I hear, consistently, four arguments against the critics of the current government response to the hurricane in southern Louisiana. They are
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An in-person response from a coworker who read this:
"Yeah, you're right, and I elect my officials to take care of me and I don't give a shit about New Orleans." Or something to that effect. I may have misquoted and I apologize if I did.
It's certainly a good thing that FEMA is not elected.
Another coworker sent me an article that says, basically, that the people left in New Orleans are the poor, and the prisoners. The social rejects, basically. And because these people are left without law, they become vicious animals, out for themselves, ruled by greed and ruthlessly doing anything they can to get ahead. They don't know what it is to worry about a job, or a home, or to care about other people because they never have before and that's what made them the social rejects they are
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Okay, let's just forget the fact that she brought out more people alive with her than just herself, including two women with no legs. Let's deal with the idea that she chose to stay. How many times every day do you hear something can kill you? "Eat total and you won't have a heart attack and die." "Can cell phones give you tumors?" "Smoking kills hundreds of thousands of Americans each year." "A killer storm is coming through ..." Our media thrives on sensationalism. If something isn't sensational, it can be made sensational. How many times have these people heard someone yelling "wolf
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I just got off the phone with my dad. He's in the "they should take care of themselves" camp.
There are three problems with that argument to me. First and foremost, you cannot assume that those who stayed had a real choice. There could be thousands of reasons and circumstances piled onto each other that would result in them staying, although they'd really like to leave. And secondly, you can't say that "well it's the city's fault" or "the state of Louisiana's fault" in the same breath as "I'm tired of all this finger pointing." And thirdly, if it's not the government's fault that cleanup, recovery, rescue, preparation, etc. etc. etc. has been run so crappily up to this point, why do we have FEMA? I'd like my 1% income tax refund, please, or whatever part went to FEMA.
You're not alone, I've been following this and I'm with you 100%. However I am coping by trying not to think about it too much. Really devistating, hard to imagine.
Pay careful attention to that last link, there's a comment from someone who supposedly works at the astrodome and refutes many of the bad things that are supposedly going on there Hey, it can't all be bad news right?
All these links are on the same site, but they're culled (by human editors) from different sources and provide links to the sites that have more information where appropriate.
A friend helped me work through this today. His theory, and it makes sense, is that deep down, these people who appear to be without compassion, are afraid.
Remember, this is a theoryThey are afraid that this could happen to them. To convince themselves it can't, this cannot be a random act of nature, it has to be somebody's fault. If it's somebody's fault, it needs to be the people to whom this happened. It can't be the government's fault because these people need to believe that the government can and will protect and rescue them. If the protecting / rescuing isn't helping down there, then it can't be the government's fault, it has to be the people down there. It also helps, at this point, to generalize the people left as poor, the welfare population, who are too lazy to get a job and revel in leeching off our tax dollars, the most criminal of all the social classes, these animals
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"Yeah, you're right, and I elect my officials to take care of me and I don't give a shit about New Orleans." Or something to that effect. I may have misquoted and I apologize if I did.
It's certainly a good thing that FEMA is not elected.
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That breaks my heart and directly refutes some of the opinions in that article.
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I just got off the phone with my dad. He's in the "they should take care of themselves" camp.
There are three problems with that argument to me. First and foremost, you cannot assume that those who stayed had a real choice. There could be thousands of reasons and circumstances piled onto each other that would result in them staying, although they'd really like to leave. And secondly, you can't say that "well it's the city's fault" or "the state of Louisiana's fault" in the same breath as "I'm tired of all this finger pointing." And thirdly, if it's not the government's fault that cleanup, recovery, rescue, preparation, etc. etc. etc. has been run so crappily up to this point, why do we have FEMA? I'd like my 1% income tax refund, please, or whatever part went to FEMA.
*pounds head on wall*
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Here are some other links of interest:
FEMA detainment camp - http://www.boingboing.net/2005/09/08/katrina_blog_account.html
An EPA rep speaks on Katrina - http://www.boingboing.net/2005/09/08/katrina_account_from.html
Rape / murder / beatings in Astrodome - http://www.boingboing.net/2005/09/07/katrina_rape_murder_.html
Pay careful attention to that last link, there's a comment from someone who supposedly works at the astrodome and refutes many of the bad things that are supposedly going on there Hey, it can't all be bad news right?
All these links are on the same site, but they're culled (by human editors) from different sources and provide links to the sites that have more information where appropriate.
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Remember, this is a theoryThey are afraid that this could happen to them. To convince themselves it can't, this cannot be a random act of nature, it has to be somebody's fault. If it's somebody's fault, it needs to be the people to whom this happened. It can't be the government's fault because these people need to believe that the government can and will protect and rescue them. If the protecting / rescuing isn't helping down there, then it can't be the government's fault, it has to be the people down there. It also helps, at this point, to generalize the people left as poor, the welfare population, who are too lazy to get a job and revel in leeching off our tax dollars, the most criminal of all the social classes, these animals ( ... )
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