The Subject Supposed to Loot and Rape

I tried to read this article, but it is just too darn silly. . .

“For example, on September 3, the Superintendent of the New Orleans Police Department told the New York Times about conditions at the Convention Center:

Posted by wolf on Oct 20, 2005 at 7:58 AM

One more thing.

While we sit in our comfortable climate controlled rooms typing on our modern computers and sipping diet coke (or coffee) we think we are so very modern and civilized. But it **IS** just a thin veneer. All of us are just animals, and when circumstances get a bit more *rustic*, when survival is at stake, our teeth bare and guttural snarls emerge from our delicate palettes. Evolutionarily we are a tiny baby step from our basest selves.

So of course i believe that poor blacks can degrade into uncivilized savages in a matter of a few days under highly adverse circumstances. I think the process might be EVEN FASTER for the folk (skin color being, of course, immaterial to this type of thing) at the top of the pyramid however, given that they are less used to the struggle and savagery of everyday life, ensconced in their “important” little lives. . .

Anyone remember the Donner party? The Watts riots? The insurgency in Iraq? Humans are a particularly difficult species to tame. . .

Posted by wolf on Oct 20, 2005 at 8:10 AM

And,

<i>Even if all the reports on violence and rapes had proven to be factually true, the stories circulating about them would still be

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 20, 2005 at 9:56 AM

That’s it, Jay.  You’re exactly right, you racist son of a bitch.

No, seriously, Jay.  The straw man argument is that blacks, because they loot, riot, rape, rob and murder other people, are looters, rioters, rapists, robbers and murderers.  If you accurately report what really happened, and ignore the rest of what really happened, then you must be a racist, because only racists are motivated to report selective incidents to justify general conclusions.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 20, 2005 at 2:43 PM

Let’s try a thought experiment.  Let’s assume that all the colored folk in New Orleans, being the the incorrigible, inveterate thieves that you believe them to be, stole all the food and water, cash and transportation from all the white folk in New Orleans, and evacuated the area before the hurricane hit, leaving all the white folk in New Orleans to suffer the incompetent consequences of George Bush and his merry band of political sinecures.  Using your own implied definition of racial morality, one can only conclude that thousands of white victims of the hurricane would have simply, righteously, starved to death rather than loot and riot, rape and rob, and kill one another.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 20, 2005 at 3:06 PM

The hurricane is a social metaphor, Jay.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 20, 2005 at 3:10 PM

Let

Posted by wolf on Oct 20, 2005 at 3:15 PM

If you understood the difference between a straw man argument and an ad hom, wolf, you wouldn’t feel so obsessed with your own projective fantasies of my sexual inclinations.

My point, in case you and your redneck confederates missed it (and, predictably, you did just that) is that, given all the coverage concerning the suffering and social dislocation caused by the hurricane and the inadequate response to it, focusing on the brutal consequences is racist because it promotes racist conclusions with respect to the victims of the hurricane.  In fact, focusing on the rioting and looting conveniently ignores the apathetic response of a government (of predominantly white folks) whose reason for existence is to serve all of the people, not just the rich, white ones.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 20, 2005 at 4:11 PM

So Wolf (and Jay), what is the real problem with the article?

1) That it calls out bias that you deny exists.

2) That the hypothesis about why there is apparent bias is out of line.

Big difference.  It seems a little like you are asserting that there was no bias or that it was insignificant in terms of how the situation was reported.  What do you mean?

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 20, 2005 at 9:58 PM

This is silly. By your logic, we should never mention the holocaust, because it would reflect badly on Germans, or the conquistadors, because it might arouse anti-Spanish feelings.

And withholding negative information can actually hurt the people you’re trying to protect. E.g. if no-one was allowed to mention the high imprisonment rate for African Americans, we wouldn’t even know there is a problem that needs addressing.

And if repeating New Orleans atrocity stories means one must be a racist, does that mean Oprah hates black people? Of course not. Only confirmed racists saw these stories in a racist light. The rest of us were thinking “What if that were me down there? What would I do in that situation?”

This kerfuffle seems to show that PC ideologues are like Straussians, in that they believe there are some things that the common people are not fit to know.

Posted by eyeresist on Oct 21, 2005 at 12:23 AM

Or, for example, Eyeresist, the displacement and near extermination of the indigenous population for fear of making white Americans feel badly…

It is not surprising that this article has led to much misunderstanding. After all, we are not all Lacanian psychologist-philosophers who can view the hurricane as the social metaphor (as Major Major points out) as the author intended. He didn’t lay out any guidelines about what we should or should not report on - or declare what the common people are not fit to know. Reread the last two paragraphs. That’s ultimately what the article is really about - and there is nothing unclear or misleading here…

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 21, 2005 at 3:55 AM

“My point, in case you and your redneck confederates missed it (and, predictably, you did just that)”

You misunderstand. It is not so much i don’t understand your “argument”. Rather it is that it is foolish. Note that while i call your argument foolish, i refrain from calling *you* names. Surely we can rise above such things? (And no, i was not asserting you *really* solicit prostitutes, rather i was making a foolish argument in the same style as your foolish argument, hoping you would grasp the silliness of same).

Posted by wolf on Oct 21, 2005 at 6:06 AM

GreyArea - the problem with the article is that it claims reporting objective facts is racist, in and of itself. Frankly i am a bit stunned that *anyone* wouuld defend such idiocy. But i suppose polictical correctness continues to evolve. . .

Posted by wolf on Oct 21, 2005 at 6:12 AM

To restate what I said, the article explicitly states that ,

Even if all the reports on violence and rapes had proven to be factually true ... the motives that make me say it are false.

The author is ascribing racist motivation to anyone who reports the truth, just as Major Major did.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 21, 2005 at 7:34 AM

I think you are all missing the point. The author is not saying that accurate reporting is racist - although he does not do a good job explaining his thought clearly. I think the point is that people made-up racist stories and reported them. If they had LATER turned-out to be true, they would still be racist stories because when they were reported, they were made-up racist stories.

    What if the “boy who cried wolf” had gone yelling about a wolf that wasn’t there, but while he was yelling - a real wolf just happened to show-up?  Would he then be truthful? No, he is still a liar even though chance made him look truthful at that moment.

I think this is the give-him-the-benefit-of-the-doubt reading that we all hope for when writing.

Posted by Siskiyouz on Oct 21, 2005 at 9:29 AM

Excellent point Siskiyouz. The boy who cried wolf about a wolf that wasn’t there is a good analogy.

Posted by David in Canada on Oct 21, 2005 at 11:06 AM

Zizek also seems to be reiterating the adage that the greatest sin is to do the right thing for the wrong reasons.  It may be true that blacks in New Orleans did loot and rape, but to make that claim because “that’s what blacks would do” is dreadful, and the reason that “the right thing for the wrong reasons” is wrong is that it predicts further right things for wrong reasons, or means justified by ends, and this is morally corrupt.  An honest mistake is preferable to a correct statement motivated by dishonesty or avarice, for example racism.

A problem with Zizek’s analysis, that Eyeresist saw, I think, is that it depends on identifying motives, and while Zizek identifies those motives as racist, for many of us our motives for accepting the horror stories weren’t based on confirmed racism but on a general pessimism about human nature.  “Of course they’re looting and raping; we’re so fucked up as a society that when our support systems break down we can’t respond except as selfish brutes.”  This exception actually proves Zizek’s general theory, though: we’re trapped by our general preconceptions, racist or pessimist, and miss opportunities to make positive specific changes.

Posted by Laura Pyle on Oct 21, 2005 at 12:11 PM

A white woman is reported “scavenging for emergency supplies” in one story.  In another story, a black looter is reported.  If the stores they are taking goods from are, um… not open, then they are both actually looters.  So I suppose the story of the black looter is more truthful than the other, but only superficially so.

These sorts of side-by-side comparisons can be observed from the body of news reporting on Katrina.

What leads the reporters to conclude different things about the same basic action committed by two different people?  .  I don’t think it is unreasonable to explore the possible underlying cognitive models behind the contrasting images.

The article is certainly imperfect, but it seems to me that some are being a bit hasty in dismissing it.  Just because there was looting, rape and murder committed, doesn’t mean that there is no problem here.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 21, 2005 at 12:33 PM

wouldn’t the difference between “scavenging for emergency supplies” and looting also have something to do with the type of goods that were taken?  stealing food and stealing an iPod are not quite commensurate, given the situation…

Posted by achmann on Oct 21, 2005 at 1:54 PM

Of course they are different all together… who in your mind was taking the i-pod?

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 21, 2005 at 2:56 PM

achman:

..oon second thought, if I take something I can trade for food, am I looting?  We are pretty deep into a hypothetical situation at this point.  I’ve never seen very much context presented in any of the headline stories. 

I think it is potentially dangerous to give reporters the benefit of the doubt on assessing the semantic difference between looting and scavenging for emergency supplies.  However, I do believe it is important for researchers to follow up stories like this and look objectively at why the news is reported the way it is reported. 

Reporters are merely human.  It would be silly to deny that they have their own biases or to simply assert that due to their profession, they can turn them off.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 21, 2005 at 3:10 PM

Stealing anything is completely commensurate, given the situation.  In a period of catastrophe, when the normal moral constraints of civilized social interactions are suddenly ripped away, people act according to, and are judged by a completely different set of standards.  Property laws, in the face of a locally universal destruction of property, are abandoned and ignored.  People whose lives are in peril are justifiably unconcerned with the value of anyone’s property, and least of all with the property abandoned by those who fled for their own lives.

Condemning a specific group of people for their abnormal behaviour in an abnormal situation, one for which none of them were reponsible, is straight-out racist.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 21, 2005 at 3:40 PM

My critical reasonin’ and logic ain’t the best, but I sort of see the point of this article, you know?

In any case, I’d sure like to see you, Wolf, thrown into some god-forsaken hell hole situation like being left for dead in New Orleans, and see how you act.  lol.

Posted by JoeBlow on Oct 21, 2005 at 9:29 PM

As soon as I saw the words of that intellectual pervert, Jacques Lacan, I knew exactly what was to follow. The author’s “ideas” on “walls” (many of which are actually borders of sovereign states) subvert the whole dialogue and, predictably, pervert it. If people are able to escape their lands and get somewhere better, who will be left in the lands of tyrants? Those with the least courage, with the least resources, with the least of everything it takes to make their lives better. And so human capital spills to the lands of plenty, increasing the inequities that presently exist. [Compare the draft-dodgers’ flight to Canada (and those who claimed they’d go if W was re-elected), making Canada increasingly liberal (or Liberal) and America increasingly conservative with the loss of those liberals.]

As for the looting and raping: taking food is one thing, and LCD TV quite another. The real racism is the racism of Big Government’s big hand patting American blacks on the head and saying “there there” and, with tiny stipends exchanged for votes, increasing their dependency on the welfare state. The real racists here are the bend-over-backward whites who, to prove they aren’t racist, created a whole new plantation for fatherless families.

Posted by abu_nudnik on Oct 21, 2005 at 10:46 PM

The problem is that Mr Zizek undertakes to mull over a range of topics that is simply too vast - enough can be written to fill a book on each one - the EU’s boundaries, the Walls Present and Walls Past of this world, the Holocaust.

This brings in a lot of noise into what I assume is his central topic - views of the world through coloured lenses, seen in the light of the reporting of the aftermath of the hurricane.

