Making Suffering Invisible
David Teague
This isn’t just bad policy—it’s the first real step toward American fascism.
The White House just ended harm reduction, shut down housing-first models, and greenlit the institutionalization of homeless people, addicts, and mental health patients.
Let’s call this what it really is:
State-sponsored erasure of the vulnerable.
They’re not solving anything.
They’re disappearing the evidence of their own failure.
If you can’t see the danger in this, it’s time to wake the hell up.
Harm reduction saves lives.
Portugal decriminalized drug use and saw massive drops in overdoses, HIV, and crime.
Canada’s Insite program has seen zero overdose deaths on-site.
Safe consumption sites work—because they’re rooted in compassion and reality.
Housing First works.
Utah’s program proved it: over 90% of people remained housed, and the state saved money compared to criminalizing poverty.
It costs less to help than it does to punish.
But now? They’ve abandoned that logic.
Why?
Because this isn’t about public safety.
It’s about feeding the private prison industry.
It’s about turning homelessness into profit.
It’s about punishing addiction instead of treating it.
It’s about criminalizing mental illness because it’s cheaper to lock someone away than to actually care for them.
This is not reform.
This is a coordinated shift into modernized eugenics—cleansing the streets of the “undesirable,” then rewriting the law to say it was for “safety.”
If you know history, you know exactly where this leads.
Once a nation decides that poverty is criminal, that addiction is immoral, and that mental illness is a threat—it starts building the walls for everyone else.
You think they’ll stop at the tent cities?
They won’t.
Because once the streets are “clean,” it’s already too late.
This is how fascism always begins:
Make suffering invisible.
Make non-conformity illegal.
Build prisons instead of policies.
Redefine morality to mean obedience.
Call it “order.”
And if you dare dissent? You’re next.
I’m saying this as someone who’s lived it.
As someone who’s walked the streets, seen harm reduction save lives, and watched housing-first actually work.
This isn’t abstract to me. This is personal.
So no—I won’t stay silent.
And neither should you.
Because if we don’t push back now, we’re going to wake up in a country where just surviving outside the system is a crime.
This isn’t about cleaning up crime.
It’s about cleansing the inconvenient.
And once that happens…
There’s no one left to protect you.
Author’s statement:
I'm David Teague. I come from the streets of California — not as some outsider looking in, but as someone who’s lived the weight of this system firsthand. I’ve been walking the line between survival and resistance for a long time. Most of what I speak isn’t theory — it’s what I’ve seen, what I’ve felt, and what I know deep down others are feeling too.
I’m not backed by some institution. I’m not speaking from a podium. I’m speaking from sidewalks, encampments, street corners, and solidarity circles. The way I write comes from the people around me — the ones who don’t usually get heard. And all I’ve ever wanted is to make sure those voices never get silenced again.
I speak for those they ignore. I write because our voices echo louder when they're not filtered. I’ve seen firsthand how systems are weaponized against the people — and now I use every tool I have to return that fire with truth.
I stand with the people — all people — who are done begging for crumbs while billionaires feast. If you want clean words and soft lies, look elsewhere. I’m not here to pacify. I’m here to remind you that we are many, and they are few — and that the fire of resistance is already burning.
You want credentials? I’ve got scars.
