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Bloomberg: Coke-Selling Beggars & Punch-Ups Plague Dublin

  • 24-10-2014 1:20pm
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 138 ✭✭


    Bit surprised at this, especially since the writer lives in dublin and ought to have some concern over exaggerating the problem.

    http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-23/coke-selling-beggars-and-punch-ups-plague-downtown-dublin.html
    Dublin, which declares itself the “City of a Thousand Welcomes,” is baring more of its ugly side. Behind the recovering prosperity in a nation rocked by a five-year financial crisis, aggressive begging, drug dealing and violence can lend the Irish capital an air of menace.
    i know it's an irritation but all capitals have blackspots. "Plague" really??


«1

Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,652 ✭✭✭I am pie


    Punch ups!

    Knuckle Duels!

    Boozy Brawlers!

    Tis a plague...a plague i tells ya.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,472 ✭✭✭✭Grayson


    he's not that wrong. the number of beggars who accost you is stupid. And it's not unusual to see a bust up in temple bar.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 34,809 ✭✭✭✭smash


    There's beggars selling coke now?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 43,028 ✭✭✭✭SEPT 23 1989


    Bloomberg:a station mainly watched by coked up,money worshipping psychopaths


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 11,835 ✭✭✭✭cloud493


    Fairly sure this should be moved to the Dublin forum, its a fairly boring topic at this point anyway.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 397 ✭✭Areyouwell


    Bloomberg:a station mainly watched by coked up,money worshipping psychopaths

    The very types who helped put the world economy on it's knees back in 2008.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 138 ✭✭WILL NEVER LOG OFF


    Grayson wrote: »
    he's not that wrong. the number of beggars who accost you is stupid.
    i've never been accosted in dublin.

    to me, accosting suggests confrontation as opposed to some fella saying "any change luv?" or that british man on clarendon street saying "buy the big issue please"

    now i'm not particularly intimidating-looking so although it definitely happens some people, i'm guessing confrontation is not quite a plague


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,944 ✭✭✭fedor.2.


    Sorry now, Dublin City centre is an absolute kip. It's like an episode of the walking dead, with all those junkies around, and that scummy,nasally and guttural accent is horrendous.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,802 ✭✭✭✭suicide_circus


    I live in dub city centre and walk around it all the time. I am asked for money almost daily but it's rarely aggressive. What tourists and visitors probably find off putting are the many strung out or tweaked out individuals roaming around areas like o'connell st, christchurch, grafton st, georges st, dame st...pretty much anywhere a tourist might be.
    Obviously every capital will have addicts but few have them concentrated around the main tourist attractions and also allow them to deal, shoot up, piss and shiit and cause general mayhem with complete impunity.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 588 ✭✭✭cometogether


    Dublin is not that bad. Some people need to relax


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,248 ✭✭✭✭BoJack Horseman


    smash wrote: »
    There's beggars selling coke now?

    When they cross another beggar selling Pepsi, the fighting starts.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,248 ✭✭✭✭BoJack Horseman


    As an occasional city centre user, yes, Dublin had indeed a slight air of menace about it.

    Locals may become immune over time, but for non-regulars it is apparent & disheartening how Dublin has receded.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,381 ✭✭✭Yurt2


    The corner of Westmorland St. and Aston Quay opposite O'Connell bridge without fail has people dealing, being arrested for dealing or shoplifting or just junkies bush drinking and asking people for fags. Without fail, there's always hassle there when I pass. Complete magnet for anti-social behaviour and absolute embarrassment.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 23,495 ✭✭✭✭Billy86


    From the article: A gap-toothed man with a beard approaches, asking for cash. Turned down, he offers the drinkers cocaine.

    Excuse me a moment, my bullsh*t detector just exploded.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 954 ✭✭✭Highflyer13


    People need to take their heads out of the sand. There is a serious drug and begging problem in Dublin City Centre. Every day I walk from Harcourt Street to Parnell Square. I know what i am talking about. Whilst most are not very threatening, they create a menacing atmosphere. We have a great city here in Dublin but it could be so much better. Recently I am seeing more awareness from outsiders about :( issues. It needs to be sorted now.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 11,128 ✭✭✭✭Oranage2


    Actually happened to me before, some little scummer asked me for some money, I said no, he then asked if I wanted some coke, I also said no.

    But Dublin city centre really is a bit of a Kip, no offense but esp the north side of it like o connell st , talbot st etc.

    The south side of the city isn't much either just a slightly bit nicer and with less junkies floating about.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,376 ✭✭✭The_Captain


    Billy86 wrote: »
    From the article: A gap-toothed man with a beard approaches, asking for cash. Turned down, he offers the drinkers cocaine.

    Excuse me a moment, my bullsh*t detector just exploded.