For a start, when I was reading through, I remembered a study I read about, which found out that a discussion immediately loses any further point when somebody brings up Hitler or the Holocaust. In this case the author himself seems to have obliged.

Then while it might be the in-thing to see all races and classes as equal, we must agree that there ARE inherent differences - whether caused by heredity or environment - that we cannot ignore. (By the way my skin is brown in color, and I’m mailing from halfway around the globe)

The way someone who is of, say, Japanese origin sees the world (even if he is a second generation American) has to be different to at least some extent from, well, anyone else.

If someone kills another, or robs him, or beats him up, it is the same crime; and his guilt is no different if his skin is black, white, yellow, brown or - for the matter - green.

But if a look at the prison population says that there are more blacks there, then you have something to wonder about, and try to address. That however cannot be done by simply excusing the individual attacker based on the shade of his skin.

As for the Lurking Savage, just try another thought experiment. Wait on a street corner and, one by one, walk up to skins that are of various shades and occupy different positions in life - and slap each one of them.

Study their reactions.

If there is reporter looking on, and who will write a report, walk up to him, and slap him too. And read his report the next day. So much for objective reporting.

I know, because I was a reporter till three days before. No, I didn’t quit because anyone slapped me.

Posted by passerby on Oct 21, 2005 at 11:57 PM

As it happens WOLF was sreeching for the blood of those desperate looters and Rapists against, all argument for reason and perspective.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 22, 2005 at 2:56 AM

WOLF
<i>Let

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 22, 2005 at 3:02 AM

Rabbit is in a WOLF wacking mood ........... this will be his last entry for now, but shall return to this thread to add more useful input later. 

The Major says:

wolf, ..............obsessed with your own projective fantasies of my sexual inclinations

Rabbit mentions that Wolf has been known to employ such ‘imagery’ as this before, he has left much of his religion behind but retained his particlular kinks it seems.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 22, 2005 at 3:11 AM

The problem with the article is that it cries its own wolf story.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 22, 2005 at 8:39 AM

What I see lacking in the responses to this article are the tangible and real implications of this potentially racist dialogue that occured between the media, its viewers and emergency assistance services.  I thought that the most important point Zizek made was that these reports prevented emergency services from coming to the aid of needy people in New Orleans. 

If anyone is interested, the National Public Radio [NPR] program “This American Life” did a great radio show, interviewing people who were involved in the aftermath of the storm.  [You can listen to a free, archived stream of the show on their website].  The reporting of the situation led the military and police to harass and distrust anyone in New Orleans because they believed mayhew was ensuing, when it in fact was not.  There may have been wrong or immoral behavior by some people in New Orleans, but that does not mean that thousands had to be deprived of basic human needs because of a perception.  There is an obligation to provide assistance first and ask questions later, stopping only if there is a serious risk to those providing aid.  During the news coverage, I heard some reports of people getting shot at or hearing gunshots, but Zizek is claiming that these fears were unwarranted, and what if he is correct?  Then a gross disservice was perpetrated upon many innocent individuals. 

The other thing that this article does not address is the Bush debacle that led to the depraved conditions in New Orleans.  Though the article does not take this up, it is not a reality we can disregard.  If an evacuation had been planned or levees better supported, no one would have been forced into those depraved conditions in the first place. 

In conclusion, I think Zizek is not crying wolf but explaining in his own philosophical/Marxist way how a perception of people or an imagined community of people can create tangible and/or damaging consequences for society.  It stems from Zizek’s studies of communist/totalitarian regimes, in which discourse propped up unfair political systems.  In the American example, it is the media which determines the main discourse and the government which follows this ‘will of the people’.  If we as the people have nothing to say and allow the media to determine its own views of a situation, we can look forward to many more New Orleans-s.

Posted by bundeslagr on Oct 22, 2005 at 11:08 AM

I wish to cite another psychoanalytic anecdote, for reasons of personal edification, but also because I think it may shed some light on the highly problematic claim on which Zizek balances his entire argument.  Had all the disorder

Posted by metrosocial on Oct 22, 2005 at 2:23 PM

The reason “Scary Movie”  is funny it lets U peep over the balance at comedy; the New Orleans Deluge hurt because
it showed U a glimpse over the edge during tragedy.
“Everybody run here come the whites”  is humorous for the underlying truth.  They will lock U up if you dont. Yes the rich feel guilty not the poor.

Posted by Markangelo on Oct 22, 2005 at 5:42 PM

unfortunately there is no way to confirm what went on in New Orleans.that looting occured is a given,that murder and rape went is a given.to what extent that it occured is speculative at best. I suspect even euthanasia went down in New Orleans.We will never really know what went on.
But it is sure that some of these things if not all occured.
As they all occur in America regularly

Posted by skullker on Oct 22, 2005 at 6:14 PM

<i>  Metrosocial says :

Woman/Bee Anecdote :  “This anecdote is generally told pejoratively, meant to expose the quackeries and pretensions of psychoanalytic practice.  However, it raises an interesting question: why does this woman presumably initiate and continue her treatment, rather than, say, calling an exterminator?  Seriously, why? .....

Regardless of the

Posted by David in Canada on Oct 22, 2005 at 6:32 PM

What makes this cognitive structure so controversial is that it appears to be intrinsically human, and universally applicable.  Racism, sexism, homophobia, ethnocentrism, and religious or ideological affiliation seem to be “necessary” to promote social cohesion and co-operation, if also at the expense of those “minorities” which, in the aggregate, constitute a majority of the population.  This universal definition of the “other”, however specifically it’s defined, simultaneously defines the limits of our collective fraternity.  A hundred years from now, the genetically enhanced will regard the remainder of humanity with the same suppressed contempt and concescension which the economically enhanced currently relegate to the indigent and the ignorant.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 22, 2005 at 7:42 PM

We are still uncomfortable with the idea that the people from next door, the next village and the next country are the same as ourselves.

We see them, not us. Some see rivals, not equals. Others see enemies, not friends.

The difference is not in the person judged, but in the the person judging.

When, instead of calling them rivals or enemies, we can call them our equal or friend it is not them that have changed for the better, it is us .

Posted by David in Canada on Oct 22, 2005 at 8:01 PM

As has been said many times before:

” We have met the enemy. The enemy is us. “

Posted by David in Canada on Oct 22, 2005 at 8:07 PM

Lacan sounds right to Rabbit. That too is how Rabbit see’s the process of people believing things contrary to evidence or even their own beliefs of yesterday.  They have a need for something which is supplied on a give and take basis by the “machine”. The feeling that everything makes sense and all is known, the black hats are this and we are the white hats, and that can answer all questions, if there are any, which there are not. Questions are just conspiracy theories.

The feeling is provided by faith.  The ideas, are like pills, take this one and say it for this situation.  Tomorrow, that pill is forgotten we have a new one.  It is the way in which Bush has comitted and illegal war and continues to do it.

It is the way in which those people in Katrina were left to suffer and were actually maligned, instead of being assisted.  assistance was witheld and on the basis of what?

several have made comments on this thread about not know the extent of looting or raping and other violence.

The following has been reported and Rabbit contends as true.

The police who claimed rapes and murders and shootings by armed looters have been sacked and these reports were untrue.  The national guard had control of the situation at the superdome things and despite investigating a couple of assault allegations, with no result, they said no rapes.  One death from shooting but maybe suicide and nobody shot at any national guardsmen or at their helicopters.

If anybody wishes to say otherwise, then Rabbit will gladly provide all info but he assumes it must be widely known?

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 23, 2005 at 3:20 AM

By the way, some of us did the math at the time of the most extreme claims of violence and found the rate to be less than the same crimes among that many people on a daily basis.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 23, 2005 at 3:25 AM

Re major major’s thought experiment:

Let’s revise the assumptions and pretend that the underclass is white and not black.  The blacks plan ahead and have the means evacuate themselves.  They do so not by stealing (as they do in mm’s experiment) but by behaving like responsible adults.  Let’s assume the whites left behind are there not because they have been robbed of everything by blacks but because they are have all the qualities that marks an underclass.  No, they would not starve “righteously.”  They would behave as underclass people behave.  They would act as New Orleans’ black underclass did act, which is to do nothing but complain that help did not arrive as fast as a free breakfast at the Head Start program and then to engage in various sorts of anti-social behavior. 

Under your own thought experiment, the choice for the whites would not be (1) starve righteously or (2) loot, riot, rape, rob and kill.  Not being members of an underclass, they would have skills to find other alternatives.  Even if the blacks in your experiment had robbed the whites of all their material things, the whites would still have the possessions that count: ability to organize; to lead; to follow; to cooperate; to help oneself and others; to take care of and rely on one’s familty.  Etc, etc. 

Re major major’s racist language: 

Many people who find “nigger” to be a vile term think nothing of using words like “redneck” and “hillbilly.”  One sort of racist insult is simply not tolerated in our society.  Saying “nigger” in public can end one’s career.  But high minded liberals can use derogatory words describing poor rural Southern whites and poor Southern highlanders as synonyms for ignorance, prejudice and violence and no one seems to mind. 

I am about to conduct my own experiment: let’s see if the moderator of this forum permits me to write “‘nigger’” or tones it down to “‘n——r.’”  If the moderator does so I have a request.  Tone down the other bad words too:  “‘r——-k’” and “‘h————y.’”

Posted by geebee on Oct 23, 2005 at 5:38 AM

Geebee,

Rabbit does not detect a reasonable tone behind your words, indeed you sound somewhat full of preconceptions..

You wouldn’t be a “poor rural Southern white” by any chance?

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 23, 2005 at 6:04 AM

Of course, you’re right. geebee.  The whites would have done the same thing the blacks did.  They would have organized among themselves to provide each other with the mutual support required to survive the disaster, including those isolated incidents of mayhem which the racists feel compelled to relegate to racial or ethnic categorties.  People don’t bleed black or white, fascist or communist, blood.  The response to disaster is completely human, and not all of it is noble or virtuous.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 23, 2005 at 6:49 AM

GhostRabbit:  Your comment (the first sentence) lacks substance.  I have no response because there is nothing to respond to.

Re your question (second sentence): rather than comment on the content of my argument you ask about my race and my regional and socio-economic background. 

Is my race relevant?  I disapprove of racist language.  “Nigger” is an offensive term and so is “redneck.”  I use neither. 

Major Major:  Maybe there was another hurricane and another city named New Orleans.  In the events I am familiar with there was very little self help by the members of the black underclass.  There were tens of thousands of people doing what they always do: depending on the government to do everything. 

You seem to think it is racist to note that the helpless victims and the criminals were black.  I suggest that the opposite is true.  Willful blindness about these facts points to a belief that blacks are inferior and cannot be held to the same standards as whites.  That is the most profound sort of racism.

Posted by geebee on Oct 23, 2005 at 7:44 AM

Geebee, your lines drip with racist undertones - the blacks doing what they always do, huh?:
complain about having to wait too long for their free breakfasts, live off government handouts, etc. You’re spreading bad, bad vibes, here gee…

You are (indirectly, though not *that* indirectly) denying that blacks have always been given - and still are being given - a raw deal in American society. Your innuendoes are far worse than using the word “nigger”.

And your claim that “redneck” is racist language - on a par with “nigger” - is laughable. The latter refers to an entire race of people. The former refers to a sub-class of a race of people (people who belong to this sub-class by their own choice): those with an ignornant, racist and bigoted mindset. It is not the *term* “redneck” that is offensive - it is
*being* a redneck that is offensive.

