Is San Francisco really that bad?

I simply derived the number... 56 / 8.3K = 6.7
The SF population stats vary, but even assuming poipulation declined to 800K, that computes to murder rate = 7

Sirius Glass said:

Uh, and who is going to Oakland? It is not on my horizon.

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What do you like to photograph? Oakland, Alameda and Treasure Island have some great spots for "last century industrial USA" landscapes.
Similar to this:







Certainly looks different vs old and tired golden gate + victorians! Your SWC will shine. I have been focusing on photographing Oakland since the pandemic started. Had to find something to do every weekend, and got bored of SF.

Which city with the most character assassinations, though?

Surely SF, if one is to count TV talking head references.

Huss said:

Is she nervous? Or does she love living there?

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I'm sure she loves it. Most kids don't worry about things like this.

Here's the homicide rate in the five boroughs of NYC. (right map). So you can see it depends where you are. They did a comparison to dog ownership by locations but I'm not sure if there is one that I notice anyway. I wonder what the crime rate is to residents who own and use film cameras. Now that might be an interesting map comparison.
Map of crimes vs dog ownership
Article https://findingspress.org/article/3...dog-ownership-and-crime-rate-in-new-york-city

Steven Lee said:

I warned you about not citing the FBI in #207. They do not include San Francisco, Oakland, and Los Angeles in their reporting. But looking at the SFPD dashboard, the homicide rate was about 14.5 in 2022 (56 homicides per 815K people). High, but not crazy high. It would have landed within top 25 in the country.

[EDIT] Wrong math: 56 homicides per 815K = 7, thank you @wiltw

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Many crimes if not homicides are under-reported because the cops aren't enforcing or they're just not reporting them because it looks bad for the government and city.

Steven Lee said:

It's like saying that New York and Brooklyn are two different places. Technically true, but in practice it is one giant metro area where people commute in both directions. Places like Piedmont which is a large part of Oakland that eclipses 95% of SF in terms of wealth, safety and in other ways (quality of schools or civic services) is head and shoulders above all of SF.

Here's another anecdote: I know lots of Oaklanders and San Franciscans, and the former tend to have a more favorable view of their city and show less cynicism about the future. It is even noticeable in their respective Yelp/Reddit communities. Check it out.

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Nah.

If you are going to vacation in San Francisco, you are not going to go to Oakland. Unless you deliberately do that.

I have not once visited San Francisco, looked around, and thought - d@mn it I am in Oakland!

So what if people commute? People commute from one place to another all the time. The question here, yet again, is about San Fransico, not Oakland.

I'll make it simple. Here is a map. See that lump on the left that the OP is asking about? That is San Francisco. See that water divide that you need to use the 80 bridge? Once you cross over that you are in Oakland.

San Francisco is not Oakland.

Does anyone else see the horrible irony of an argument about which places have the highest murder rates?

If you want the highest auto traffic accident rate in California, just drive up to Eureka! We are right up there with pedestrians getting whacked, too.

Bad road design coupled with speed (and other drugs). Move out of that town in 2015 once my boys graduated.

In my little town now, you stop to talk to someone in the middle of the street, chat awhile, and eventually say, "Here comes, Bart. Guess we shouldn't block all this traffic. You got all your dogs? See ya!"

The local bar, I live next door.

MattKing said:

Does anyone else see the horrible irony of an argument about which places have the highest murder rates?

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I slow down at accident scenes in the hopes I see death, dismemberment, or at least a little blood. All I want to know is which cities are at the top of the list for murders so I know where to vacation next.

Vaughn said:

If you want the highest auto traffic accident rate in California, just drive up to Eureka! We are right up there with pedestrians getting whacked, too.

Bad road design coupled with speed (and other drugs). Move out of that town in 2015 once my boys graduated.

In my little town now, you stop to talk to someone in the middle of the street, chat awhile, and eventually say, "Here comes, Bart. Guess we shouldn't block all this traffic. You got all your dogs? See ya!"

The local bar, I live next door.

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Blue Lake looks like a nice town. My motorcycle would like heading east from there.

I'm not quite as quick on the film processing as @Steven Lee, but here's one from October 2022. Again, a day trip outing with my family, with a lunch stop in the SoMa district with my school-age kids in tow. We walked a few blocks from our car to the restaurant and nobody felt unsafe at any point in the day. That's Salesforce Tower disappearing into SF's famous fog.

2022.09.20 Roll #318-07458-positive.jpg by dourbalistar, on Flickr

dourbalistar said:

We walked a few blocks from our car to the restaurant and nobody felt unsafe at any point in the day.


2022.09.20 Roll #318-07458-positive.jpg by dourbalistar, on Flickr

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That is because, "The story of crime in San Francisco is one of extremes. Compared with other major U.S. cities, S.F. boasts lower-than-average rates of violent crime, but also suffers from unusually high rates of property crimes, such as theft and burglary."

