How did San Francisco become the city in a ‘Doom Loop’?

You may remember that two high-profile crimes in San Francisco this spring put a spotlight on the city’s woes.

Bob Lee, the tech executive who helped create Cash App, was stabbed to death on a downtown street in early April. The same week, a former city fire chief was attacked with a metal pipe and hospitalized. A homeless man was immediately arrested in this case. News of the two attacks prompted a barrage of criticism of San Francisco, especially from tech leaders who said they were alarmed by what they saw as rampant crime and an exploding homelessness problem.

Jesse Barron, a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, recently published a fascinating account of the attack on the former fire commissioner and, more broadly, the origins of San Francisco’s negative reputation.

The story of the crime turned out to be more complicated than it seemed; the victim has since been accused of regularly dousing homeless people with bear spray. And there’s more to the story surrounding San Francisco than meets the eye, Jesse explains. I highly recommend his full article, which you can read here.

“What everyone seems to forget is that San Francisco is so much more than the viral videos of the tent camps in South of Market,” Jesse told me. “Yes, they exist. But they are just one facet of the city.”

I recently spoke with Jesse about what he learned in the months he worked on the article. Here’s our conversation, lightly edited:

Why did you want to focus on the incident with the former fire chief?

My last piece for the magazine was a long cover story set in San Francisco, so I spent a lot of time reporting there, and I knew the perception of the city as a high-crime hellhole was exaggerated. But I didn’t actually know where that perception came from.

There was a constant stream of dark, vile viral media, especially about homelessness and street crime, which had a profound impact on how everyone saw the city – including its residents. Who produced it? How was it spun and manipulated? What arguments were implicitly made by this content, and which players could benefit from it?

I made the decision to take this seemingly average attack case and actually follow it to the ends of the earth, to see how many of these bigger questions it would address. A lot, as it turned out.

You write about the “doom loop” idea – that San Francisco will go into a tailspin because all its problems are intertwined. But inner cities across the country have struggled following pandemic lockdowns. Why do you think this story has endured so strongly in San Francisco?

The most obvious answer is that something is actually going wrong. San Francisco is facing multiple overlapping problems: work-from-home policies have emptied downtown office buildings, there is a fentanyl crisis, and homeless services are grossly inadequate—the shelter system, for example, is short of more than 4,000 beds.

But many American cities face similar challenges. In Los Angeles, where I live, the share of homeless people without shelter is significantly higher than that in San Francisco. It gets virtually no attention.

Why is San Francisco attracting all this vitriol, which is so disproportionate to the conditions on the ground? I think this is because San Francisco has a special place in American media and politics – everything that happens there is magnified. It is as much a symbol as a city.

What was most surprising to you in your reporting?

Two of the most surprising people I met were Ricci Wynne and JJ Smith. Smith describes himself as a street videographer and Wynne describes himself as a “video vigilante.” They’re not professional journalists, but they take many of the photos and videos that fuel the doomsday talk on Fox News and The Daily Mail and elsewhere.

Smith in particular is extremely conflicted about this, because he views his audience as his neighbors, not the media. He sometimes makes videos of people overdosing, lets them watch it and records them watching it. He explained that his goal was to prevent them from overdosing again.

Smith showed me one of these videos, which I describe in the article. It was the most shocking – and representative – piece of media I encountered in San Francisco.

Where we travel to

Today’s tip comes from Emily Dolton, who lives in San Diego:

In Imperial County, the perfect art day trip is a drive north from El Centro through Niland to Salvation Mountain. Originally built by Leonard Knight from adobe bricks and thousands of gallons of paint, this religious work of art is essentially a constantly evolving, vibrantly painted mound.

If you drive even further north, you’ll come across the off-grid squatter community of Slab City. Essentially an artist community that runs entirely on solar energy and focuses on repurposing waste into art. The residents have camped on slabs left by a World War II naval base. East Jesus, founded by Charlie Russell, is on the north side.

It’s essentially a free installation of modern outdoor art, made from everything from car parts to hundreds of TVs stacked on top of each other, and it says a lot about waste in society. Visitors should remember to bring cash because, above all, this is a residential community that wants their art, but not their lifestyle, to be scrutinized. They survive on donations and the sale of art. Use the toilet before you leave.

Follow the coastline of the Salton Sea and you will find the town of Bombay Beach. Large open-air art installations, often integrating water as part of the art, are spread across the city. Make sure you don’t get too close to the water’s edge as the silt will suck the shoes off your feet. These installations are better photographed with longer range lenses on traditional cameras.

Tell us about your favorite places to visit in California. Email your suggestions to CAtoday@nytimes.com. We will share more in future editions of the newsletter.

Tell us

Have you seen fall colors in California this year? Send us your best photos at CAtoday@nytimes.com. Please include your full name and the city where you live.

And before you go: good news

For those tired of the pies and pumpkin-spiced sweets that abound during the holidays, the churro, a deep-fried and doughy delicacy with a formidable presence in California, may be a worthy reprieve. The latest list from the San Francisco Chronicle of the Bay Area’s most exceptional churros will keep even the pickiest aficionados well supplied.

The list, published this month, highlights Bay Area businesses selling the best churros, including restaurants and sole proprietorships, each with a different style and preparation.

In the East Bay area, try the Hayward churro stand next to Mexico Super Market, where Oscar Lopez, also known as the Churro Man, has been baking the treats himself since 2009. In San Francisco, a tapas bar called Red Window has a top contender for Spanish-style churros, traditionally served with chocolate sauce, which are ordered in packs of four.

Whether you’re looking for restaurant fare or just a quick snack, as Cesar Hernandez, The Chronicle’s restaurant critic and author of the list, puts it: “The baton-like fritter, with its star-shaped edges, remains one of the simplest pleasures of life.”

Thank you for reading. I’ll come back tomorrow. — Soumya

PS Here it is today’s mini crossword.

Maia Coleman, Briana Scalia and Halina Bennet contributed to California Today. You can reach the team via CAtoday@nytimes.com.

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