Another difference: black people are offended when white people refer to them as “niggers”. Many rednecks (even most?) tend to wear the term like a badge of honour. They even take pleasure in being referred to rednecks by their “enemies”. I’ve heard them use the term “redneck pride” in self-reference. I can well imagine a modern-day “Oakie from Muskokie” (spelling?) with the word “redneck” in it…

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 23, 2005 at 10:42 AM

Anarcho-Sozi:

You should take a lesson in reading comprehension.

I did not say that “blacks [are] doing what they always do.”  In reference to the black underclass,  I said that “There were tens of thousands of people doing what they always do: depending on the government to do everything. ”

There is a distinction.  Perhaps your mind is not subtle enough to grasp it.

I did not say “blacks’ are any certain way.  I did say that many thousands of underclass blacks in New Orleans are dependent on government support.  You think one must be racist to state facts. 

As to “redneck.”  What is laughable is your denying that the term is offensive.  You cite the fact that many whites refer to themselves as “rednecks” as proof that the word is OK.  Many blacks use the word “nigger” in a similar fashion.  That makes this term OK too, I guess. 

You fail utterly to understand the point about “redneck.”  “Rednecks” were poor white rural Southerners, people who worked in the fields and got sunburned necks as they plowed and hoed under the hot sun.  Maybe you think people “choose” that lifestyle but I assure you they don’t.  It is a hard way to make a living.

The offensive character of the term displayed very accurately in your argument.  People choose to be ignorant and racist therefore they choose to be “rednecks.”  In other words all poor white Southerners are ignorant racists.  That attitude is known as “prejudice.”

Posted by geebee on Oct 23, 2005 at 12:05 PM

You’re right again, geebee.  There was another hurricane and another New Orleans (the “other” ones).  The problem lies in your selective filtration of the “facts” which were themselves initially filtered by the media.  When supplies of food and are limited, people share them.  When those supplies are depleted, they forage for further supplies of the same.  The media reported all of this, although they referred to the search as “looting”.  When these subsequent supplies are quickly depleted, people attempt to evacuate themselves from the scene, since, of course, no other alternative course of evacuation was made available to them.  When their attempts to evacuate themselves from the source of disaster is blocked by the police and inhabitants of adjacent neighborhoods, they continue to forage for food and water in their own neighborhoods, and vent their frustration and rage by looting, rioting and, not incidentally, fulfilling the expectations of racists.  None of the above indicates in any way any specific preference for anyone affiliated with any given race, gender, sexuality, religion or ideology.  Any comprehensive account of Sherman’s march through the South describes essentially the same process.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 23, 2005 at 12:19 PM

Sharing.  Yes.  What we saw was sharing. 

Some policemen shared a dealer’s Caddies.

A policewoman was caught by MSMBC sharing WalMart’s shoes.

Posted by geebee on Oct 23, 2005 at 12:53 PM

One more thing:

The accounts of the violence came thru the media.  The panicky NO officials said things (10,000 dead floating in the streets!)  and the media repeated what they were told.

Now we are told over and over again that there was little violence and that the accounts were wildly exaggerated.

Maybe.  I wasn’t there.  But I did read about life in the Superdome in the Manchester England and Melbourne Australia newspapers.  Tourists from these places were holed up in the Superdome along with the locals.  Their story was not a pretty one.  These tourists were under constant threat by black predators.

Posted by geebee on Oct 23, 2005 at 1:02 PM

geebee,
your response to my last post is some of the greatest nonsense I have read in a long time. Unfortunately, it is now 1.00 in the morning in Europe and my Lebensabschnittsgef

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 23, 2005 at 3:50 PM

If your English is deficient perhaps you should not attempt to lecture native American English speakers about the subtle meanings of unusual words.

Posted by geebee on Oct 23, 2005 at 6:11 PM

Here’s the story from another perspective:

Denise Moore, 42, from the Convention Center:

“Lots of people were dropped off, but no one was picked up. We thought we had been left there to die. There were young men with guns, but they were the only ones who people could count on. They were the ones that brought us food and water. Nobody had eaten in days. They got the food and water for the old people and babies. Cops would come by, then speed off. The National Guardsmen rolled by with guns, they never brought us anything. They left us there to die.”

Alva Harris, 58, From Jefferson Parish:

“When we got there, we were hopeless and hungry. What did we have greet us? A line of military police with M-16 rifles. They watched us, caged us in barricades, laughed at us, took pictures of us with their camera phones. I saw a young man get down on his hands and knees and beg for water for his little baby, and I saw that child die right there on the concrete. This was murder. That’s the truth. They wanted us dead. They just didn’t think so many of us would survive.”

Shelly Sorina, 31 from the Superdome:

When the buses came to take us from the Superdome, they were taking tourists first. By that I mean White people. They were just picking them out of the crowd. I don’t know why we were treated the way we were, but it was like they didn’t care.”

Posted by Vostok on Oct 23, 2005 at 6:53 PM

Geebee….Rabbit shall be more specific for you then.

Nigger was and is a racist term, a form of bigotry.  That doesn;t stop one using the words and it shouldn’t. What is supposed to mean is we don’t call each other such things in a disparaging way, unless we mean to insult someone.

Redneck, Hillbilly and A*sehole are not necessarily Racist terms. They, like White trash for that matter, are not specific to any race, but intended to label people, for whom bigotry is a defining part of their character.

It is not bigoted to call a bigot a bigot or to treat him like one.

Rabbit was trying to be polite but will on your insisitence specifically say you
seem to be a Redneck.

Rabbit goes with the second definition in this instance.

Specific enough for now. Rabbit see’s others are engaging you in fair debate.  Rabbit is just borrowing the moron for a moment.  Wack   Wack

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 23, 2005 at 8:41 PM

From Webster’s New World Dictionary of American English, Third College Editon

* redneck or red-neck n [[from the characteristic sun-burned neck acquired in the fields by farm laborers]] [slang] a poor, white, rural Southerner, often. spec. one regarded as ignorant bigoted, violent, etc.

(The asterisk indicates an Americanism)

From Merriam Webster On Line

Main Entry: red

Posted by geebee on Oct 24, 2005 at 4:20 AM

That’s right White Trash has been defined as including not only Black people sometimes but also Bush, including Babs.

This is the definition Rabbit directed you to, Redneck.

2. A white person regarded as having a provincial, conservative, often bigoted attitude.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 24, 2005 at 4:44 AM

Oz uses that pronunciation and English is thus closer to my mother tongue than that Pidgin you call American.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 24, 2005 at 4:45 AM

Just because Rabbit is calling you a white person with a provincial, conservative, and bigoted attitude, it is based only on a reading of the attitudes inherant in your writings. As a non bigoted person, as far as race, Rabbit can actually see other entirely prosaic explanations for failings you consider to somehow be inherant within a race of people.  The socio-economic factors especially, combined with other social historical ones, are more than enough to explain the disparity in certain crimes, their detection even more so, and to the economic situations some people find themselves in.

There is a whole world of nuanced ideas about human interactions and history generally which is denied to some people by their own doing, their own willful ignorance. 

It is from the position of relative freedom, to consider many more possibilities than a closed mind can, that Rabbit calls you a redneck, by the above definition.  there are indeed more appropriate words and Rabbit has had this private reservation all along, if you would prefer Rabbit examined your postings more carefully and found a more fitting term, it could be arranged.  You have in the least displayed reasoning and a willingness to engage a subject directly.

For this Rabbit will re-trace, and re-consider.  However, the Rabbit is somewhat irreverant and has a knack for naming things, all Rabbits do.  So it is only a good idea if you consider yourself to be hard done by with the term Redneck, and that any potential replacement is not likely to be a step back.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 24, 2005 at 5:01 AM

Lebensabschnittsgef

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 6:39 AM

or, more colloquial, love of my life

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 6:40 AM

actually, that would be idiomatically, not colloquial.

Sorry.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 6:41 AM

Sorry, if this is getting posted a second time - but the first time it didn’t seem to go through…

Okay, geebee, your stereotypically reactionary statements were not about blacks specifically, but about *all* people at the bottom of the socio-economic class ladder. But the obnoxious sub-text - that it is their fault that they are there - is still there. It has nothing to do with the nature of turbo-capitalism, right? I’ll not comment further on that.

So my English is deficient because I don’t know how to translate one word? Well, I’ll give it a try:
Lebensabschnittsgef

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 7:24 AM

<i>Jay, you missed the potential aspect of temporariness in this. The word you translated is

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 8:13 AM

English is more like French when it comes to making up new words, though there are plenty of Germanic words in English that combines two (though rarely more) words together to make a new one.

Hyphenation is what is usually done with phrases that become single concepts (which I unfortunately omitted above).

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 8:16 AM

Redneck is not necessarily derogatory. It can refer to an unsophisticated earthy common sense lifestyle devoid of pretension.

Check out Jeff Foxworthy’s views on unsophistication. It is a hoot, if only because it is so grittily true.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 8:20 AM

<i>Finally, I think the accusation of being

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 8:23 AM

Racism is not unidirectional. There are plenty of black, hispanic, and Asian racists in America. The whole stupid construct about how racism and sexism are unidirectional is crap. Attitudes are attitudes, prejudices are prejudices regardless of your race or sex. The unidirectional argument is just a way of excusing everyone in the world except for white males for any crap they want to shovel.

And outside of academia - does anyone believe that? its just too absurd to take seriously. A black man that says all whites are scum is not racist?

wake up!

Posted by Siskiyouz on Oct 24, 2005 at 8:32 AM

Okay, let me reword that. A black in America has every right to be prejudiced against whites. It’s probably not going to do him much good in life, but it is understandable and not to be set on a par with racism on the part of the oppressor.

Obviouisly, whites are not the only racists in the world - even if you take my original standpoint that only the oppressor can be a racist -  I’ve heard a lot, for example, about Japanese racism.

But still, you’re the one who had better wake up, Siskiyouz. White males - and their system of imperial domination and subjugation - *are* the world’s main problem - and they have been for a long, long time.

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 9:25 AM

The perceptions created of Blacks in New Orleans as looters, rapist and criminals appears to be the primary role of U S corporate media; to substantiate and justify the rationale for white supremacy.  If this distorted view of Black Americans had not been promoted, corporate media would have been accused of not reporting the full Katrina “story” because white folks “just knew” this would happen the way it was reported and can now skirt any remote sense of responsibility and justify their lack of remorse by saying to themselves “those niggers deserved to suffer”.  In reality white folks all over the gulf coast suffered the affects of weather disasters too but those stories weren’t/aren’t being broadcast because Americans don’t expect bad things to happen to white people since they’re inherently “good people”.  Is it racist for any Black person to hate white people since they buy into this?

Posted by theloneous on Oct 24, 2005 at 9:29 AM

A black in America has every right to be prejudiced against whites.

Huh?! Since when does ANYONE have the right to be prejudiced?

<i>It

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 9:37 AM

I’m sorry, Jay, but I’m going to stand by my statement. It is laughable for whites to complain about racism on the part of blacks.

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 9:54 AM

I agree, it is laughable.

Until individual whites, who have never demonstrated a solitary prejudical bone in their lives, start to lose job opportunities because of it.

