Here is an example of what is really happening in Mid market with all the new businesses moving into the area as a result of the mayor’s tax incentives. You’re simply having more young tech workers coming into close contact with hard core junkies
The scene is on Stevenson between 6th and 7th
The guy in the hoodie on the sidewalk is acting very erratically, jerking back and forth and he is headed to the right, across the alley to where five more people are gathered on the sidewalk and doing some dope between parked cars
The two guys on the left are watching all this directly in front of them. They were having a conversation until the dope came out and now they’ve stopped talking and a just staring because they can’t believe this is going on right in front of them, out in the open, in broad daylight
and there it is, the Mid Market Twenty Yard Stare
The twenty yard stare is a variant of the classic 1000 yard stare which came out of World War II and Vietnam and refers to shell shocked soldiers who witnessed too many war atrocities. The twenty yard stare is similar and often happens to young college students recruited by non profits to work with these same hard core San Francisco street people /drug addicts. These young recruits often last less than five years at these non profits, such as Tenderloin Housing Clinic before developing these symptoms and have to move on to a more normal life
New tech workers in the mid market area of San Francisco can expect this. If they stay longer than five years, the ‘twenty yard stare’ could become permanent
