San Francisco: A City of Very Many “Contrasts”

Rhetorical Analysis of the New York Times article, “San Francisco, Rich and Poor, Turns to Simple Street Solutions that Underscore the City’s Complexities”

In the article, “San Francisco, Rich and Poor, Turns to Simple Street Solutions that Underscore the City’s Complexities,” published in 2018 on The Washington Post, Scott Wilson describes San Francisco as “among the most exciting and puzzling in the nation.” As a senior national correspondent for The Washington Post who has been covering California and the West, Wilson emphasizes that the city has generated a lot of wealth from tech industry but seems to be at a loss when it comes to handling its social problems. In the article, Wilson uses the words, “eccentric” and “contradictory” to describe San Francisco Mayor London Breed’s policies, including the city’s decision to freely distribute plastic caps of needle holders to heroin addicts on streets while banning plastic drinking straws to prevent pollution. By using irony, oxymoron, and juxtaposition, the author effectively shows the contrast between Mayor Breed’s confident but unsuccessful approach to dealing with homelessness.

To start, Wilson familiarizes the audience with San Francisco by introducing streets of San Francisco as “hilly, curvy, cinematic” and at the same time, “a bleak showcase for the mentally ill and economically displaced” because of the expansion of tech industry and how it created socio-economic inequality. The author further raises a question whether the city is effectively spending its “quarter-billion dollars a year” on homelessness by introducing San Francisco Mayor London Breed and her priorities.

What does the author suggest through the title?

Wilson’s use of contrast in the title evokes a sense of irony, thereby questioning Mayor Breed’s insufficient governing polices. According to Oxford Dictionaries, irony is defined as “the expression of one’s meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect.” The title of the article is “San Francisco, Rich and Poor, Turns to Simple Street Solutions that Underscore the City’s Complexities” and since “simple” and “complexities” are opposite in meanings, the audience can sense the author’s ironic tone from the start.  The author uses this strategy to insinuate that the city’s simple approach may not be enough in dealing with its complicated social problems. The author successfully uses irony in the title to appeal to readers’ logic by setting the tone of sarcasm, catch readers’ attention, and encourage curiosity in finding out the city’s insufficient measures.

What does the author suggest through the introduction ?

Wilson’s use of contrast in the introduction evokes another irony to highlight Mayor Breed’s impractical measures. According to Oxford Dictionaries, irony is also defined as “a state of affairs or an event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects and is often amusing as a result.” He mentions that people can see piles of “sterile plastic caps to hypodermic needles,”on streets, which are freely distributed by the City to heroin addicts on streets.  At the same time, Wilson mentions that the city previously banned drinking straws to prevent plastics from being washed into San Francisco Bay and cause pollution. This contrast amuses the audience because it prompts them to wonder why the city banned one plastic and not the other.  The author employs a mocking tone because the city’s measures are contradictory. He successfully appeals to the audience’s intellect, allowing them to draw their own conclusion on this ironic situation.

What is San Francisco Mayor London Breed’s approach to homelessness

The author also uses another contrast, oxymoron, in his attempt to describe Mayor Breed’s incompetent approach to homelessness. Wilson challenges Mayor’s “get the simple things done quickly” approach by stating an oxymoron, “simple and hugely complex.” This is to say that the author casts a doubt on Mayor’s “simple” approach, which is to make the streets very clean and offer housing to homeless people at the same time.

Further, Wilson describes Mayor’s “get the simple things done quickly” as her attempts to employ “poop patrols” to clean feces off the streets and building safe injection sites so the city can temporarily hide heroin addicts off the streets. The author then introduces a quote from a volunteer for a nonprofit organization, who states that the shelters are still full in the city. By contrasting Mayor’s priorities and the volunteer worker’s quote, the author successfully implies cynicism and convinces readers that “poop patrols” and “safe injection sites” are not practical answers to alleviating homelessness. The complexity of this reality is reflected in this contrast. Thus, going back to the author’s oxymoron, “simple and hugely complex,” the author effectively raises a concern whether keeping the aesthetic of streets are more important than proving safe places for homeless people.

Why is Market street so bizarre ?

