My building was recently broken into. Among the things stolen were a few bikes – including my own – and some sound equipment. As I went through my week, a few people asked about it and I mentioned it to a few friends and family members. When I told them about it, I was frequently met with a term that I hadn’t encountered until I moved to California – transient. Person after person immediately blamed the theft on “transients” with self-assured disgust.

The first time I heard someone refer to the homeless as transients, it felt hateful, like a slur. As I have become more established in California, I hear the term more often: supposedly synonymous with homeless. Even amongst police or the experts we have encountered through this course on homelessness, it seems to be part of the vernacular. Still, something about it strikes me wrong. Transient. It feels dehumanizing. If the word grants them any humanity, it seems to mark the homeless as other, therefore none of my concern so long as they leave or are invisible. Alternatively, it might say they’re other and dangerous.

Regardless of what “transient” means, many of these people, with no context, were sure that the homeless were the criminals responsible. In the 70’s and especially into the 90’s, our society seemed to lay the blame of homeless on the individual, but what created the image of these people as criminals?

Of course, the security footage showed three men leaving in their car and I have no way of knowing if they were homeless or not. I’m not even trying to argue that this idea of the homeless, or apparently transients, isn’t rooted in some amount of truth. I’m simply interested in understanding where this image of thievery and violence came from.