To condemn a man’s future merely on the basis of their race is racist.

Unless we are to have different standards for different races, but then that would destroy the whole argument, wouldn’t it?

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 11:09 AM

Quotes from several posters and my comments:

“Once again, the term

Posted by geebee on Oct 24, 2005 at 11:12 AM

geebee,

Apologies. I will refrain from using that moniker here.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 11:17 AM

Jay Cline:

Thanks.

Some people can be persuaded with facts and reason.  Others cannot.

Posted by geebee on Oct 24, 2005 at 11:25 AM

geebee,
you repeatedly refuse to address any of my points about the word “redneck” - and then accuse me of ignorance. And yet many American sources seem to agree with me that the main meaning of “redneck” today is rabbit’s Nr. 2 meaning, *not* “all rural white southerners”. Here is my argument one last time:

<i>Of course

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 11:33 AM

Quote from geebee:

Excusing blacks for things that whites would not be excused for.  Holding blacks to lower standards.  This is racism at its most profound.

Affirmative action as a form of racism. Even the most “profound” form of racism. This is a very old argument, geebee. And it’s pretty sickening. The alternative is, of course, doing absolutely nothing to try to correct all the wrongs done to blacks - over the centuries and right up to the present day.

Blacks have the same chances on average as whites in modern-day America, right? That’s why most of the prison population is black - and why most of the death-row candidates are black, right? And the average black American has attended a school equal in quality to the average white American, right? And the fact that far more than 12 per cent (which is I believe the percentage of blacks in the US) of those left behind in New Orleans is pure coincidence, right?

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 11:49 AM

Anarcho-Sozi

Yes, so called affirmative action is racial discrimination. 

New Orleans’ population is 67% black.  The US as a whole is 13% or so.  It would be odd indeed if the population left behind in New Orleans after Katrina were 12% black.  To accomplish this the government would have to take white people INTO the stricken area.

Note your choice of words: “left behind.”  This implies that some people were taken out (by the gov’t or some other agency) before the storm and others left behind.  The people who evacuated in time did so by their own actions.  They did not wait for the government to provide transportation. 

Like every other large American central city New Orleans is largely populated by poor blacks, many worse than poor, i.e, underclass.  These are the people who lacked the wherewithal to get out on their own.  They waited for the gov’t to act and were let down, largely by the corrupt local gov’t which is the first responder.

Posted by geebee on Oct 24, 2005 at 12:22 PM

And the fact that far more than 12 per cent (which is I believe the percentage of blacks in the US) of those left behind in New Orleans is pure coincidence, right?

The facts are correct, but if you want to make a conclusion of racism about those left behind in New Orleans, you need to compare those left behind in New Orleans with the percentage of blacks in New Orleans, not the US in general.

I am not discounting the argument, just the statistics being employed.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 12:25 PM

Geebee,

That’s not what I meant to say. I expressed myself very poorly. Worse than poorly. I totally misled the reader.

What I meant was: the fact that the percentage of inner-city poor (actually not just in N.O. but in all big US cities) is well over 13 per cent black.

How can such a high percentage of inner-city poor be black if blacks and whites have equal chances in general?

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 12:37 PM

Sorry, that was Jay, not Geebee.

Back off list on this topic…

Posted by Anarcho-Sozi on Oct 24, 2005 at 12:38 PM

It iIs a very valid question. But to ascribe it to current racism is not an foregone conclusion.

Thought experiment: if you have a magic wand and could wipe out racism in an instant, will the effects of centuries of racism also be wiped out?

No.

As I have argued re: the Cosby Debate, the racism of the 50s and 60s has been greatly diminished. But now we have to rebuild our communities devastated by decades of welfare state mentality. In the 40s and 50s and 60s, the African-American communities arguably had much stronger family institutions than other communities. Now, that community is in disarray, broken. And the children have suffered the most.

What is needed is a reinvestment of affirmative action dollars into real educational programs and communities where our children don’t have to dodge gangs as they run from school to home.

What is holding back black progress is not just racism, but the vicious cycle that encourages self-victimization. Charges of racism in the wake of Katrina only serve to divide and polarize the whole community.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 12:51 PM

“How can such a high percentage of inner-city poor be black if blacks and whites have equal chances in general?”

70% of black children born in US are born to unmarried women (and girls).  Many live in a culture of inter-generational poverty, a kind of poverty that is spiritual and moral more than material and financial. 

They do not have the same chances that my children had.  Not by any stretch of the imagination. 

My wife and I married when we were 28.  I had a job.  I worked and took care of my children.  My wife and I stayed married.  We raised our children and prepared them for a self-sufficient life.  My own parents did the same for me and my siblings.  As did their parents for them.  Intergenerational success. 

Your question seems to imply that we all start off the same, and that government confers advantages on some and not on others.  And that the goodies are divided up by race. 
   
That is not the case.  What people do, how they behave, is the greatest factor in their succcess and the success of their children.  We are not passive recipients of government largess.  We are actors.  We do things.  And what we do is the biggest factor in how we do.

Posted by geebee on Oct 24, 2005 at 1:06 PM

absolutely!

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 24, 2005 at 1:19 PM

Geebee  If Rabbit said he has seen it, then you need but ask and he will produce something, but until he has had a chance to reply to an initial query, best not to go making assumptions.  This is a start, where a definition of White Trash is alluded to which can include Dubya, it is not the article Rabbit has in mind which is an essay on the subject, but it will be forthcoming.

Everybody understands that it is no longer acceptable to be rude to racial or ethnic minorities; see how Bush’s conservative Republicans go out of their way to avoid insulting Islam. The one group that is considered fair game, however, is the kind of ‘white trash’ who can be branded racist. White trash from, say, Essex are an easy target. White trash from backward Texas are easier. And rich white trash from Texas are the easiest of all. President Bush has thus become the symbol of one minority it is deemed politically correct to hate.

source

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 25, 2005 at 2:12 AM

Maybe Rabbit should make one thing clear, he is aware that Redneck is offensive slang.  It did not seem necessary to actually label it as an insult. It seemed self evident to Rabbit and since he didn’t say stupid redneck, he gave you the benefit of the doubt in this regard, my mistake. Rabbit shall try to clearly label his remarks if he percieves any misunderstanding hereover.

The definition of number two, which is a choice, is the one Rbbit originally alerted you to, and the others are not in this instance approriate, and in fact Rabbit would not use the other definition, for he feels it is bigoted.

Although Anarcho-Sozi has had a little trouble articulating precisely what he means, less his fault than yours, since you are the American speaker, his point is nonetheless reasonable.  The resentment of disadvantaged minorities of the majority which has shown rascist attitudes towards them in the past, to their disadvantage, is not the same as the racism which led to the disadvantage.  Then the minorities too may find Labels with which to show their resentment, and these will in reflection seem to have a rascist bent, but this was seldom the choice of the minority which first suffered at the hands of the Oppressor group

This is rubbish <i>If you call me a

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 25, 2005 at 2:35 AM

Rabbit also now feels obliged to mention he cannot generally find MUCH of consequence with which to disagree with GeeBee’s position.  ..............................He reasons well and the matters we are disagreeing on are really only opinions and largely semantic.

Rabbit was a Ratbag…..................
GeeBee is not a Big Redneck…..................

The thing which Rabbit would say about the Racial stuff from Katrina, and much of it can be traced back to an earlier thread on ITT which was actual at the time of the disaster, and when the reports of Looting and Violence were at their peak, is this.

The impression we got, from the reports was that all these things were going on, and even then the numbers from the reports seemed over dramatised, they were not actually that high or unreasonable under the circumstances. See the link above and you will see what Rabbit said then and what he is saying now is being said with the benefit of hindsight. 

The impression was of all this bad stuff happening, which was depicted as being predominantly Black and some Poor Whites, and that this was partly to blame for help not being provided.

This has been shown to have been completely false. There was no basis for any of the reports of Rapes, Murders, shooting at National Guardsmen or widespread looting.  Some looting and yes, some serious organised scale looting by Police has been uncovered, was evident, but what do you expect?

the things was shown as being there when it wasn’t. There was a racial component involved at the time in the depictions and since the depictions were false they indicate deepseated Racism. Like it or not.  It was a mirror to society in the larger picture, I think.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 25, 2005 at 2:55 AM

Intergenerational poverty?

Intergenerational success?

Good Grief, GooBer.  I haven’t read such a load moralistic crap since, well, since you last posted your redneck truisms to this site.  You think whites are superior to non-whites because they’re married and maintain stable marraiges throughout their working lives?  No shit, Sherlock.  Any couple, white or not, married or not, who maintain a stable relationship throughout their working lives will achieve a more affluent social staus.  The operative terms are “stable relationship” and “working”.

Racism, by definition, is the maintenance of “intergenerational poverty” by one racial or ethnic majority group over another racial or ethnic minority group through means of social and economic restraints, like job and housing discrimination, substandard public and private education, and, of course, adherence to those cherished racist cultural truisms for which you feel such a fond regard.

The “intergenerational poverty” of the urban black commuinity was created over generations of American institutional racism.  It is currently aggravated by the limited “intergenerational success” of the Liberal project, which you hope to abolish.  Voting rights, welfare rights, abortion rights, affirmative action and anti-discrimination statutes all combined to allow some members of the black community to escape the “intergenerational poverty” which you so eloquently describe, by escaping from their formerly segregated communities.  The people who remain, white or black, are the ones who fell through the safety net which you and your racist representatives hope to dismantle.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 25, 2005 at 4:03 AM

Definitions:

In addition the definition of racism given earlier, I have another.

“Institutional racism” means there is no identifiable racism at all but we have to blame something or someone for our troubles so we choose unnamed institutions. 

“Any couple, white or not, married or not, who maintain a stable relationship throughout their working lives will achieve a more affluent social staus. “

It seems you agree with me. 

I have been labled as racist in this forum but I don’t take it seriously.  The definition is dumbed down so much that the word is meaningless. 

BTW, have I identified my race?  Some people seem to jump rather quickly to conclusions. 

I would also be interested if you could cite one thing I have written that is racist. 

Here is the definition of racism:

Main Entry: rac

Posted by geebee on Oct 25, 2005 at 4:25 AM

<blockquote>You think whites are superior to non-whites because they

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 25, 2005 at 6:57 AM

Correction:

No. But someone who comes from a stable family background, regardless of race, has significant advantages over someone who doesn’t.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 25, 2005 at 6:59 AM

geebee says:  “70% of black children born in US are born to unmarried women (and girls).  Many live in a culture of inter-generational poverty, a kind of poverty that is spiritual and moral more than material and financial.”.  The operative phrase in this flawed premise is “culture of inter-generational poverty”.  Such a culture is not derived or driven by spiritual or moral values but by perceived options for survival while maintaining a little dignity.  Cosby implies that the culture he berates is a drag on the progression of Blacks in America but I don’t think he would argue people are spiritually dead or immoral, only that they continually limit reactions to their situation in self defeating and destructive ways.  He promotes education as the best remedy because educated informed people perceive their options to be more broad and varied.

Posted by theloneous on Oct 25, 2005 at 7:41 AM

At the risk of sounding stupid, um… who do you think created the situation Jay?  I mean it is pretty clear that whites in this country have a lot more to do with maintaining and fostering the status quo than blacks do, wouldn’t you agree?

