Media use of the term “transient” — when and why
By Anna Daniels
The local news recently carried two short articles about stabbings that had taken place. The headline of one article identified a woman as the victim while the other identified the victim as a transient.
Why did 10News choose to use gender in one description and the victim’s lack of housing in the other, instead of using a gender description in both? Does this journalistic decision matter?
Man or Transient?
Here’s a short exercise. What are your immediate thoughts when you read the following:
- Woman stabbed
- Man stabbed
- Point Loma resident stabbed
- Child stabbed
- Transient stabbed
- Gang member stabbed
- City Heights resident stabbed
- Tourist stabbed
Which of these descriptors engender feelings of concern and empathy for an individual who is a victim?
Which corroborate negative feelings about a whole group of people?
And in a world in which media live and die by page hits, which one of these descriptions motivates you to click on the headline and read the whole article?
The use of the term “transient” strips the individual of his and her basic humanity and too easily validates perceptions of homeless people as sub-human, depraved criminals even when they are the victim of a crime. If you doubt that, here are a few of the choice comments left on the article.
Other states buy one-way bus tickets for them to come here. We are chumps.
Not to mention all the garbage and filth they leave and the brush fires they start
Christine Schanes, attorney and longtime advocate for homeless people addresses the use of the term in Homeless Myth #7: “Oh, No! A Transient!”.
Some housed people use the term “transient” to ridicule homeless people. They use that term to mean a person who is an untouchable, an undesirable, often a lazy, possibly a bad person who is not a member of their community, but only staying in their community to utilize the available services and then the homeless person will be on their way.
However, the majority of homeless people in a certain place may not have come from somewhere else, nor do they intend to go anywhere else — so they can hardly be called, “transients” under any definition.
Why aren’t tourists called transients?
She goes on to raise the issue of the term “transient” in the context of Transient Occupancy Taxes (TOT).
A question comes to mind: if there is a “transient” occupancy tax upon persons, unless exempt, who rent hotel/motel rooms, does this, by definition, make these people, “transients?”
San Diego Free Press is made up of citizen journalists, although a few of us have a professional background in journalism. As editors we take the time to research the norms and standards of journalism and learn a great deal from that.
As editors of a progressive site we are also tasked with bringing critiques of the media forward. Two people were stabbed in two separate incidents in Mission Valley. One of the victims was a man, the other a woman. One stabbing took place in an encampment of homeless individuals, the other on a street.
Descriptors should be used thoughtfully and provide pertinent context. Otherwise they subtly and dangerously project judgments that slant our perceptions of whose lives matter.
Anna Daniels
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I also hate the term “transient”. This is the term used when the medical examiner’s office in San Diego used when informing me of my brother’s death. Yes, he was homeless, but he was not transient. Christine Shanes, whom I have met, is correct. I hate when people try to put “nice” titles on tragic human situations. I wish I could have helped or saved my brother, but I could not. I do not know the answers but we do need better vocabulary to discuss these issues.
Laura, I am sorry to hear about your experience with the County medical examiner officer. The use of the word transient conveys more about our own callousness and indifference than meaningful information about our fellow human beings. Your brother deserved better.
The 110 page proposal by the Chargers for their “Convadium” uses the word “transient” repeatedly to refer to all those suckers that we’re going to tax so that the Chargers can have their new stadium. However, they have no plans whatsoever for the homeless people that already camp out in that area.
Words mean what we mean them to mean. The tourism industry long ago learned that even the words tourism and tourist can seem cold and somehow troubling. It’s “hospitality industry” now, and those being, uhh, er… hospitalized (?) should be called “visitors,” making us “America’s Most Visited City.”
Calling homeless San Diegans “transients” perfectly reveals their mindset.
The homeless are not residents of San Diego in the eyes of the city and county governments and non-governmental organizations, therefore, they have no “civic” obligation or duty to provide aid to them.
Tourists are “guests.”
Anna and others who are posting comments – Thank you for describing something I saw clearly when the Mayor released his proposed budget this spring, full of not-so-subtle indications of how his staff views people who are struggling with homelessness.
Here is one item I found especially troubling in the recently approved 2017 budget overview on page 33 (** added for emphasis)) :
“Citywide Solid Waste Code Enforcement Program
“Personnel and non-personnel expenditures associated with the Citywide **Solid Waste** Code Enforcement Program was transferred to the General Fund as part of the Zero Waste Plan.
“This Citywide program includes 18.00 FTE positions and provides **transient camp** inspections and abatements; illegal dumping and **scavenging** enforcements; hazardous waste investigations and violations.”
The recent “sweeps” downtown before the All-Star Game & ComicCon are apparently part of this “Zero Waste Plan.” And “scavenging” is one way people living on the streets raise money via recycling bottles etc.
So: people’s belongings are considered “waste” to be hauled away, the places they are struggling to survive are “transient camps” and collecting recyclables- one way people who are homeless make money- is being more aggressively discouraged. The net result: people who already have lost their homes are also losing the last of their possessions and a source of a meager income.
Yes- language matters. And as always: follow the money.
“All transferred to the general fund.”
It should be the city motto.
What about recycling, re-use, and reduce by doing these? Zero waste means make use of all things. Sadly are Re-elected mayor is the first who should go and we should RE-USE a former Assembly member who knows how to deal with State & Federal bureaucrats. And probably has dealt with quiet a few County bureaucrats too!
Once again, we get what the powerful & rich want, and once again we the lower income get to pay for it and all its ugly little consequences.
“If you can’t bully them around then you have no idea how to be a Strong Mayor!” -K.F. Unless it happens to hurt you or your wifes’ personal paycheck. What’s her name…Mrs. Faulconer?
Sadly, media will never dig into the legal mess.