Wilson’s use of juxtaposition to describe Market Street is effective in raising a question about Mayor’s measures.  Oxford Dictionaries defines juxtaposition as “the fact of two things being seen or placed close together with contrasting effect.” Wilson describes a line separating Market Street from glamorous parts to its not so glamorous southern parts. The glamorous part includes offices of Twitter, SF Fitness with its fancy glass doored spinning classes and lunch trucks that serve tuna poke and tacos to tech workers. He also describes that next to such scenery, passersby can see “an open-air heroin shooting gallery” where homeless people shoot up on streets. Through the use of juxtaposition, the author attempts to appeal to the audience’s sympathy. The powerful imagery of Market street, which depicts the rich and the poor, is an effective way to let the audience question the city’s measures because such scenery shows that the city is not spending its budget on homelessness wisely.

What are some of the testimonies?

The author presents and contrasts four quotes to build his argument that Mayor’s governing policies are inefficient.  The author first establishes credibility by citing Mayor Breed and uses her quotes to question whether her approach to homelessness is ethical or not. The author quotes Mayor, “I want people to walk around this city and think ‘wow it’s so clean here’” The author believes that Mayor’s “down-and-very-dirty approach” to addressing homelessness as part of her “legacy” is reflected in how she employs “poop patrol” to clean feces and implement safe injection sites to those heroin addicts on streets. 

The author further establishes credibility by introducing a quote by Jeffrey Ouyang, a worker for the tech start-up Zumper, a real estate search site. Witnessing a sharp increase in housing costs, Jeffrey quotes, “You begin to wonder about all the tax dollars and whether they are spent in the right way… Poverty and homelessness have gotten progressively worse despite the city’s rising tax. You begin to think about impact and whether we have any of it right.” By introducing this quote, the author successfully hints Mayor’s incompetent measures because the source is from a tech worker who actually walks the streets and wonder why poverty and homelessness is getting worse despite the city’s huge spending on homelessness.

Wilson also establishes his credibility by introducing Jessica Doing, a nonprofit worker for an organization that connects homeless people with their families.  Jessica laments that people are willing to help homeless people but they do not know where to start or what to do. The author quotes Jessica, “What I see is that people are compassionate, but they don’t know what to do. And they don’t want to look in the eye without some kind of solution.” The quote suggests that a credible source has witnessed lack of organizations nor leadership from the city to solve the problems and that city may need to take more time to build these organizations.

Lastly, the author further establishes his credibility and strengthens his argument by quoting Regina Pina, the office manager at Zumper. Regina commutes to San Francisco from Tracy and is surprised to see homelessness. The author quotes Regina, “And it makes me anxious. But the shelters are full, and I don’t see that many other organizations out here.” The author uses this quote to convince readers that at the end of the day, despite the city’s effort to make the streets clean, the core problem of giving safe places for homeless people is not addressed at all.

The author compares all of these four quotes to confront Mayor’s measures in addressing homelessness. Through the use of comparison, the author demonstrates that Mayor’s “Poop patrol” and “safe injection sites” are not effective because despite the city’s huge spending on tax for homelessness, poverty is getting worse on streets, volunteers do not know what to do or where to start and shelters are still full.  Using various credible sources, the author successfully persuades readers to take on his viewpoint.

Conclusion

Ultimately , through a series of contrast, Scott Wilson eloquently conveys Mayor Breed’s incompetent approach to dealing with homelessness. The author ends the article with a quote from Regina, “And it makes me anxious. But the shelters are full, and I don’t see that many other organizations out here.” The author clearly implies that the current situation seems discouraging because of the complex nature of homelessness and promising solutions seem still up in the air.

Works Cited

Wilson, Scott. “San Francisco, Rich and Poor, Turns to Simple Street Solutions that Underscore  the City’s Complexities.” The Washington Post, 3 September 2018. Accessed 30 Jan 2019.

“irony.” en.oxforddictionaries.com. 2019. Oxford Dictionaries, 2019. Accessed 27 Feb 2019.

“juxtaposition.” en.oxforddictionaries.com. Oxford Dictionaries, 2019. Accessed 27 Feb 2019.