By the way, has anyone given thought to what *poverty* does to the stability of a family?  Surely families that function well do better, but is there no point where doing badly enough causes families to fall apart?  I think we can safely say that the solution to poverty is not as simple as getting married.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 25, 2005 at 10:16 PM

Rabbit has nort really got any substantial issues with any opinions on this thread, and as a courtesy only is letting people know this.. Of course he shall look back in case anybody felt a need to reply directly to anything posted by him, but overall, Rabbit feels he has wacked someone, mostly for fun and has not even made any specific points worth mentioning, so cheerio, and Cheers, GeeBee, sorry, you don’t actually seem too bad at this point, Rabbit was a bit hasty and doesn’t detect a real rascist so much as a slightly slanted viewpoint, not much different to his own natural upbringing at least.  The Redneck word was used too loosely and was only justified in retrospect.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 26, 2005 at 12:15 AM

If 70% of the children of whatever race is being raised by unmarried woman ... Spouting racist nonsense is stupid. How have whites created that situation?  ... come up with solutions.

who do you think created the situation Jay?

I guess the underlying assumption there is that those 70% are mulatto???

Persistent poverty is certainly an onerous factor. But, as I have said earlier,

the racism of the 50s and 60s has been greatly diminished. But now we have to rebuild our communities devastated by decades of welfare state mentality. In the 40s and 50s and 60s, the African-American communities arguably had much stronger family institutions than other communities. Now, that community is in disarray, broken. And the children have suffered the most.

My own opinion is that the welfare state has done more to contribute to the damage evident in the current conditions of the poor than anything else.

The welfare state provided little, if any, encouragement and motivation for the poor to find ways out of it. Instead it entrenched the poor into the recipients of the “nanny state” and made them beholden to the party that refused to fix it long after the dangers were evident.

If FDR’s and LBJ’s welfare state is the answer, why after 60 years, three generations!, is it still so critically needed?

Katrina definitely exposed the underbelly of the poor and their condition. But encouraging and reinforcing tired old racist cliches, white or black, is NOT the solution.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 9:58 AM

I think we can safely say that the solution to poverty is not as simple as getting married.

simple? Yes, I agree.

But it is good and necessary start!

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 10:00 AM

my point about marriage is that the statistics pointing to unmarried parents are, by and large, poorer than married ones does no good if we don’t consider which is the symptom and which is the cause. (ie: does being impoverished make it more difficult to stay married?)

If this is the case, then getting married is not a first step.  Dealing with the conditions that lead to poverty would be a more effective first step.

Does the welfare state really lead to poverty?  I mean it is such an age-old argument, why is the matter not settled by now?  Don’t you think it is really an oversimplification?  During feudal times, there wasn’t a very effective welfare state, yet plenty of people lived in poverty.  Isn’t that a bit inconsistent with the assertion that if we simply stop helping people, they will take care of themselves?

Do you really think that lowering taxes and unleashing unfettered capitalism is supposed to result in a thriving middle class?  Would eliminating the minimum wage and abolishing unions help solve the problem?  Why were these institutions created in the first place?  Was everything just fine before ‘big government’ got in the way?

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 26, 2005 at 11:59 AM

Does the welfare state really lead to poverty?

Never said it did. But in the second half of the last century, the implementation of the welfare state without incentive to better oneself has led to an entrenchment of the existing poverty.

<blockquote>Isn

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 12:28 PM

<blockquote>During feudal times, there wasn

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 12:31 PM

<blockquote>my point about marriage is that the statistics are… no good if we don

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 1:33 PM

Where do you get your data on the strength of African American Families over 60 years in the past?  I’m not saying you are making this stuff up, but what measurements are you using?  Divorce rates per capita?

I would love to see some in-depth analysis that outlines the qualitative differences in families of the descendants of slaves in this country.  I’m sure some anthropologists were curious about the subject before and after the new deal.

Why didn’t everyone rise out of the great depression equally?  Great stuff.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 26, 2005 at 2:35 PM

First of all, it was institutional racism that created the problem of poverty among non-white minorities, to begin with.  And the institutions were slavery and colonialism.  That’s right, Jay. We’re back to those tired old Liberal arguments which you feel obliged to dismiss without any adequate rebuttal.  British colonialism did not end with their defeat during the Revolutionary War, but continued under American administration in the form of incremental colonialism, territory by territory transformed into a constitutional confederacy of united states.  After the Second American Revolutionary War, the war which introduced and consolidated the Industrial Revolution within our country, slavery was formally abolished and the confederacy subordinated to a federal republic, one which allowed the Southern states to institute segregation in exchange for their allegience to federalism.  American colonialism was made possible by European emigration, which allowed the European nations to rid themselves of their “excess labor capacity” by shipping it out to our shores, where they (the emigrants) were employed to colonize the continent,  over the graves of its original inhabitants.  It’s no surprise to discover that these emigrants were regarded with as much contempt as their non-white counterparts.  In fact, they were socially equivalent to our “emancipated”, if also segregated, slaves and the indigenous natives which they were forced to subdue in order to appropriate their land.  But unlike their non-white counterparts, they were easilly assimilated, those who survived the conquest, into a white supremacist culture.  The legacy of that culture continues to this day, and the comparative consequences of the hurricane in New Orleans is just another example of that legacy.  I really get a kick out of listening to conservatives lecture the liberals about the virtues of “self-sufficiency”, as if they were, in fact, self-reliant rather than dependent upon government subsidies to the businesses which they own or administrate, and the unremunerated labor of the people employed, both foreign and domestic, to produce the products they require to produce a profit.  If they could be confronted with the original ancestors which they religiously revere they would run screaming from the confrontation.  They would resemble the people they presently find intolerable.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 26, 2005 at 3:03 PM

We’re back to those tired old Liberal arguments which you feel obliged to dismiss without any adequate rebuttal.

Which ones? There are so many to choose from.

it was institutional racism that created the problem of poverty among non-white minorities, to begin with.

Absolutely. Never said it wasn’t. But I have said that the institutional racism that existed before the Great Dr. King, is largely gone. The South of today is not the South of the 50s and that wasn’t even the South of the Confederacy.

Racism itself will never die, but it has been castrated to a large extent.

What I have said, repeatedly, and what everyone is ignoring what I have said, is that confrontation racist politics is not the answer.

Not anymore.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 4:00 PM

Major Major’s own diatribe from the start proves racism and prejudice, as in pre-judging people, still exists.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 26, 2005 at 4:01 PM

Jay Cline is asked once more to stop the Blockquotes, if it persists, complaints will be made, it is irritating, and sincen Jay contributes very little of value to these threads it is to be hoped he could show a bit more dignity than his “pissing contest” games.  The blockquotes are annoying, go and find a site which uses smilies, if that is so important to you Jay.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 26, 2005 at 4:59 PM

He is a flippant, empty headed little prick and prolific as hell when pontificating.  If it isn’t obvious Jay loves himself tell us what is?  Jay you are a poser, you have as usual nothing but what you imagine to be clever statements. They are stock slogans mostly, and any usefullness they may afford you in some forums, is lost here.  You have never given a reference for anything, your opinions are universally disrespected due mainly to your ABSOLUTE inability to express then coherantly in connection with reality.  You have nothing but words, unconvincing even on their face.  You are so out of your depth on this forum it is sad to watch.  It isn’t that Scorpy is not more stubborn than you, he is, but he at least can formulate a coherant argument, until the inevitable foot shot.

Rabbit thought he detected some intelligence, expecially when you noticed what was obvious when Luminous Beauty posted your back and forth above, that you were being a Troll.  You are being a troll so long as you refuse to do anything but pontificate with not reply or challenge.  You are basically affecting a monologue with reference to others words on a selective basis.  The blockquotes especially which always fuck up a threads readability, and fill space are especially irritating when they are always in the midst of your mind-numbingly useless diatribe.

Would others please remind Jay about the blockquotes, Rabbit thought he’d gotten the message the first time he asked, albeit in a less than polite fashion.  If somebody is so crass as to be unable to realise such a faux pas, don’t expect Rabbit to politely tap them on the shoulder and whisper in their ear.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 26, 2005 at 5:39 PM

Oh and since Jay felt the need to “up the ante” so to speak when he realised that others had started using HTML, let Rabbit make it perfectly clear how the magicians tricks can be seen through, the easy way.  Just to take the wind out of any more posers’ sails.

Ask your mouse to go up to view, and when the pointer is there, click the right button, and then select source.  Left click source, and a page will open , which looks incredibly boring, but it is if you look closely the nuts and bolts of the page.  It is the secret instructions to the electrons, from these plans they can make the web page you see.  If you want to know exactly how something is done, locate the part of the page which relates to it, and see what did it.

HTML is always preceded, as far as Rabbit knows by < > and ends with the </ >.  Try it with this page and you will see.  Rabbit does not mind magic, but let it be magic and not merely card tricks.  Jay much better to be known as the person who inspired everybody to evolve, than to be trying to maintain the mystique.  This is how greedy and ambitious men hijacked our trust in the first place.  Rabbit is about removing mystery and simple ideas, which work.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 26, 2005 at 5:50 PM

Sorry meant the left button on mouse, both times.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 26, 2005 at 5:51 PM

Please, Jay.  Don’t let my racist diatribes distract you from responding to GrayArea’s request.  Where *do* you get the data to support your assertions with respect to the stability of African American families?  The Washington Times?

Posted by Major Major on Oct 26, 2005 at 8:37 PM

Don’t ask Jay for such mundane things as sources please.  The unwritten rule is that if Jay says it then it comes from God, or at least from his number one boy Bush.

Therefore it just IS.

Darn your impertinance, Major.  You will be ignored for your presumption and see if you are not.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 27, 2005 at 12:13 AM

With regard to the blockquotes, I quote from an email exchange I had with David,

>—- david,

> I disagree.
>
> It does a great job of deliminating quoted material,
> as the blockquote HTML is intended to.
>
> Apparently, ITT agrees with me.
>—- Jay Cline <sufrensucatash@yahoo.com>

ITT decided to use boxes to represent valid HTML blockquotes. It would indeed be very appropriate to take the issue up with them if you disagree.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 27, 2005 at 3:47 AM

Where *do* you get the data to support your assertions with respect to the stability of African American families?

I cannot speak for the 70% statistic; that was presented by someone else here. I accept it if only because no one else has even attempted to refuted it.

My own contention of the decline of the strength an integrity of the African-American family from the 1940s and 1950s to the present day comes from hard-bitten, first-person, in-my-face, intimate experience.

I have no problems resting my argument on that data. I would think that those who would like to gleefully tear apart my arguments would be delighted at such an easy target to refute my contentions.

All you gotta do is disprove my experience.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 27, 2005 at 3:53 AM

Jay: 

I don’t have to disprove your experience.  But since you lay down the gauntlet, I can dispute your line of reasoning.  You can surely tell the difference between declaring that African American families were stronger 30, 40, 50 or 60 years ago and saying that *your* first-hand, anecdotal experience tells you that they were.  Yet this is all you are offering.

This sounds like “from the gut” anti-intellectualism at work here.  It leads to bad policy.  You reason that a breakdown in the family causes poverty because there is such a high rate of single-parent families among the poor.  One could as easily claim that since welfare recipients are poor that, welfare causes poverty.