The title of the thread states the question: "Is San Francisco really that bad?"

Really that would depend on what he did and to whom. Did he have their permission so it was consensual? Even then depending on the standard that one goes by, it still could be bad. Was he drinking or eating to excess? If so that would be bad. But who is to say whether it was really bad? Who is sitting in judgment?

wiltw said:

That is because, "The story of crime in San Francisco is one of extremes. Compared with other major U.S. cities, S.F. boasts lower-than-average rates of violent crime, but also suffers from unusually high rates of property crimes, such as theft and burglary."

https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2022/fixing-san-francisco-problems/crime

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Not arguing with the data - crime happens in every city, big or small. All I'm saying is that it doesn't deter me from visiting SF and taking photos while I'm there. I take sensible precautions like not leaving items in the car, but otherwise just go about my business.

dourbalistar said:

Not arguing with the data - crime happens in every city, big or small. All I'm saying is that it doesn't deter me from visiting SF and taking photos while I'm there. I take sensible precautions like not leaving items in the car, but otherwise just go about my business.

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You don’t mention the real reason you take your kids with you. It’s the same as to why you take them with you camping. You can still run faster than them, so whether it is escaping a murderer or a grizzly, you’re good.

Huss said:

You don’t mention the real reason you take your kids with you. It’s the same as to why you take them with you camping. You can still run faster than them, so whether it is escaping a murderer or a grizzly, you’re good.

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Now that you mention it, I'm going to have to re-think my strategy soon because I'm pretty sure my son is almost faster than me now...

dourbalistar said:

Now that you mention it, I'm going to have to re-think my strategy soon because I'm pretty sure my son is almost faster than me now...

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Time to pop out another kid if you want to keep taking pics in San Fran.

Don't make jokes about the crime rate even around the SF opera house. I had a 72 old co-worker so good at the handball court that he took on young UC jocks, and nearly always won. But one night walking back to where his car was parked, there after a downtown SF event, he was beaten up by a group of young thugs who did it simply for the cruel fun of it, and left nearly dead. He was in the hospital a long time, and never fully recovered.

Likewise, there have been quite a few brutal muggings of the elderly in Oakland Chinatown recently, with some fatalities. Even a former US Senator was mugged in that neighborhood this past year. It's not such a bad area itself, except that it's just a few blocks away from that portion of town which truly is awful. It creeps the heck out of me seeing tourist teenage girls running around naive there, when human traffickers and pimps are, unbeknownst to them, within walking distance! - yet actually patrolling for victims in cars. My wife and I actually witnessed one such abduction ourselves, but yelled loud enough to briefly distract the criminal, and the girl managed pulled herself free from the car. We escorted her back to her irresponsible parents two blocks away. Likewise, portions of Emeryville have a lot of lowlife criminal types hanging around nearby. Gotta keep your eyes open, even during daylight hours, but especially at night.

There are two categories of crime statistics. Those released to the public, and those you have to research for yourself. It's very common for a big shopping center, for example, to work very hard to keep a squeaky clean reputation even when undeserved. Likewise, college campuses. But around a dinner table at the home of a police Detective or Swat officer, it's a whole other story.

Again w the Oakland.

So far reading your posts in this thread you have:

1. Had a warehouse assistant shot dead.
2. Assistant nearly beaten to death
3. Assistant’s friend throat slit
4. Friend who’s house got shot up by gangs
5. Co-worker beaten up after playing handball.

Almost unbelievable!

Huss said:

Nah.

If you are going to vacation in San Francisco, you are not going to go to Oakland. Unless you deliberately do that.

I have not once visited San Francisco, looked around, and thought - d@mn it I am in Oakland!

So what if people commute? People commute from one place to another all the time. The question here, yet again, is about San Fransico, not Oakland.

I'll make it simple. Here is a map. See that lump on the left that the OP is asking about? That is San Francisco. See that water divide that you need to use the 80 bridge? Once you cross over that you are in Oakland.

San Francisco is not Oakland.

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Huss, with respect, you're missing the point. To ask "Is SF That Bad?" invites comparisons. As bad as what? Oakland? Noo Yawk?
And Drew's list of crimes is entirely believable to me. I grew up there and I got the heck out as soon as I could.
What I loved about living in Arcata, my wife could go on a walk at night, and not even think about crime. I wonder if the proliferation of mega-pot farms in the Bottoms has changed that.

takilmaboxer said:

..
And Drew's list of crimes is entirely believable to me. I grew up there and I got the heck out as soon as I could.
..

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Grew up where?

My problem is actually how some people so casually made fun of being "murder" - I guess they thought by not saying "murdered", they are like the Bevis and Butthead "hur hur, ha ha, I was murder, hur"

Well, I think this series makes appropriate fun of the concept:

Looks like a fun series. But I don't have Hulu.