greygirlbeast | Addendum: out of sight, out of mind

Current Mood: angry
Current Music: Brian Eno, "How Many Worlds"

Addendum: out of sight, out of mind

As for as I know, Poppy and Chris followed through with their plan to enter Jefferson Parish today. I've been worried about them all afternoon.

And here I see that FEMA wants to forbid the press to photograph the bodies being recovered from New Orleans. Same dren Bush pulled with the Iraqi dead. Like, if we can't see the dead, we won't think about the dead, and then we won't vote like people who've seen dead soldiers and dead flood victims. In fact, if we don't see the dead, it's pretty much like there never were any dead. Contrast both of these cases — Bush forbidding photography of the bodies of returning soldiers and victims of the Katrina disaster — with the deluge of graphic photos we got after the 9/11 attacks, photographs which certainly helped him sell his wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Am I talking conspiracy? No, I'm talking business as usual. I think "conspiracy," in the context of the Federal government of the US has become a synonym for "business as usual."

I want to address a misunderstanding that arose yesterday, from the comments I made yesterday evening. I'm not saying that the Bush Administration should be held accountable instead of local governmental officials. I'm saying everyone who had a hand in turning this natural disaster into a natural disaster compounded by human incompetence is to be held accountable. That includes Mayor Ray Nagin, who could have ordered a mandatory evacuation days earlier than he did, and for the Governor of Louisiana, who could have seen Nagin's inaction and taken matters into her own hands. That's the human error before the disaster. Blame falls on Bush and Chertoff and FEMA and etc. after the disaster. If that's not clear, what I mean, I don't know how I could make it any clearer.

Should people live in areas prone to flooding? I can't believe how many Bush apologists are claiming that residents of NOLA had this horror coming to them because they "chose" to live where they did. No, seriously. I'm hearing this crap all over the place. Do you know how much of the human population worldwide currently lives within three feet of mean sea level? 100 million people (from National Geographic, September 2004), that's how many. And, as we saw from Katrina, people living in coastal areas much higher above sea level may see catastrophic damage. Katrina's storm surges were something like 20-25 feet. Moreover, harping about where people choose to live ignores the fact that virtually everyone everywhere lives in a potential disaster area. This gets back to what I was saying yesterday about the Earth not being static, about stuff moving around — air, rock, snow, magma, water, mud — sometimes moving quickly and with cataclysmic results. Just about everyone of us lives in the path of some future disaster, either natural or made-made. Should New Yorkers be blamed for living in a city likely to be targeted by terrorists? Of course not. That's absurd. But they did have a chance to leave after the first World Trade Center bombing, right? What about people who live anywhere along the west coast, with its earthquakes, volcanoes, mud slides, forest fires, and tsunamis? What about the plains and the southeast, where tornadoes do so much damage? What about people in Missouri and Arkansas, sitting on top of one of the most dangerous faults in North America, the New Madrid system? What about the entire state of Florida? No, of course not. To do so would be bullshit and nonsense. This is just a pathetic, desperate attempt by the arrogant and ignorant, by those lacking compassion and those who will go to any obscene length to prop up George W. Bush, to blame the victims of Hurricane Katrina for their own deaths. It's sick. It makes me more ashamed of humanity than usual (which is saying something).

Gagh. Enough of this for now.

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... I'm wondering if it would have even been humanly possible for Mayor Nagin to force evacuate everyone from NOLA prior to the storm.

... I'm wondering if it would have even been humanly possible for Mayor Nagin to force evacuate everyone from NOLA prior to the storm.

Probably not. Forcing everyone out would have probbaly taken weeks and military intervention, but there's little doubt that if Nagin had ordered the evacuation sooner, more people (more being an unknown and unknowable quantity) would have taken the threat more seriously and left.

If they had offered FREE bussing out of the city when they began telling people to go to the Convention Center, the Dome... there would still have been those who stayed (there are those refusing to leave now) but at least we'd know that everyone had been given the opportunity & the means by which to leave.

This thing was fucked up on every level, from the President to the street cop. All the way down.

but at least we'd know that everyone had been given the opportunity & the means by which to leave.

Yep.

This thing was fucked up on every level, from the President to the street cop. All the way down.

Like I said...yep.

... I had heard that those in NOLA with their own transporation (and who heeded the evacuation warning) did get out in time ... but it was those who did not have any transportaion (and those who refused the evacuation warning) who stayed behind.

Considering the high number of people in NOLA who do not have vehicles, I wonder even if Nagin could have forced them onto NOLA city buses to evacuate, if there would have been enough buses to carry them all.

An anecdotal tale told to me by a few emergency response people is that they were tying the floating bodies they found to telephone poles so they wouldn't float away, and they went on to rescue people they could. I can only imagine how things are starting to look there now that the water is starting to drain. I had the most horrible feeling just hearing this story, and the stories of nursing home residents drowning in their beds that came out today. I am not sure how I would deal with actually seeing it. I don't really want to. I can imagine it just fine.