    I know, pathetic. On-street dealing just doesn't really happen here like it does in US and Uk cities


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,559 ✭✭✭RoboRat


    Dublin has its problems but no more than any major capital city I have visited.
    An online video surfaced this month of a man being repeatedly punched during the daytime on Henry Street, one of the two main shopping avenues in the city.

    Heavens forbid, punched in the face, repeatedly during daylight hours. That doesn't happen anywhere else!

    The junkies are an eyesore but I wouldn't call them a menace, most are so off their face or fcuked up they couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag.

    The begging does piss me off but they only beg because its profitable, if people didn't give, there would be no reason to beg.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,476 ✭✭✭Potatoeman


    You might not notice it but on Sundays when it quiet its far more noticable. Huestons luas stop seems to be mostly junkies, Abbey street and Talbot street are pretty bad too.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,536 ✭✭✭Silentcorner


    It would be a huge help if people didn't isolate Dublin in this instance. Irish people engage in a kind of parochial snobbery that involves insulting each other or completely denying there are any issues. I don't see these people as the problem, I see these people as victims of a much wider malaise, involving a number of different arms of the state.

    This is an Irish issue, it is at its most obvious in Dublin, I find it even more tragic that it is happening 1km from Dail Eireann, because this is a physical manifestation of a dysfunctional political system, which has never gotten to grips with governing a certain section of Irish society. If social problems are not dealt with in Dublin (where they will always manifest themselves first on account of the size of the city) they spread to all cities and towns, at different times. Equally if the judiciary and gardai managed to properly police Dublin, the rest of the country's cities and towns would be the much safer also.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭Dayum


    I've been to a lot of other capital cities and I can say that I find Dublin in the ha'penny place when it comes to crime.

    Does it need a good scrub and a coat of paint - yes, but do I feel like I'm going to witness a drive-by shooting every time I walk down Westmoreland? Absolutely not.

    To be honest, Dublin needs to be beautified. The roads in the inner city were not designed for the level of traffic going through it on a daily basis - they were built for the horse and cart. I'd privatise some streets in the city centre and let the businesses come to some arrangement that would work most efficiently - whether that would consist of pedestrianising a majority of them, who knows? But one thing is clear, they'd clean up; plant trees, and maybe someone would have the brilliant idea of connecting both LUAS lines.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,055 ✭✭✭conorhal


    RoboRat wrote: »
    Dublin has its problems but no more than any major capital city I have visited.



    Heavens forbid, punched in the face, repeatedly during daylight hours. That doesn't happen anywhere else!

    The junkies are an eyesore but I wouldn't call them a menace, most are so off their face or fcuked up they couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag.

    The begging does piss me off but they only beg because its profitable, if people didn't give, there would be no reason to beg.

    The begging is off the hook, which is no surprise, the article indicates a 30% increese in rough sleepers over the last year.
    Junkies aren't generally a menace, but the don't really make you feel much warmth for the north side of the city either, the north and south sides are like the two pubs on my road, one is smart, freshly painted and has hanging baskets of flowers outside. The other is a shabby kip that always has a couple of depressed looking blokes wandering from the bar to the bookies or smoking outside.
    I have never drunk in the second establishment. It's not that I'd be scared to walk through the door, but the general air of grotty despair would never incentivise me to do so. The northside is a bit like that,why would I spend money around Henry St or socialize there when across the river there's fresh paint and hanging baskets?
    Unless the utterly useless Dublin CoCo come up with a coherent plan for the north inner city it's decline will continue.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 27,349 ✭✭✭✭super_furry


    fedor.2. wrote: »
    Sorry now, Dublin City centre is an absolute kip. It's like an episode of the walking dead, with all those junkies around, and that scummy,nasally and guttural accent is horrendous.

    Someone from Cork complaining about a guttaral accent? :pac::pac::pac:


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 23,495 ✭✭✭✭Billy86


    I know, pathetic. On-street dealing just doesn't really happen here like it does in US and Uk cities

    I'm thinking more on two different lines:

    1. Cocaine is an expensive substance, someone begging for money for cans wouldn't be able to afford it and definitely wouldn't be selling it.

    2. If he was trying to sell "cocaine" then it would have been talcum powder or a bag of flour.

    Which is why my detector couldn't handle the bullsh*t from both sides. :pac:


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,652 ✭✭✭I am pie


    Anyone who thinks Dublin is dangerous hasn't travelled much nor do they have much capacity for perspective.

    Alternatively, they are from Cork.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,248 ✭✭✭✭BoJack Horseman


    I am pie wrote: »
    Anyone who thinks Dublin is dangerous hasn't travelled much nor do they have much capacity for perspective.

    How many visited countries would you count as well travelled?

    I'm wondering if my total allows me legitimate perspective on Dublin.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,652 ✭✭✭I am pie


    How many visited countries would you count as well travelled?

    I'm wondering if my total allows me legitimate perspective on Dublin.

