman-invokes-religious-freedom-argument-to-fight-2000-fine-for-feeding-the-homeless/
A woman claims that she has been feeding homeless people at the local park since 2005 but this was the first time she has been ticketed for it. She is fighting the 2000$ fines by claiming that the Religious freedom act gives her the right to violate the law because helping those in need is part of her religion.
Despite the stereotypes about USA, I doubt that Texas has laws against giving any aid to homeless, but it appears that the problem is that she didn't have an official food truck or something and she was giving out the food from her own car. Maybe there are simply some regulations in place to ensure peoples safety or something? Anyway, this may be one of the few good uses for Religious freedom act in a while.
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I don't know why, but the fact it was bike cops made me laugh.
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I wouldn't honestly be surprised if Texas had laws against feeding the homeless, though I can't be bothered to check at this time of night. I mean, in Hawaii it's apparently legal to destroy their property with a sledgehammer, and Texas is far more to the right than Hawaii is.
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Sorry, Askold, but no. It has nothing to do with food safety in the slightest. There are several states where its outright illegal to feed the homeless. I think the only way around it is by getting a special permit and running a soup kitchen (or something along those lines), which even then, would likely be very difficult to acquire since you're helping icky homeless people not starve to death. The homeless aren't seen as unfortunate people who are already suffering enough, they're seen as tarnish on a city's (or state's) glistening facade. They make them look bad, so they try to hide them away and/or kill them instead of helping them, ya know, not be homeless by giving them a place to stay.
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I wish people would stop confusing "war on poverty" with "war on the poor".