To the guy downvoting every time I comment - do you feel powerful doing that? I even got a downvote for simply stating the country I live in. Dude, I live in a van and I get harassed by cops. I'm just trying to get some advice from people (like that Youtube link @David_Eight just posted) Keep downvoting, you're not going to make my life any worse.

Watching it now, thanks! It sucks that you have to study the law for rights you already have but "it is what it is".

like no shit you would use a different vehicle if you had access.

Thanks for stating that! It's like when there's a cold snap below freezing and some homeless guy freezes to death from exposure and someone says, "Why didn't he just go rent a hotel room for the night? It's just one night"

Yeah, that is a good idea. It would probably work best on a VW van like the kind surfers use. I suppose with enough stickers strategically placed it could look like you were into rock climbing, or surfing, or something involving the outdoors.

All of that is good advice. I do get haircuts and stay clean shaven most of the time. So, I don't look homeless but my van does.

It seems like every day there's a new article about people getting priced out of apartments and unable to afford homes. So, it's just a matter of time before there's some huge "Grapes of Wrath" style caravans of people living in cars. I wonder if it will get to the point where the cops look the other way simply because there's too many people living in cars.

Yeah, you are right. Once I opened the door when I got pulled over by Border Patrol. I opened it because my power window was broken. They did not like me opening the door.

Yeah, you're right about that. I have seen those rules about car camping. Not sure what they were at the campground I was at but I got there around 1:30PM and was only there an hour before the deputy sheriff showed up. Even if that campground had a rule like that it was only 2:30 in the afternoon and surely there wouldn't have been a "you must set up your tent within x minutes of arriving" rule. Cops suck! And the people who call cops because their overactive imagination gets the best of them suck too!

Thanks for that article. I do agree with it. But this might be similar to "there's plenty of dead pedestrians who thought they had the right of way". I already know that technically I can refuse to show my ID without reasonable suspicion but if the cop arrests me illegally I still have to go to court to assert my legal rights and I can't afford the money or the time.

Yep, I agree with you. I do move around a lot. But I also paid for a spot at a campground where you're supposed to be able to just chill and I still got harassed.

different towns....also the incident at the campground happened and there were other people camping. The cop didn't go check in on any of them. His specific "reasonable suspicion" was that in the past at that campground they have had trouble with "riff-raff". Great! So be it, then why not go ID check all the other campers then? I was being profiled and targeted because of the vehicle I was driving. If you don't understand then that's because this hasn't happened to you 10 times or more. It gets tiring.

Well, go buy a shitty minivan and drive it through some small towns and then after you get harassed you might get fed up a little. Maybe I was too ambiguous with the post title....I should have posted "what should I do" rather than "what do you do"

Are you living out of said van?

Yes, I am.