I never mow the lawn in the rain, but that doesn’t mean that mowing the lawn *causes* the rain to stop (despite any anecdotal evidence supporting the hypothesis)

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 27, 2005 at 8:51 PM

hay dude METROSOCIAL u seem 2 make lots of sence wit yr psychoanalysis stuff! i belive all the other idiots who r posting ought to take a closer look at his posting n first take a better understanding of what zizek tries explain how coloured person occupies her place in american-hertrosexual-male-white fantasy space,
so METROSOCIAL dude if u want to share yr insights upon these stuff i can always post my mail ID-so v can discuss(psycho.,politics,etc.,...) wit each other???

Posted by jaymajor on Oct 27, 2005 at 11:51 PM

GA, the only difference between your examples and mine, is that mine are based on decades of real-life trench warfare and yours are hypothetical constructs.

You do not have to refute my experience, but that don’t mean it ain’t so.

I stand by my conclusions.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 2:31 AM

Correction:

yours are contrived hypothetical constructs.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 2:58 AM

Marriage found to improve blacks’ lives

The state of the black family concerns many scholars. Census data show that 34 percent of black families are headed by married couples. This is a substantial reversal from 1950, when almost 80 percent of black families were headed by married couples.

The ball is in your court…

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 8:10 AM

It amazes me, really does, that proofs of the persistence of structural racist projects are still required.  We could, certainly, rely on an impressive corpus produced, in the past three decades, by critical race scholars; we could offer arguments and counterarguments, stacking them up like the logs of Uncle Tom’s cabin; we could spread anecdotal evidence in layers, thick and delicious, like Aunt Jemima’s pancakes; we could turn an eye to those grotesque silhouettes—the Jesse Jacksons, the Bill Cosbys, the Chris Rocks—haunting our front lawns like Sambo figurines.  But what’s the use? Black folk just can’t be taken for real in this country, for as soon as they enter the public sphere, they are instantly distorted—often literally mutilated—until we only recognize them as our unsightly, poor relations: Uncle Tom, Aunt Jemima, little boy Sambo.  And those, by the bye, are the representations of “good niggers”; the bad ones don’t even get to have a concrete shape in the national imagination.  They are, simply, the dark menace, the shadow lurking across the street, the enormous, venomous cock poised to penetrate our wives, or, worse yet, our gated communities. 

If it sounds as if I am given to polemics; if it sounds as if the shuffling, thick-lipped and imminently threatening proto-negros are anachronistic in our own age of social justice and racial utopianism, I suggest this sobering reflection on black archetypes that invade the collective imagination, and their shady “disappearance” from the surfaces of culture:

Posted by metrosocial on Oct 28, 2005 at 10:05 AM

Jay:

That is great census data there.  Clearly by your previous reasoning, there must have been less poverty among blacks in the 50’s as a result of their marital status.  Any data on that?

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 28, 2005 at 10:15 AM

Separately: Jaymajor, if s/he is still inclined to continue on a psychoanalytic thread without disturbing the rest of the correspondents on this board, will find me ready to ramble at barashfp@uchicago.edu. 

And the point is well taken: we seem to have disregarded, for a while, the thrust of Zizek’s argument.  So, in an attempt to turn back to the text, I want to talk specifically aobut the rhetoric of otherness, that is, the ways in which the term itself is useful and the ways in which it is limited.  In the first place, I feel I ought to remind the board that the real weight of otherness cannot

Posted by metrosocial on Oct 28, 2005 at 10:32 AM

Jay: 

The figures I found from 2003 show 47% of African American families are married-couple families.  34% of families were two-member families - An easy mistake to make.

Another paper also points to more nuanced data including the observation that before the 1960’s many divorvces among rural blacks were informal arrangements and likely went unreported:
http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/publications/books/fulltext/colorline/95.pdf

I thought it was a thought-provoking paper on the subject.  No silver bullets here I am afraid.  Still no thoughts on whether or not poverty contributes to the problem of ‘marriage breakdown’

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 28, 2005 at 10:55 AM

Sorry - Glitch

http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/publications/books/fulltext/colorline/95.pdf

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 28, 2005 at 10:57 AM

You really need to fully read your own references. The only conclusion the report says that might contradict what I have been saying is that the problem is more complex than I have been saying.

But I never said it wasn’t. I was discussing the impact of the welfare state has on a race already disadvantaged by historical discrimination.

At the risk of annoying some people, here are some (lengthy) extracts. (and the url is [url=“http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/publications/books/fulltext/colorline/95.pdf”]
http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/publications/books/fulltext/colorline/95.pdf[/url])

I encourage everyone to take a good read.

(part 1)

<blockquote>But with respect to marriage and child rearing, black and white Americans do live in substantially different worlds. Over the past fifty years, for all Americans, marriage rates have declined while divorce rates and out-of-wedlock births have climbed. But the negative changes have been greatest among African Americans
...
In the 1950s, after at least seventy years of rough parity, African American marriage rates began to fall behind white rates. In 1950, the percentages of white and African American women (aged fifteen and over) who were currently married were roughly the same, 67 percent and 64 percent, respectively. By 1998, the percentage of currently married white women had dropped by 13 percent to 58 percent. But the drop among African American women was 44 percent to 36 percent

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 1:08 PM

(part 2)

<blockquote>Without doubt, today

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 1:09 PM

(part 3)(

A’s assertion about the frequency of unreported divorces among African Americans before the 1960s is about the only assertion that his referenced report does NOT quantify, beyond merely saying “perhaps”. But the authors follow up that bit of ambiguity with this:

Regardless of the reliability of earlier census data, however, the racial difference in divorce is now quite large. By 1998, the African American divorce rate was more than twice as high as the white rate (422 per thousand compared with 190 per thousand). The divorce rate for Hispanic women doubled between 1970, the first year for which data are available, and 1998, from 81 to 171 per thousand (compared with a quadrupling of the African American rate and a tripling of the white rate over the same time period).

But to answer GAs question, <i>Still no thoughts on whether or not poverty contributes to the problem of

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 1:16 PM

correction:

In the quoted section of part 1 (3rd paragraph), a footnote reference got promoted to normal text in the translation.

...45 percent higher for African Americans than for whites, 9 vs. 6.10 These are…

The ‘10’ is a footnote.

Sorry about that.

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 2:11 PM

Jay:

I do read my own references.  It was hardly necessary to post all that crap.  Anyone who cared could paste in the link for themselves (which would be far better than your spoon-feeding).  The reason I even put it up here is to point out the incredible complexity behind what we are talking about.

Meanwhile, you cavalierly spout overly simplistic solutions to every problem I have ever seen you address.  You appear to be uninterested in any finding that does not support your preconceived ideas about how things ought to work.  It does no justice to the issue at all.

Your brain is short-circuited by the feedback loop you have created for yourself.  Everything you read supports your arguments because you only go from what you already know.  Talk about entrenched.

What a waste of time you are.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 28, 2005 at 2:20 PM

My apologies if I offended.

It was my impression that you were questioning the validity of my claim that the strength of the African American family had been in significant decline since the 40s and 50s,

<blockquote>Where do you get your data on the strength of African American Families over 60 years in the past?  I

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 28, 2005 at 4:39 PM

Very well Jay if you persist in being an asshole just because you can be, that is fine with Rabbit.  ITT has not endorsed Blockquotes at all by posting their own ver infrequent messages, they are the exception and nothing they choose to do here is an example for Jay, we can all be little smart arses if we wish, it’s just that you seem to be the only one who has so little else going for him that you need to piss higher.  Rabbit has not done anything further at this point than point out that they are unneccesary and fill up space and distract.  It is of course rabbit’s opinion, but Jay will notice that nobody else is using them, and it is no longer because the thing is magic to them, which is whenm you enjoyed it most, let’s face it.  You are one of those who would hoard his pitiful syore of knowledge rather than pass anything useful on to others which may help them to “catch up” to or “Take over” you.  You are a typical cowering NWO citizen, knowing nothing, having his opinions fed to him directly instead of news. That is why we never see any sourcing for you.  you have no idea what the hell we are talking about.  You have never even acknowledged one of the dozens of challenges to produce a refernce for ANYTHING.  You have a Blog for god’s sak.  Someone with as little real knowledge and as few original ideas as you has a blog?  Rabbit really does believe there are far too many blogs these days and you are the proof of it.  What the hell kind of a nitwit, with no original thoughts, no actual factual clues and no ability to even defend his ideas beyond bombast, thinks his ideas are worthy of their own site?

You gave your egoistic bent away before, by drawing attention to your blog at least twice, back when you were not using block quotes, back when you found bold and italic and links were enough to make you seem clever.

Rabbit invites others’ comment on the blockquotes issue, he will drop it if others say so, but is of the opinion that they are stupid.

Of course whether we go with them or not, the fact is that Jay has shown himself to be a Poser. Not for using them in the first place, but for the pattern of his use of oneupmanship on HTML. When Rabbit saw this he introduced the whole concept of HTML to the natives, with ten minutes or less of time spent doing it, and suddenly the Missionary with his firesticks looked mortal after all. Boy your mortal boots are not much, but they are all you’ve got.

How about using them to post a LINK, any link.  It just ocurred to Rabbit that the only link you ever have posted is to your own site.  You really do think you are the be all and end all of all knowledge, don’t you?  You are the original source.  That is so cool, people we can just illustrate our points by linking to Jay’s blog, it is the source of all knowledge.  No wonder he never uses lesser sources, he is the greatest source of them all.

Rabbit is struck with awe….....................looks at Jay….....................Is it God, in disguise?  How does it know all these things without any doubt?

ooooohh.

.....................................^^....................................................

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 29, 2005 at 12:43 AM

If anyone ever feels sorry for someone who is on the recieving end of his stick, please to bear in mind, Rabbit was a much bullied and picked on kid once. Rabbit is not a Bully. Rabbit is more like a Pest Controller.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 29, 2005 at 12:51 AM

<blockquote>Rabbit invites others

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 29, 2005 at 12:53 AM

In fact they are used by sleaze bags mostly who just skim over things to keep the blinkers on, and the4y can of course help to make Jay’s posts easily identifiable at a glance, thus saving valuable time reading his self centred preaching.

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 29, 2005 at 12:56 AM

Rabbit, please drop it.  It is rather distracting.  I would humbly suggest that page after page of block quoted text is merely annoying and not worth getting so worked up over.

ITT could stop the practice by decoding the text before it is stored.  Since they choose not to do that, you are throwing yourself on the mercy of people who may not be all that interested in your opinions.

BTW, ITT may be more clever than this, but if you want to mess up the whole thread, it is usually as easy as forgetting to close a tag.  I thought for a moment that Jay had actually done that back there.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 29, 2005 at 10:25 AM

Katrina, Conservative Myth-Making and the Media

By TIM WISE

During the flooding of New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, many a voice praised the media for its supposedly aggressive coverage. The fact that Anderson Cooper cried on camera, or that Geraldo evinced outrage (imagine that), or that even Fox’s Shepard Smith waxed indignant at the suffering in the streets, was taken as evidence of some newfound courage on the part of the press.

Standing up to FEMA’s Mike Brown, and making him appear every bit as incompetent as he was—a task about as difficult as making Paris Hilton look underfed—inspired plaudits for any number of network anchors and reporters in the field. So too, Cooper’s upbraiding of an utterly hapless Mary Landrieu, she of the U.S. Senate, just to show that both parties were fair game in this brave new world of independent media, no longer willing to be led around by the neck on a leash, as it had been with, say, Iraq, for starters.