    We've checked our records and it's come back as a no.

    Sorry, back to the airport with you.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,248 ✭✭✭✭BoJack Horseman


    I am pie wrote: »
    We've checked our records and it's come back as a no.

    Sorry, back to the airport with you.

    How much travel is required then?

    You must know, otherwise why talk out your hole?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 43,028 ✭✭✭✭SEPT 23 1989


    Until a judge,politician or a member of the elite golden circle is killed on the streets of Dublin nothing will be done


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,472 ✭✭✭✭Grayson


    i've never been accosted in dublin.

    to me, accosting suggests confrontation as opposed to some fella saying "any change luv?" or that british man on clarendon street saying "buy the big issue please"

    now i'm not particularly intimidating-looking so although it definitely happens some people, I'm guessing confrontation is not quite a plague

    i was in town shopping the other day and there were a few beggars who came up. When I said no there were some that persisted. Not for too long, but they still didn't take no the first time.

    It gets worse in the evening. If you're standing outside the front of a bar there's ones that come up and ask for money. Some will also offer drugs. they do circuits of bars. I've spend a few nights outside the front of a city centre bar having a few drinks and smoking and the same beggar will comeback every 30 minutes or so. So the strange thing is that although there are many homeless and beggars in dublin, there aren't that many that do this circuit thing. But because there's a few doing the circuit you will be standing outside for 10 minutes and be asked for money a few times.

    The Roma who beg are the worst. they'll keep asking until you give them money. If you don't they will actually start pushing you. Last year I was on dame street at about 1am, and one blocked my way. She kept stepping in front of me. I tried to pass her on the inside and when I did she pushed me up against a wall. Then she ran away. That's when I noticed my phone missing.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 35 DiegoCosta


    Relatively speaking Dublin is a safe city. You'd be much more likely to be assaulted or mugged in London.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,116 ✭✭✭Trent Houseboat


    I know, pathetic. On-street dealing just doesn't really happen here like it does in US and Uk cities

    This exact thing happened to me out side the Foggy Dew about a year ago. If it was the same guy then gap toothed may have been a kind description, yer man had about four teeth.

    Asked me for money, I said no. Asked for a smoke, I said no. Asked me if I wanted some coke, I said no. He assured me it was good stuff, yet I declined.

    I assume it's to lure you off the beaten track in the name of discretion, and then threaten you into handing over cash and phone.

    Street dealing does happen in Dublin, it was a fixture of Marlborough street for years until the Luas works started. You can see it on the boardwalk too.

    Having said that Dublin is a pretty safe place.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,370 ✭✭✭✭Son Of A Vidic


    Bloomberg:a station mainly watched by coked up,money worshipping psychopaths

    I'd also throw narcissist into the mix there.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,465 ✭✭✭MOH


    Billy86 wrote: »
    From the article: A gap-toothed man with a beard approaches, asking for cash. Turned down, he offers the drinkers cocaine.

    Excuse me a moment, my bullsh*t detector just exploded.

    That happened us during the summer. Drinking outside a pub in town, guy asks for money, then heads off up the road. Comes back down the road a while later, asks us for money again, when we turn him down asks us if we want to buy cocaine.
    Unless you were incredibly stupid (or amazingly drunk) you wouldn't in a million years think he was actually selling cocaine. It seemed more an spur-of-the-moment enterprising, if misguided, attempt to come up with something to offer us in exchange for money. Nobody actually took him seriously


  • Site Banned Posts: 2,922 ✭✭✭Egginacup


    Billy86 wrote: »
    From the article: A gap-toothed man with a beard approaches, asking for cash. Turned down, he offers the drinkers cocaine.

    Excuse me a moment, my bullsh*t detector just exploded.

    It's like something Alison O'Riordan would write.

    "...the German tourist complete with spectacles and lederhosen, replied with a polite but firm 'nein!' "

    :pac:


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,280 ✭✭✭Davarus Walrus


    Spotted a couple of junkies buying their fix from a couple of skobies only 20 minutes ago. On the corner between the quays and Westmoreland Street. Done in public. So the open drug dealing is happening.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,381 ✭✭✭Yurt2


    Spotted a couple of junkies buying their fix from a couple of skobies only 20 minutes ago. On the corner between the quays and Westmoreland Street. Done in public. So the open drug dealing is happening.

    Yup, the exact corner I was talking about earlier on in the thread. They should just have a Garda there full time. Granted it will push the problem elsewhere but at least it would be less visible and less likely for pedestrians on a main thoroughfare to be hassled/mugged/pickpocketed/caught up in a junkie fight.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 2,618 ✭✭✭The Diabolical Monocle


    Bit surprised at this, especially since the writer lives in dublin and ought to have some concern over exaggerating the problem.

    http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-23/coke-selling-beggars-and-punch-ups-plague-downtown-dublin.html


    i know it's an irritation but all capitals have blackspots. "Plague" really??

