# What would happen to a John/Jane Doe? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 26, 2023, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157 "2023-08-26T22:08:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2023, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157/21 "2023-08-28T17:01:52Z")
Whenever I get the notice that I can’t embed a YouTube link, I either link to it in the post, [like this from Forbidden Planet](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2BYyeS-fIU) or simply put the actual link inside parentheses like this ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2BYyeS-fIU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2BYyeS-fIU)) ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2023, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157/22 "2023-08-28T17:04:54Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > Put each of those two URLs together into one line, since we’re not allowed to link to them. It’s not that we aren’t **allowed** to post links to Youtube; it’s that, for the past few months, Discourse has been intermittently flaky about how it treats Youtube links: > [@Have links to YouTube been disabled?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-links-to-youtube-been-disabled/981958/246): > > I do web design professionally as part of my job, you can’t have spaces in a web address. That’s why we love putting \_ in file names. If you want a space in an address you use HTML code %20 instead, because an actual space doesn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![alovem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@alovem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alovem)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2023, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157/23 "2023-08-28T17:15:34Z")
Media links seem to work when you put 'em in a quote box. Like this: > [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu-MX8h7J-Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu-MX8h7J-Q) ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2023, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157/24 "2023-08-28T17:36:57Z")
[![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/f2BYyeS-fIU/hqdefault.jpg "Monsters From the Id (The Climax of Forbidden Planet (1956))") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2BYyeS-fIU) [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/6HtqVKs_xVE/maxresdefault.jpg "Marking Time, Waiting For Id (Forbidden Planet re-scored by Shiro Sagisu)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HtqVKs_xVE) ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2023, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157/25 "2023-08-28T19:02:44Z")
Homeless people end up in ERs all the time so not having an address to go to is not necessarily an impediment to being released. People get released from prison with some bus fare & not much else. I don’t see not having a fixed place to go as an impediment Every year, especially in winter, there are a few stories of someone who got out in the middle of the night, whether that’s a young child or an elderly dementia patient. Sometimes the family wakes up in the morning & realizes that one of them is missing & call the police & sometimes the cop driving down the street at 4am realizes that person probably shouldn’t be out there dressed in just PJs in subfreezing temps & upon talking to them,realizes they don’t know where home is. Those people would get taken into protective custody until they can figure out where they belong. Are we talking about a rom-com type of amnesia where they forget who they but can otherwise function in society or do they not even know how to function & use money? Social services would most likely get involved with the latter. > [@Love\_Rhombus](#): > > Would they be helped to get new identification papers, like a driver’s license? What’s your state’s policy on aliens who don’t have any documentation; no birth certificate or SSN card? Are they going to be able to get a license on just their word? What if they end up getting their memory back & now have two different state IDs with two different names & addresses? I’d _love_ that. - “What’s that officer, you pulled me over for speeding? Why yes, I am John Smith who lives at 123 Main St, just like it states on this here driver’s license.” ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2023, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157/26 "2023-08-28T19:18:14Z")
There have been cases of apparently true amnesiacs. Back in 1997 or so, someone tracked down a reporter for a Tacoma newspaper named Jody Roberts who’d disappeared 12 years earlier. She was found living in Alaska under the name of Jane Dee and had no memory of being Jody Roberts. [https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/AMNESIA-LEADS-TO-NEW-LIFE-3109295.php](https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/AMNESIA-LEADS-TO-NEW-LIFE-3109295.php) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-to-a-john-jane-doe/989157.md?page=1)