Interesting that you mention New Madrid as I was just talking about it with the contractor that works on our house. He said of the tall buildings downtown, the newer ones were built on bedrock but the older ones will likely crumble in a good-sized quake. I've had people poke fun at me because I've secured my bookcases to the walls but after reading about New Madrid years ago, I'd rather suffer snickers than be crushed by my tall oak bookcases.

The news of wanting to block photos doesn't surprise me (anger yes, surprise no). I'd be surprised if they post an honest number of deaths. If there are no photos then it's easy to say 10,000 died instead of 50,000. Someone on nola.com did the math based on population and the estimated percentage of those who left and came up with 40,000... and that was only a day or so after the flooding.

Imagine a person with family in New Orleans who hasn't heard from a relative in some time. On the news they see their family members dead body floating down the street.

The positive, this individual outside of New Orleans now knows that their family member is indeed dead.

But imagine finding out THAT WAY. Imagine having to learn it like that, and having shown all over the news again and again and again.

We know people are dying, we know people are dead, I personally don't want to see dead bodies floating down the street. That isn't news, that's obscenity used in place of news to create shock value and boost ratings.
As for good ole boy GW, maybe this is a ploy to keep from sinking into this bullshit up past his eyeballs. Either way, hes sinking. Lets not make the victims family see dead bodies and wonder if that is someone they care about.

Just playing the devils advocate,
scorp

Just playing the devils advocate,

We really don't need those.

You may well be right, in principle, about the obscenity of airing such photos. And that's an issue of ethics and the press. But forbidding the press (or anyone else) to take those photos is a First Amendment violation.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Of course, I suppose one can argue that Congress isn't doing this, FEMA and W is, etc. and etc.

You may well be right, in principle, about the obscenity of airing such photos. And that's an issue of ethics and the press. But forbidding the press (or anyone else) to take those photos is a First Amendment violation.

Like FEMA cutting/trying to cut the lines of communication into Jefferson county. The current administration have been masters of controlling information, media and spin control, and they haven't been subtle about it. It scarily shows how far you can go with disinformation even with a lot of open press.

I don't want to see dead bodies either (hell, I can't even deal with gory horror flicks when I know it's fake) but for our government to censor it is scarier and more disturbing than seeing dead bodies. In an ideal world (I realize I'm thinking of Fantasyland here, not where we are now) the photos would be allowed to be shot (it really is news) and the news crews would have the courtesy / sense / compassion to not sensationalize it. You can have photos showing the scope of the tragedy without showing specific identifiers of individuals. The abstraction of the numbers 1000 dead, 10,000 dead, etc. pale in comparison to a shot of a mountain of body bags. It really is a point that needs to hit home because just like the people in NO that thought "oh, I'll be OK, I can ride it out" there are still people in areas not affected that can shrug it off as "this won't happen to me". I think seeing the consequences in pictures is invaluble and more likely to sink in than just reading statistics. The reason we are being denied pictures is not to spare the families, it's to cover the butts of those in office. They want "damage control".

Oh, I wholeheartedly agree Bush is hanging on with his little monkey paws. And the American media, bless its heart, is running on little BUT shock value. Bush protests and attempts to halt pictures of Iraq casualties' coffins shown--yet few bat an eye, including these most moral bible-bangers, at an unidentifiable corpse tied to a phone pole. I wonder which is more important? However, I've got more of a problem with the double standard in the media's censorship. Yes, it's cruel, and morbid, and verging on the obscene... but this was a cruel and obscene event, and I'd rather see the casualties than have this swept up and sanitized as much as our administration will try to. (Then again, I don't have any friends, family, or loved ones in LA, so I guess it's a little different...)

On another note (and only a wee bit off topic), the whining by Hastert and others that we should not rebuild the city (because it's below sea level, and I guess they were "just asking for it") makes me far more angry. As a resident of Minnesota--I grew up within a couple hours' drive of International Falls, repeatedly the coldest spot in the lower 48--I can't walk outside four months of the year without heavy insulation for fear of becoming a human popsicle. Does this mean that we have it coming every time some homeless person freezes, or someone gets frostbite, and that it must be God's will? Bah. And this is a hell of a lot more likely for your average resident than a category-5 hurricane. I wasn't sure my disgust for my species could go too much further...

We know people are dying, we know people are dead, I personally don't want to see dead bodies floating down the street. That isn't news, that's obscenity used in place of news to create shock value and boost ratings.

I disagree. I don't think that it's so much that I have a morbid streak that's crying out to see the dead float by in technicolor, but I think that I have a sincere desire for the entirety of the world at large to see the cost incurred when the apathetic scream like howler monkeys that they have a mandate to govern this nation.

We need to see the dead. We need to see it because it's something that people will never forget. It's one of those things that will burn itself into the very fabric of the mind. There was absolutely no excuse for this disaster, it could have been avoided. There was absolutely no excuse for the routing of humanity that occured after the levees of New Orleans were breached, it could have been avoided.

Apathy. That and a piss-poor set of priorities are to blame.

It's a little hard to be apathetic about someone when their rotten body is floating in a puddle of filth on television for everyone to see and experience.

