It's fascinating, because shelters in and of themselves are positive things: they're built to be refuges or safe havens. Places where you expect help is at hand.
They sound negative when you start to look at the reason for them existing. Not because shelters are bad, but because homelessness and abuse and abandonment is bad.
From a UK perspective, shelter to me makes me think of a bus stop or an awning to get out of the rain, or to get some shade.
Yes, that's how I perceive it as well. The fact that you're in circumstance X might suck, but shelter for that is always good. It's interesting to me that people find the word "shelter" itself negative because they associate it with the unwanted circumstance. I wonder if the same happens with "haven", "succor", etc.
They sound negative when you start to look at the reason for them existing. Not because shelters are bad, but because homelessness and abuse and abandonment is bad.
From a UK perspective, shelter to me makes me think of a bus stop or an awning to get out of the rain, or to get some shade.