From the San Francisco Gate:

‘Am I in the bad part of town?’ Tourists shocked by what they see on San Francisco streets

It’s something many San Franciscans see on a daily basis, outside their homes or offices and during their commutes. For better or for worse, locals are used to walking by crime scenes, have seen open injection drug use, and have witnessed mental health episodes firsthand.

But when a tourist lands at SFO, guidebook in hand, that reality can be shocking.

“Is this normal or am I in a ‘bad part of town?’ Just walked past numerous homeless off their faces, screaming and running all over the sidewalk near Twitter HQ and then a murder scene. Wife is scared to leave hotel now,” wrote an Australian Reddit user Wednesday.

Some tourist from England posted this about San Francisco on Reddit.

Recently I was in SF (stayed near Union Square) for a couple of days, and I’ve been there for a few days 4 years before that. It was an easier starting/stop off point for 2 road trips. Anyway. I honestly thought it was hell on earth.  I’d been there for probably less than a day, just wandering around the center, and already seen more than enough poverty and suffering to cause me wanting to leave desperately. 

But what was more shocking to me was the amount of homeless people and beggars, and clearly VERY mentally unstable ones at that, who wondered the streets freely. I saw many people talking to themselves, or to things that weren’t there. Even in a Macy’s, and there weren’t any police officers to help them or do anything avout it. There was a man who stood in the middle of a busy street, pulled his trousers down, and began scratching/scrubbing his clearly diseased legs. A man stood by the side of the street wearing a bright orange sleeping bag zipped up to his neck with the hood on like some kind of low budget Doctor Who alien, and a woman was begging on the street with her two CHILDREN. No police in sight.

A Canadian tourist said this.

I’ve wanted to visit SF my entire life and I finally make it here and my goddddd it’s terrifying. Anyone have any advice for a tourist aside from “don’t be such a pussy.”

San Francisco sucks, I’ve documented this before.  There is human shit and needles on the street.  Homeless everywhere.

If you park a car on a San Francisco city street, it will be broken into.

All of this lead to this story in the San Francisco Chronicle.

SF tourist industry struggles to explain street misery to horrified visitors

As president of the Handlery Union Square Hotel, part of Jon Handlery’s job is to scour travel websites to find out what tourists are telling one another about his hotel and San Francisco.

He tries to respond, thanking his customers for their patronage and acknowledging their gripes. But he’s stopped even trying to explain the No. 1 complaint: the city’s miserable street scene that’s made all the more stark against the backdrop of so much wealth and luxury.

Tiffany’s and tents. Neiman Marcus and needles. Macy’s and mental illness.

Yeah, it’s a lot of the same stuff we’ve heard elsewhere.

Then came this gem, that really explains so much of the problem.

You may ask, “Who cares what some dad from a flyover state or some businessman from another country thinks of us?”

That right there.

Why should the locals of San Francisco care about a problem them have trained themselves to ignore when the people who are frightened and disgusted are just a bunch of uncultured, knuckle dragging, flyover country rubes.  I bet they even wear Crocs and cargo shorts.

Who gives a fuck what some Dad from Nebraska thinks of San Francisco.  If Omaha is so awesome why isn’t Facebook and Google there?  Fuck him and his clean streets and non-homeless in Old Market.  We’re better than him.

Any tiny bid of sympathy I’ve had for San Francisco is gone.  Let the “big one” hit.  Hopefully it will be some sort of epic Wrath of Poseidon and Sodom and Gomorrah crossover and the tidal wave that takes out the city will wash all the filth into the sea.

In Florida, one of the chief rules of the state is “don’t offend the tourists.”  It’s right up there with “you don’t mess with the Mouse.”  You will never hear a representative of Florida say “who cares what those hicks from Iowa think about Orlando, we like it this way.”  If they do, they won’t be representing Florida for very long.  Even Florida liberals stayed away from the “don’t visit the Gunshine state” anti tourism activism.

If you are so contemptuous of normal, Middle Americans that you can’t even consider their opinions when they say “your city scares us,” then to hell with you.