The Hard Truth…an obscene consideration

15th April 2011   ·   0 Comments

By J. Kojo Livingston
Contributing Columnist

Part I

I’m trying to participate in and tolerate the Facebook phenomenon. (My young-adult daughters don’t want to “friend” me for some odd reason.)

A former city councilman that has helped me with some of my interventions here was in a conversation with two white nouveau-racists, you know, the kind who don’t say “nigger” publicly but resort to code-words to express their disdain for Black people or the target of the day.

The conversation involved a comparison between how the Japanese handled their earthquake and how Black people handled Hurricane Katrina. Most of us have heard some form of this drivel since the flood in Iowa a few years back. The drill is that other folks took care of themselves while the Black Katrina victims refused to leave before the hurricane and begged the government to save them afterwards.

What struck me first was the raw arrogance of these guys to sit in judgment of how others handled disasters of this magnitude. Yes, I know their thoughts were not original, both Limbaugh and Beck had both stooped to mocking the victims of the disaster in Japan long before these geniuses decided to spread this wisdom. The meanness of spirit and absolute lack of human compassion for the suffering of others led me to ask the question: Are these people becoming more savage and less civilized?

In pretending that they knew exactly what happened there are many things that escaped these skinheads-to-be. Since I keep hearing parts of the same sick dialogue in other areas I am listing some points of consideration for those who want to more than kick folks who were already down.

CONSIDERATION NUMBER 1: Many people did not leave because they simply lacked the means. I had to give a car to some relatives so they could escape. Buses, trains and jets were not an option for most. Walking was also out of the question. And, yes the government could have used the 1,000 school and city buses that went underwater to help these people. In addition to able-bodied, working people who could not get out there were many sick and elderly who could not leave. I know because I was personally responsible for seeing to the transportation needs of about a dozen of them.

CONSIDERATION NUMBER 2: Let’s call this the “Cry Wolf” syndrome. Some people simply did not believe a hurricane would hit, or nearly hit. Why not? That’s an intelligent question.

People did not believe a hurricane would hit because they had been hearing the same warning for as many as 30 years and nothing happened. I arrived in New Orleans in 1981 and as best I can tell, every single year, at least once per year we were told to run for our lives from a killer hurricane. Every single year, at least once per year the so-called threat turned at the last minute. So people who closed businesses, took off work, spent money on gas, hotels, food, etc., came back a little poorer than they left. Sometimes their houses had been raided.

My family started evacuating a year before Katrina when Ivan threatened. We did not evacuate because we thought the hurricane would actually hit. We evacuated because we knew that a strong enough storm would leave us in uncomfortable heat without electricity and possibly without water for three or four days. We were fleeing discomfort, not death and destruction.

It was the most horrible ride of our lives. Sixteen hours to get from New Orleans to Shreveport (a five-hour drive) in bumper to bumper traffic that was moving too slow to drive and too often to turn your car off. We had to fill up three times. Thank God we had the cash; nobody was giving away sympathy gas. Then, after a million people left their homes and jobs and found safety, hurricane Ivan went elsewhere.

Although we did evacuate for Katrina it is easy to understand why many would not.

Next week we look at the elephant on the Katrina table and examine the spiritual underpinnings of the conservative’s drive to make the world a meaner, nastier place to die.

Until then, Whatchagonna DO?