    Journalists.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 336 ✭✭Creative Juices


    As an occasional city centre user, yes, Dublin had indeed a slight air of menace about it.

    Locals may become immune over time, but for non-regulars it is apparent & disheartening how Dublin has receded.
    My thoughts exactly. I used to love Dublin but it has changed.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 10,562 ✭✭✭✭Sunnyisland


    Back in Dublin the last two weeks, have been walking from st Stephens green down and across to Parnell street and everywhere in between,seen a few beggars and homeless people around Nassau st and Pearce st,seen three lads be searched in fleet st but mostly I seen busy happy people going about there business,
    The only time I got shouted at was when a group of people with Viking hats on went aargh at me.
    Maybe I was just lucky :-)


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,376 ✭✭✭The_Captain


    Spotted a couple of junkies buying their fix from a couple of skobies only 20 minutes ago. On the corner between the quays and Westmoreland Street. Done in public. So the open drug dealing is happening.

    I have no doubt that homeless/junkies buy and sell on the street to each other, but there's not guys dealing on the streets to 'normal people' like you get in other countries.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,046 ✭✭✭Berserker


    I have never been offered drugs in Dublin city centre. I think people blow this stuff completely out of proportion. I lived and worked there for years before anyone asks.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 43,028 ✭✭✭✭SEPT 23 1989


    Berserker wrote: »
    I have never been offered drugs in Dublin city centre. I think people blow this stuff completely out of proportion. I lived and worked there for years before anyone asks.

    why would a dealer take the chance that you might be a copper?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,046 ✭✭✭Berserker


    why would a dealer take the chance that you might be a copper?

    Exactly. This contradicts the line where the 'gap-toothed man' offered the drinkers cocaine.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭Dayum


    why would a dealer take the chance that you might be a copper?

    A friend of mine is a copper. To be honest, as much as people might not like to think it but the fact is the coppers don't give a flying ****e about the dealers. They know them well. The majority of dealers around town give the gardai info on bigger fish. They couldn't care less who they're selling to and why should they?

    It's not like Joe Smith out for a new pair of jeans is going to pass by one of these guys and buy heroin. It's the same people giving custom.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 980 ✭✭✭stevedublin


    Bloomberg: Coke-Selling, Beggars & Punch-Ups Plague Dublin
    Fixed your title


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,046 ✭✭✭Berserker


    Fixed your title

    Pedant.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 368 ✭✭Putinovsky


    I know of at least 2 regular beggars around the South William Street area that go around offering coke to anyone sitting out the smoking areas so it definitely does happen.

    If you don't think Dublin is menacing take a walk through the city centre on a Saturday night when your sober. It is a bit unsettling.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 260 ✭✭SVJKarate


    I walk around Dublin's Grafton Street / Nassau Street / Temple Bar on a daily basis. I regularly encounter 'homeless' beggars (some of whom seem genuine, others less so) but for the most part they are in fact very respectful and certainly never pursue me. I've even stopped and spoken to a few where I thought they were at risk, and discussed how they could go about getting help.

    There are a few people clearly off their heads, but during daylight hours at least they never interact with me. Indeed they seem to be almost unaware of me as we pass each other.

    Slightly more annoying and persistent than the beggars are the 'chuggars' . . . but in recent months there are far less of them about. O'Connell Street and its tributaries are a bit worse than my usual haunts, admittedly.

    All of the above can make it slightly unpleasant to walk about Dublin, but I cannot say I have ever felt unsafe nor threatened by their presence. That does not mean others are wrong to feel that way.

    Noticeably in other countries I see far less beggars, and those I encounter are usually silent - just using a sign to advertise their plight (except for the few who perform songs & music on the public transport then pass around the hat). The main streets are usually kept free of beggars, drug addicts etc. Dublin's lax approach could very well be intimidating to tourists, and we would be well served to deal with that problem even if we cannot easily find a solution to the underlying homelessness and addiction problems.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,963 ✭✭✭CelticRambler


    This is an Irish issue, it is at its most obvious in Dublin ...

    Ah heyor ... :pac:

    It's not an Irish issue, nor a Dublin one - it's just normal "city" life. I'm a Dub by birth but haven't live their properly for more than twenty years. And despite numerous trips back, I've never been "accosted" in Dublin like I have in Paris. Anyone who thinks a few coke-heads wandering around is bad for the city image should try walking a few blocks in Paris from Gare du Nord with their 8-year-old daughter and explaining to her what all those "women of a certain character" are waiting for. And then there's the deaf-dumb-blind Roma men/women with the sick/handicapped child, or the bloke whose determined to give you back the gold ring you just dropped ...

    As someone else said above, Dublin's in the ha'penny place compared to real black-spots.


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