When did America’s public libraries become homeless encampments?

What happened to libraries?

No, I’m not talking about school libraries being turned into propaganda factories, shelving what amounts to textual pornography for middle school students, all justified under the guise of “inclusivity.” That’s a discussion for another time.

One December, as my wife left the library, a homeless man spit across the stairs onto the back of her dress. She turned around to find him quite satisfied with himself.

I am talking about the fact that across the United States, a tragic number of public libraries have turned into daytime homeless shelters and temporary asylums for the mentally ill, the insane, and generally disturbed.

Furious George

Go to any public library in any big city, and you will see a security guard slowly patrolling the quiet floor. Every once in a while he wakes up a bum up who’s sleeping on a bench behind the periodicals.

“No sleeping,” he mumbles as he nudges the drowsy man. Unkempt and disturbed homeless men in their 50s hunch over the computers while mothers pull their 3-year-olds close, hurrying past on their way to the children’s section.

Hanging around, right inside the lobby in the winter, the insane argue as a fight is about to break out. You walk by, head lowered, hoping to get inside without attracting any attention.

Great expectorations

Years ago my wife and I lived in Milwaukee. The library there was like any city’s library. A big, beautiful building right downtown full of books — and vagrants. So many of these old city libraries are so structurally stunning, and there is something darkly poetic in this. These grand buildings, built at a different time, a higher time, now lower than ever.

The bricks are the same, but their purpose has been degraded. One December, as my wife was leaving, a homeless man spit across the stairs onto the back of her dress. She turned around to find him quite satisfied with himself. This is the current state of these once-great testaments to literacy.

There may be no greater metaphor for our collapsing society than the demise of the library. Before everyone had money to buy the books they want, the library was a lifeline. Before the internet and before everyone had a telephone in their homes, the library was an oasis of knowledge. In the desert of the new world, the library was a miraculous thing. It was a symbol of civilization itself.

Goodnight, literacy

Today, however, people don’t read. They can, I think. But they don’t, that’s for sure.

They watch TikTok and rot their brains consuming gutter slop content. The majority of the population no longer desire the library like they once did. They, of course, still need the library, but they don’t want the library. This is another part of the story that is the demise of the library. The people are degenerating.

Of course, some people still read. I read, you read, we all read here. What are you doing right now, after all? But many of us buy our books. Personally, I end up buying books so I can support the author and own the book myself.

Often the books that I end up buying are a little off the beaten path, so they won’t be found in the library. Though I do use the library for a host of more general research purposes. Nevertheless, I know I am not the norm and neither are you. People don’t read.

Do people refrain from reading because of the homeless in the library? Probably not. People don’t read because people are getting dumber and their attention spans are fried.

Crime and… crime

But there is a certain percentage of people who visit the library less because of the general anarcho-tyranny of the situation inside. My wife stopped visiting the library after she got spit on. I stopped after being worn down by the generally depressing scene of disheveled men sleeping next to the nonfiction.

The homeless invasion of the library is a tragic example of a society that no longer has the will to keep order as it ought to be kept. The reason vagrants populate the library is the same reason cities tolerate shoplifting and general disorder. The institutions responsible for keeping order and maintaining a decent public space are too cowardly to do so. They sacrifice the rights of the upstanding citizen for the sake of the dysfunctional and disturbed.

You might think that this all sounds too harsh. One might protest, “Homeless people have a right to be at the library too!” Well, to a degree, they do. But vagrancy is a thing, and we all know what it is.

A farewell to harms

There was a time when our public spaces were kept more orderly. When those disturbing the peace were told to move along and if they didn’t go on their own, they were made to go. The homeless have rights, but so does everyone else. Public spaces deserve to be orderly, and if our government and institutions can’t ensure that, then they are failing.

There is a bigger question running like a thread through all this. Is it humane to turn the insane loose on the streets? For a while people were institutionalized; that was our solution. But then we stopped, and for the past few decades or so we’ve thought the best option was letting people go free, even if they end up harming themselves or others.

Which way is the right way? That’s a big question. I don’t know what the exact answer is. I’m not sure there’s a solution that makes us all feel good. But what I do know is that the scene of mentally ill homeless people disturbing everyone else and turning the public library into a homeless shelter is an acute example of societal dysfunction and degeneration.

There is something dark, depressing, and poignant about the scene of the city library today. This place where people used to learn before they fried their brains is now a homeless shelter.