But just as surely as the media went after those in positions of power, and sought to expose them as witless in all respects, it was even more adept at framing (pun very much intended) low-income black folks in the streets of New Orleans as a collection of deviant criminals. In other words, the more things changed, the more they ultimately stayed the same, with the press presenting images of the desperate and left behind that reinforce negative and racist stereotypes, to the utter exclusion of accuracy and fair-mindedness.

Case in point, the constant repetition of the same five or six video loops of so-called looters. The fact that most of these were taking water, food and medicine didn’t seem to matter to camerapersons or, ultimately, a viewing public quick to condemn what they saw. That the relative paucity of such video suggests theft wasn’t particularly representative of the crowds on Canal Street—after all, if looting had been that common, there would have been more than the same half-dozen clips to present—also mattered not it appears.

An even better case in point, the repetition of unfounded rumors—later proven false—to the effect that Children’s Hospital had been raided by drug addicts looking for a fix; or that gang rapes were occurring in the Superdome or Convention Center, or that babies were being molested and then having their throats slit, only to be stuffed like trash in abandoned freezers and garbage cans. False, false and false; and for none of these stories had there ever been a first hand witness who had actually seen any of the supposed carnage taking place.

Or consider the reports of thugs shooting on first aid helicopters: fact is, there are no first hand witnesses who claim they saw anyone shoot at the helicopters, as if hoping to bring them down or harm relief workers. Rather, those who were actually there, and saw the gunfire in question, report that it was intended to get the attention of the helicopters, which seemed to be repeatedly passing people by, looking at the catastrophic conditions, but refusing to land and save people in most instances. Perhaps those in the air didn’t see those on the ground? Or perhaps they didn’t understand the magnitude of the suffering below them? Either way, the gunfire was a desperate attempt to get people to take things seriously and do their jobs: perhaps not the best way to get attention, but hardly the act of mindless, violent thugs aiming indiscriminately at everyone in sight, as reports made it seem.

(Continued)

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:06 PM

(Page 2)

Yet the media, feeling no need to find witnesses or to verify claims of black deviance (because, after all, what’s not to believe?) simply went along. The result? Rescue efforts were delayed because rescue workers had been scared for their lives by a press that led them to think New Orleans was a war zone; the Governor and Mayor actually told law enforcement to stop saving lives and start arresting and shooting lawbreakers on sight; and the public, which rarely needs reasons to think the worst of poor black people, found its stereotypes confirmed. Not only whites, it should be pointed out, but black folks too, like Mayor Nagin and his crony police chief Eddie Compass, both of whom apparently think so little of their own people that they too assumed the stories were true, in spite of no evidence, and repeated the charges on national TV.

Within just a few days, urban legends began zipping around the Internet, in the form of e-mails recounting utterly fabricated events, but all of them—however false—fit perfectly within the narrative developed by the media during the catastrophe.

First there was the one about the crack dealer who refused to be evacuated to a hospital because he wouldn’t be able to sell his wares there; then there was the one about the thugs (black and poor of course) who destroyed a rest area on the Louisiana/Texas border, during a stop on the way to Houston, even urinating on the walls to show their disregard for civilized norms of behavior; then there was the one from the guy claiming to have volunteered at the Astrodome to feed and help evacuees, all to be shocked by how ungrateful they were—supposedly demanding beer, liquor, cigarettes and four-star restaurant meals. That hundreds of others refuted these nonsensical claims, and noted how unbelievably gracious the evacuees had been did nothing to damper the enthusiasm with which the lies were circulated.

And in each case, the authors of these fantasies made sure to throw in something about how racist the blacks were (calling white aid workers “crackers” and “honkies” of course), and ending with the admonition that those displaced by Katrina deserved no respect or assistance, seeing as how they were a bunch of spoiled brats who should be left to their own devices. In other words, no need to be compassionate, no need to contribute to relief funds, and certainly no need to challenge one’s already negative views towards the kinds of people left behind in the flood. They had, ultimately, gotten what they deserved.

Though the mainstream media hadn’t created these phony and vicious stories (and indeed, one has to wonder what kind of evil mind and heart would have done so), it is certainly true that they created the conditions that made such tripe believable to a lot of people. Had the media focused less on looters and supposed gang raping murderers, and more on the efforts by thousands to help one another in the midst of hellish conditions—stories that are only trickling out in the corporate press, but which those who lived through them have been trying to get told via their own accounts from the flood zone—it would have been impossible for such vile trash as this to have gained traction. But once the climate had been created and the frame set—one that said, these are bad people, who do bad things—it took no effort at all for racists to concoct lies and peddle those to a willing and gullible public that never seems to challenge stories of black perfidy, so easily do they fit within their pre-existing racist biases in the first place.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:09 PM

(Page 3)

Which brings us to the other big lie told about the poor in New Orleans: one that has yet to be addressed in the media, despite how easily it can be disproved by a mere five minutes worth of research. It is one repeated daily for the past eight weeks by conservative talk show hosts and columnists, and one to which I am exposed many times a day in my email inbox, thanks to the efforts of right wing louts without the seeming desire to do their homework. Namely, it is the argument that the reason 130,000 poor black folks were unable to escape the flooding was because they had grown dependent on the government to save them, thanks to the “welfare state,” and that was why they lacked the money and cars to get out before disaster struck.

In other words, liberal social policy had rendered the black poor unable or unwilling to work, content to collect a government check, and thus, had made them incapable of saving themselves. This lie—and it is just that, not an exaggeration or simplification or overstatement, but a flat-out falsehood—has been parroted by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Shawn Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and Charles Murray (of “Bell Curve” fame), not to mention such viciously self-loathing black conservatives as Star Parker, John McWhorter and the Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, all despite the lack of evidence to sustain it, and the amazing amount of evidence, both contemporary and historical, to refute it.

But of course the media, having long ago decided not to challenge the mainstream public’s view of folks on welfare—and indeed to collaborate with the framing of such persons by politicians of both major parties—has done nothing to set the record straight, suggesting either that they are incredibly inept at research, or just as incredibly craven in their attitudes towards the poorest of this nation’s citizens.

But the facts, however unsettling they may be for conservative mythmakers, are clear.

To begin with, as of 2004, according to the Census Bureau, there were only 4600 households in all of New Orleans receiving cash welfare from the nation’s principal aid program, TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, formerly Aid to Families With Dependent Children, or AFDC). That is not a misprint: 4600 out of a total of 130,000 households in the black community alone. Which means that even if every welfare receiving household in Orleans Parish had been black (which was not in fact the case), this would have represented only a little more than four percent of black households in the city.

According to the same Census data, the average household size in a welfare receiving family in New Orleans is the same as the citywide average for non-recipients: roughly 3.5 persons. So the number of individuals receiving welfare in New Orleans, by the time of Katrina would have been about 16,000.

Thus, even if we assume that all of the 130,000 persons left behind were poor, and that no persons receiving welfare managed to escape before the flooding with friends or family, this would mean that at most, perhaps twelve percent of the persons left behind (and whose faces we may have been seeing on national TV) would have been welfare recipients at all, let alone persons who had been rendered dependent on such benefits for long periods of time.

And speaking of dependence, or the notion that the city’s welfare recipients had grown content to sit back and collect government checks instead of doing for self, this hardly seems likely when you consider that the average annual income received from TANF, for those small numbers actually getting any such benefits at all, was only a little more than $2,800 per year, in New Orleans prior to the catastrophe.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:10 PM

(Page 4)

Indeed, such paltry amounts explain why most of the poor in New Orleans, far from being happy to receive so-called handouts, work whenever they can find steady employment, which admittedly, is not often the case.

For example, in the ninety-eight percent black and forty percent poor Lower Ninth Ward, one of the hardest hit communities (and one about which many negative things were said in terms of so-called welfare dependence), seventy-one percent of families prior to the flooding reported income from paid employment, while only eight percent received income from cash welfare. In other words, folks in this community were almost nine times more likely to earn their pay than to receive government benefits. Forty percent of workers from the community worked full-time, and the average commute time for Ninth Ward workers was over 45 minutes each day, suggesting that the work ethic was quite common to the folks who lived there, irrespective of commonly held and utterly false stereotypes.

Even food stamps—a program with much more lenient terms and where even the near poor can often qualify for minimal benefits—were only received by eleven percent of New Orleans households as of last year: hardly indicative of a general mindset of welfare entitlement. As for public housing, far from being the location of residence for most poor blacks in New Orleans—let alone those in the streets in the wake of Katrina—fewer than 20,000 people lived in such units at the time of the flooding: this representing no more than five percent of black New Orleanians. In the Lower Ninth Ward, for example, few lived in public housing and nearly six in ten families owned their own homes.

Even in the city’s poorest communities, like the Iberville or Lafitte housing developments, or parts of Central City, at least a third, and often a majority of households report income from paid employment. What’s more, tenants in the B.W. Cooper development have been managing their own housing for years, teaching job and leadership skills to the persons who live there.

Likewise, in the mid-90s, several public housing developments participated in a national Jobs Program, funded by the Annie B. Casey Foundation: a successful effort that matched low-income black residents with businesses looking for employees. In the former St. Thomas development—the first public housing “project” funded by the federal government under the Roosevelt Administration—residents had started their own coffee shop and bookstore, and had created innovative teen pregnancy prevention and safe sex initiatives.

When St. Thomas was torn down a few years ago, residents were told there would be mixed-use economic development in its place, and although they mourned for the loss of their neighborhood, many looked forward to participating actively in the economic lifeblood of the community. Then the city reneged on its promises and offered the land to Wal-Mart, which then placed a superstore on the property—the very store whose gun supply was looted during the flooding (an ironic turn of events if ever there was one). Poor folks wanted economic opportunity and jobs; the city’s elite (black and white alike) gave them a gun supply shop.

Bottom line: the stereotype of poor blacks in New Orleans (and elsewhere) as lazy and dependent on government is false. In Louisiana, it should be noted that only a very small share of those receiving TANF benefits, and AFDC before that, are able-bodied adults. Indeed, even prior to welfare reform, only eleven percent of those receiving AFDC in the state were able-bodied adults who did no work: the rest were vulnerable children, the elderly, the disabled, or adults who were already working (mostly part-time), but earned too little to come off assistance.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:11 PM

<blockquote>

(Page 5)

It should also be noted that even when persons do receive so-called welfare, there is still a predicate to doing so: one that is rarely explored, but is simply assumed to be personal incompetence, bad choice-making, laziness or other personal pathologies. So, for example, we are to believe that for those who live in public housing, it was their own lack of initiative or willingness to take personal responsibility for their lives that rendered them so vulnerable to the likes of Hurricane Katrina and the collapse of the city’s levees.

Yet what this commonly-repeated claim ignores is what came before folks ended up in public housing, in overcrowded communities, with concentrated levels of extreme poverty; and what came before had nothing to do with the welfare state, or liberal social policy more generally. Rather, what happened was the deliberate and calculated destruction of the inner-city in the name of economic “development” (which benefited only the elite) and to meet the needs of middle-class and above whites.

