This cartoon is written by me and drawn by the always-great R. E. Ryan.
It's not just cruel - these laws are literally demanding the impossible. Human beings are, alas, embodied physical beings existing in a physical universe, and it follows that we will inevitably be somewhere while we sleep. And if you're someone who doesn't have access to a private place to sleep - by definition, you'll be sleeping in public.
Not that these laws are enforced against someone like me if I doze off while working in a coffee shop (as I have several times) or while sitting on a park bench. They're not really laws against sleeping in public; they're laws against being homeless.
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