| Anarchy in the United States |
| Friday September 2, 2005, 17:36 PM EST |
Quotes taken from cnn.com about the situation in New Orleans, Louisiana in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, followed by my analysis, thoughts, and feelings on these events:
"There's no food. There's no water. There's shooting. They're killing people. They're robbing men in the restrooms, they're raping women trying to go to the restroom. So people have resorted to defecating on the floors. You can't walk. There's babies without Pampers, mammas without milk. It's chaos total chaos." - evacuee Tishia Walters
"Overnight, police snipers were stationed on the roof of their precinct, trying to protect it from gunmen roaming through the city. One New Orleans police sergeant compared the situation to Somalia and said officers were outnumbered and outgunned by gangs in trucks. He broke down in tears when he described the deaths of his fellow officers, saying many had drowned doing their jobs. Other officers have turned in their badges as the situation continues to deteriorate. In one incident, the sergeant said gunmen fired rifles and AK-47s at the helicopters flying overhead. He said he saw bodies riddled with bullet holes, and the top of one man's head completely shot off." - CNN reporter Chris Lawrence
"An effort to evacuate patients and staff from downtown's Charity Hospital had to be suspended after a sniper opened fire on rescuers. The hospital was caring for about 200 patients with no power or water, and the only food left was a couple of cans of vegetables and some graham crackers." - CNN correspondent report
This is more than a natural disaster. As with the 9/11 tragedy in the United States, it is a widespread loss of life that also raises important questions about society, politics, and humanity. Somehow, it is even more galling now that (presumably) U.S. citizens are the perpetrators of violence and crimes against fellow Americans, using this natural calamity as a catalyst to victimize, terrorize, and even kill others. The notion of rape gangs feeding off the displaced and snipers coldly executing the sick and infirm and the people who are helping them is evil. What I personally find most remarkable - and perhaps it is just naivete on my part - is how quickly this has all happened. When did these gangs decide to go on the rampage? When did the snipers decide to stake out hospitals? Had these people been planning and training for long periods of time for exactly this "opportunity", or did a switch flip in each of them that, as these events began to unfold, they could suddenly indulge their cruelest desires?
I suppose it is because we are moved by the natural parts of this tragedy that we have not yet spoken up about these horrible human events. But along with being profoundly saddened and grief-stricken for the many and ongoing victims of these tragedies, I am outraged.
It is a strange world we live in: these sort of crimes on one another happen on a daily basis in different parts of the world. But thanks to the enormity of it all, it is impossible to understand and cope with a world that is so big and different and really beyond our individual empathy to fully appreciate. So our attention and appreciation is often reduced to proximity and personal context. What is happening in New Orleans is hardly startling or unique in a global context; people in some places deal with evil behaviour like this on a regular basis. But in seeing it unfold here and now, in this way, raises my empathy for everyone. A friend of mine this week said that all people are inherently evil. I disagreed. And, even though I still disagree with his assessment, things like this give me reason to pause, and wonder.
I'm too affected right now to really think through these dynamics logically, but I believe it is inevitable that we will start asking some of these questions and talking about some of these things as we begin to cope with what has happened, and more of the details of these terrible events are made public. In the meantime, my heart and thoughts go to everyone who is needlessly suffering right now, in New Orleans and the world.
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