So, for example, consider the Treme (pronounced truh-may): the oldest free black neighborhood in the United States, home to Congo Square and Louis Armstrong Park. Located on the outer edge of the French Quarter and Central Business District, the Treme is more than ninety percent black and over half of its residents are poor, when you include those in the Iberville and Lafitte housing developments. Though it had long been a lower-income community, with the attendant issues that often emerge in such spaces, the Treme had also been, for the most part, functional. It was the site of dozens of successful black-owned businesses, and hundreds of stable middle-class families, where few lived in the so-called projects. The same was true for the 7th Ward: the base of the city’s old-line Creole community.

But beginning in the early 1960s, the city of New Orleans, as with every major city in the United States, began taking federal funds to extend interstate highways through their urban centers, which meant the heart of those places, black communities. In New Orleans, plans to extend the interstate through the French Quarter met with stiff opposition from affluent (and mostly white) historic preservationists and business owners. Once their political clout was deployed so as to block construction through the main tourist artery, planners opted to take the I-10 through the Treme and 7th Ward, whose lower income and black residents lacked the power to stop their property from being destroyed in the name of progress.

It was a story repeated throughout the U.S. during this time: by the mid-1960s, interstate construction in urban areas was destroying roughly 37,000 residences annually; this, in addition to the 40,000 more that were being torn down each year in the name of “urban renewal,” which translated into the building of shopping malls, office parks and parking lots. By 1969, nearly 70,000 homes, mostly occupied by blacks and Latinos, were being destroyed for the interstate program alone, in virtually every medium and large city in the country.

Although some had argued for financial assistance to help relocate the low-income families displaced by this process, rarely did such help materialize. Indeed, less than ten percent of those displaced by urban renewal had new single-resident occupancy housing to go to afterward: instead, they had to double up with relatives in small, crowded apartments, or move into public housing projects, which became something akin to concentration camps for the poorest and most vulnerable citizens of the nation.
<\blockquote>

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:12 PM

...oops.

(Page 6)

These policies, known euphemistically as “slum clearance” by those who implemented and supported them, actually created slums, in places which previously had been low-income, but largely working class and stable communities. In New Orleans, this also extended to the Central Business District, including the very land where the now infamous Superdome sits.

Beginning in 1971, construction began on the facility, on which ground had previously existed yet another mostly black and largely low-income and working class neighborhood. But in a contest between the needs and lives of those New Orleanians on the one hand, and the mere wants of wealthy developers, concert promoters, the New Orleans Saints and Tulane University boosters on the other (the latter of which wanted to move their pathetic team’s games there, away from the old and decrepit Sugar Bowl), which side can we guess, ultimately prevailed? And so the Dome was completed, in 1975, at a public cost of tens of millions of dollars, and the loss of yet another patch of homesteads for the city’s black majority.

All of this “slum clearance,” it should be noted, was done for the benefit of whites, and not only the rich developers. Indeed, the primary reason for the interstate highway program was to help facilitate daily movement from the cities where most people still worked, to the suburbs, where large numbers were beginning to live. But of course, it was only whites who could live there in most cases. Blacks were still subject to regular discrimination in housing (indeed, most types of housing bias weren’t even illegal until 1968), and had been largely unable to take advantage of the government’s FHA and VA home loans for the first 30 years of their existence, thanks to racially discriminatory lending criteria built into this government program.

So while nearly 40 percent of white mortgages were being written on the extremely favorable FHA and VA terms by the early 1960s, (making home ownership possible for some 15-20 million white families who wouldn’t have otherwise been able to own their own place), virtually no blacks had access to this form of economic opportunity. To then tear down black neighborhoods so as to build highways that would help whites get to their new and growing communities (like Bill O’Reilly’s boyhood Levittown), was an especially pernicious and racist combination of anti-black neglect and white racial preference.

Beyond housing issues, even regular “welfare” receipt is something predicated on history: specifically the history of low-wage employment and inadequate job opportunities, particularly in urban centers. One study from Harlem in the 1990s, found that for every job opening in the area, there were as many as fourteen people looking for work. Nationally, data has long suggested that there are between 7-10 people out of work at any given time, for every above-poverty wage job opening. In other words, there is not enough opportunity in the modern American economy, irrespective of the claims made by conservatives and believed by millions.

In fact, it has long been the official monetary policy of the United States, under the leadership of the Federal Reserve, to raise interest rates whenever unemployment drops “too low,” and suddenly the nation is faced with having too many people working. The fear is that too many people working will tighten the labor market, thereby pushing up wages, and then causing a spike in prices, to the detriment of economic well being. By raising the cost of borrowing money, the Fed hopes to cool off business expansion (and thus any attendant and related hiring sprees), and thereby, hold inflation in check.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:14 PM

(Page 7)

Putting aside the validity (or lack thereof) of this particular theory, the result of such thinking should be obvious, especially when it is regularly employed to maintain unemployment at around four percent by raising interest rates whenever joblessness drops below that level: namely, it means that millions of people will be out of work at any given time, not because they are lazy, and certainly not because government handouts appear so luxurious to them; but rather, because it is desired by the government and the nation’s economic policymakers that they be out of work.

Indeed, since the official unemployment rate fails to count all who are jobless, such as those who have grown so discouraged by their prospects that they’ve simply stopped looking (or those who are near jobless, able to pull down only a few hours of work each week, but who are still considered fully employed for the sake of the data), administering monetary policy this way results in as many as 10-12 million people being out of work or seriously underemployed at any given time. They and their dependents will then be (surprise, surprise) poor, and require some type of assistance so as to survive. None of this is a reflection on the values of the poor themselves, though it speaks volumes about the values of the rich who have supported this kind of policy for decades.

But of course, in a media culture incapable of looking deeper than the next 30-second, 100-word soundbite, none of this matters. Indeed, most reporters, news anchors, or journalists of any stripe would be unlikely to even know any of this in the first place. All that matters is the here and now: no need for context, background, or history. And so they give us poor people, stealing from stores, carless, penniless and homeless: how they became poor and why they stayed that way doesn’t matter, apparently. And by remaining silent on that issue, the mainstream press leaves venal ideologues to fill in the blanks, for an eager public all too willing to believe the worst about people who, for the most part, none of them have ever met.

Thus do we repeatedly plant the seeds for each new round of victim blaming, poor-folks bashing and racism, all the while thinking that just because Anderson Cooper cried on camera and Fox momentarily turned on Bush (but only for a nanosecond), the Earth’s center of gravity moved.

In fact, just as with the aftermath of 9/11, and quite contrary to conventional wisdom, nothing at all has changed.

Tim Wise is the author of two new books: White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son<\b> (Soft Skull Press, 2005), and <b>Affirmative Action: Racial Preference in Black and White<\b> (Routledge: 2005). He can be reached at: <b>timjwise@msn.com

http://www.counterpunch.org/wise10292005.html

Thanks for the tip, GR.

Posted by Major Major on Oct 29, 2005 at 6:15 PM

Good call, GrayArea.

Good article, Major Major.

Posted by David in Canada on Oct 29, 2005 at 8:09 PM

<flash>Tilt!</flash>

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 29, 2005 at 8:45 PM

U guys seem to be barking up the wrong tree.

Ultimatley it is the whites who look stupid in New Orleans

The blacks just look set up; which was the original

hypthosis of the article. The unreality or forced

rationalization of truths which were fantasy.

Posted by Markangelo on Oct 30, 2005 at 12:02 AM

Rabbit agrees Grey Area, in principle the Blockquotes are not an important issue. The point was only ever that JAY IS A DITTOHEAD POSER.  The blockquotes are as you admit an irritation and this seemed so obvious as to go without saying, so Rabbit did what Rabbit does, and wacked the clown, down.

Anyway the Rabbit does not really give a Sh*t, and has admitted it, on various threads which referred to this fact.

Rabbit can piss higher =, and others can too, Jay can you do a wanking smiley and would you if you could, you?

It was never intended to go on for pages GrayArea, just a hopefully unanimous vote of no thanks to boring boxes of repeats.  The issue will be yielded without fuss as it is indeed only one of opinions and has served it’s purpose, deliberate interruption as it was.

Rabbit was Looting the bag of tricks belonging to Morons and Trolls, in order to stop them Raping the thread from within, from it’s primary discussion of the twofacedeness of a system which preaches and practises two different things.

Is that back on thread, a bit?

Rabbit asks you once again why the spelling Gray without e. It is an anomaly,.........why asks Curious Rabbit who’s middle moniker shares this odd aside?>

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 30, 2005 at 12:30 AM

Who guys are barking and up what trees dear child?

Posted by GhostRabbit on Oct 30, 2005 at 12:32 AM

Don’t know who originated this thought, but it wasn’t me:

[By and large]
Gray is a color.
Grey is a colour.

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 30, 2005 at 11:09 AM

<blockquote>Or consider the reports of thugs shooting on first aid helicopters: fact is, there are no first hand witnesses who claim they saw anyone shoot at the helicopters, as if hoping to bring them down or harm relief workers. Rather, those who were actually there, and saw the gunfire in question, report that it was intended to get the attention of the helicopters, which seemed to be repeatedly passing people by, looking at the catastrophic conditions, but refusing to land and save people in most instances. Perhaps those in the air didn

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 30, 2005 at 12:56 PM

With regard to Wise’s statistics on the low utility of welfare within New Orleans, I can’t, therefore, see any better reason to start cutting back welfare programs. If the use of welfare is as sparingly as Wise alludes to, then I think that alone raises very real concerns of the effectiveness of the welfare system.

Let me dumb it up.

If the hundreds of billions of dollars spent every year on federal and state welfare programs aren’t being received by those who need it, then I smell a skunk.

Who is getting all that money?

(anybody check the average salary of a bureaucrat lately?)

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 30, 2005 at 1:06 PM

Let’s do some basic math on Wise’s dubious statistics (you’ll see why I call them dubious).

Wise alleges that the average “take on the dole” amounts to $2,800. He also alleges that only 4% of the black population in New Orleans got a piece of the action before Katrina.

Let us assume that every American family gets a piece of the action. How much would that be, using Wise’s statistics?

2800 x 100 million families = 280 Billion dollars.

Since that is about how much of the federal budget is going to welfare programs (sans state welfare spending), I ask only one small favor.

<b?WHERE’S MY FLIPPIN’ TAKE??!</b>

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 30, 2005 at 3:37 PM

(dern fat fingers)

<b>WHERE

Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 30, 2005 at 3:39 PM

There was no gunfire, full stop.  The people who claimed otherwsie, have had the sack for making such incendiary and false statements.  For the record.

Posted by Rabbit on Oct 30, 2005 at 11:38 PM

Jay, I think the term “cash welfare” was used to describe the practice of sending welfare checks directly to the poor (TANF).  A student of the welfare system such as yourself certainly has a much clearer picture of the different programs available and how benefits are delivered…

...or is it possible that you are calling for the reform of a system you really don’t know a flippin’ thing about.  That would really shock me.

Maybe you shouldn’t try to dumb it down any further.  I think plankton might be able to understand what you wrote, unfortunately they wouldn’t actually learn anything by reading it.  I’m not even sure you figured out that Wise’s article was basically written for your benefit.

Since you seem to think that the reason people are poor is because those welfare checks keep them from wanting to work for a living, it must blow your mind to find out that so much of the so-called ‘welfare budget’ in this country is squandered on folks who are actually working their asses off but are not making a decent wage.  What a waste huh?

Once again, it doesn’t seem to matter what you read.  It only proves to you that you were right all along.  Why bother reading in the first place?

Posted by GrayArea on Oct 31, 2005 at 1:29 AM