Would the ratings go up? I damn sure hope so. Everyone needs to bear witness to this so that it never comes close to happening again.

All the best.

SWH

Amen.

To those who think we shouldn;t be shown dead bodies...The government (via a bullied media) has been using 'dead bodies' (or signs of pain, suffering, or living in utter squalor) as proof that we should go to war, hate certain groups, think that People are Bad [tm], and other assorted nonsense to ensure that approval ratings remain high; whenever something is 'good' we are shown fluffy bunnies, happy school children, or momentary poses of compassionate humanitarian behavior. Now that we have dead bodies in our back yard tho (as well as pain, suffering, AND living in utter squalor) it's trying to be swept under the rug covered in fluffy bunnies, happy school children, and momentary poses of compassionate humanitarian behavior. The distancing done by making these images distinctly delineating 'good' and 'evil' has only been furthered by a media that too many Americans assume to be unbiased and accurate; these images are in part to blame for having this monster running our country. The only way they can make it right is to truly be accurate and unbiased now when the country needs it most. We are now the house of 'evil'; we can't hide or bury the bodies or we are looking away from the utter filth that has turned the 'Great US of A' into a third world country. We've had flag waving and posturing as the 'good guys' going on long enough; now is the time for truth.

Don't take this as me wanting familial rights to be overlooked; I would still want the media to be decent enough to wait for permission from the surviving family before publishing the photos, but we can't be willingly blind to this shit anymore. I said it in my own journal, but this is so huge, the devastation so great that it already dwarfs 9/11 by a very great magnitude. There are people still alive in there who will have drowned BEFORE they are rescued. If seeing the dead forces the government as a whole to IMMEDIATELY remove the people most responsible for this attrocity so that someone infintely more competent can be moved in to get those people saved days or even hours before they drown, wouldn't that be worth it?

The situation with those that back Bush comes down to basically they're like their master. They're, like Bush, unwilling to ever admit that they made a mistake or that their boy is making a mistake. Bush's handlers have been very adapt at fostering an anti-liberal attitude and his supporters are ready to pounce on anything them damn liberals have to say.

So I'm not at all shocked to hear people saying Bush and Co. are doing a great job, that the fault lies with the people who were dumb enough to stay in the city, etc ... Reality doesn't intrude upon their lives normally, why should it now?

Head in the sand is their motto.

Have you seen this article (http://uk.news.yahoo.com/06092005/140/storm-survivors-told-expose-themselves.html) about female survivors not being picked up initially because they wouldn't expose their breasts?

Un-fucking-believable.

Impeach Bush.

No, seriously.

If we can impeach a guy from lying about an affair, we can damn well impeach a guy for appointing a FEMA head who had been fired from his previous job running horse shows.

If we can impeach a guy from lying about an affair, we can damn well impeach a guy for cutting funding for a project the Army Corps of Engineers proposed to upgrade the levees so this mess wouldn't have happened.

If we can impeach a guy from lying about an affair, we can damn well impeach a guy for pretending that this situation was unthinkable- when he was told it was one of the three biggest possible calamities when he took office (along with a terrorist attack in New York- oh wait, he missed that one too!).

If we can impeach a guy from lying about an affair, we can damn well impeach a guy for playing a guitar while thousands of people were dying.

Yes, I'm using repetition. It's because some people need the message drilled in.

IMPEACH BUSH. I'm using capitals now. Does that help?

(And yes, this does go for Nagin and the governor of LA. That's up to the residents of those particular areas, though. I have no right to tell the citizens to do anything about that. But this I sure do.)

And how many people really choose to live where they do, as opposed to just being where they happened to be born? Especially the poorest of the poor?

And how many people really choose to live where they do, as opposed to just being where they happened to be born? Especially the poorest of the poor?

Bingo.

And here I see that FEMA wants to forbid the press to photograph the bodies being recovered from New Orleans. Same dren Bush pulled with the Iraqi dead. Like, if we can't see the dead, we won't think about the dead, and then we won't vote like people who've seen dead soldiers and dead flood victims. In fact, if we don't see the dead, it's pretty much like there never were any dead.

Kind of like calling all of the Louisiana displaced refugees will make the majority of the American public forget or not think of fellow members of the American public as being displaced due to a disaster. The use of refugees almost denotes that those who fled New Orleans did so by choice rather than necessity.

I'm saying everyone who had a hand in turning this natural disaster into a natural disaster compounded by human incompetence is to be held accountable.

Amen to that, although a very special sort of investigating eye should be focused on the Bush Administration's complete fuckwititude where patting themselves on the back for their overwhelming incompetence in handling the Katrina Disaster is concerned. Hurricane Katrina didn't cause the humanitarian disaster on the Gulf Coast. The humanitarian disaster came AFTER the passing of the hurricane, and is solely to blame on the facilities in place under federal jurisdiction.

All the best.

SWH

It's so clear that this is the totally predictable result of the Bush philosophy. I wish he had to live through what the survivors endured.

I wish he had to live through what the survivors endured.

Perhaps he will, in time.

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Addendum: out of sight, out of mind

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