Tuesday, September 06, 2005

I am the very model of the modern major dilettante....

(Ed- This is something I wrote a long time ago right after Katrina and either forgot about or lost the courage to post. But I found it tonight and thought I'd put it out there, probably just proving what I've stated in the title of said post)

I haven't really said anything about the hurricane or the government's response yet- partly because the outrage I feel has made it hard to string together coherent thoughts, but mostly because when it comes shit like this I really have no idea what I'm talking about.

Seriously. Dick jokes? Got 'em. Drunken rants about the borderline inbreds I've dated? Sure. But when it comes to disaster relief, racial disparities in America and the internal operations of an organization like FEMA, I really have no idea what I'm talking about. And to be perfectly honest, very few of the people in the blogosphere, on the news or around the water cooler do either. I think people see the news, the pictures, the devastation and start spouting off about things they don't truly understand.

And when people start blithering like idiots about things they don't understand in their entirety, a constructive dialog can't be created, just an environment of animosity and finger pointing. Having said all that, I'm going to go ahead and blither away anyway.

I am outraged that a "superpower" didn't do a better and faster job getting food and water to people they KNEW where going to desperately need it. One of my real questions is that if we knew this hurricane was going to be as apocolyptic and catastrophic as it was, and we also knew that there was a segment of the population in New Orleans which was largely immobile due to health problems or poverty, why then did we not bring the supplies in before the storm started? Why was that Superdome not stocked with food and water? We can put people into space, design bigger gas guzzling SUVs and give an 80 year old man with a heart problem an erection, and you're going to tell me that no one thought to get shit into that city before it became impossible to do so?

But more than that, it's the "why didn't they leave" conversation that makes me sick. You know that old saying about opinions and assholes? Well it's fucking true. I listened to the people in my office(ed- I am making this up entirely. These people do not exist. This is fiction. Any similarities are, uh, the fault of the reader for drawing stupid conclusions) have this conversation just yesterday and it was horrifying. You take an ex-cop, a Park Avenue WASP, a housewife working part time, and an idiot, mix them together in a tiny office, add a dash of pure unadulterated stupidity and what you get is about the most asinine and insensitivity conversation I have ever heard.

There was a lot of talk about "those" people. "Them" with all the kids on welfare, "those" people who have no work ethic. "Stubborn people" who refused to leave. I could actually see the cop struggle not to use the word "uppity". It's impossible for me to engage any of these people in conversation anyway as I've already been branded a lefty-pinko-communist becuase I believe that women shouldn't be forced to have babies and that "them gay folk" should be allowed to marry.

Thank god they don't read this thing and have no idea how I feel about Jesus and assfucking. (ed- huh how's THAT for irony) I ended up just leaving the room. Yeah- that's right...I'm kind of a pussy. (FYI, I just managed to use the words god, jesus, assfucking and pussy all in three consecutive sentences. There should be some sort of eternal damnation award for that. Maybe the Dammies?)

Back to the issue at hand though. It's embarrassing to me that these people are so far removed reality, that they are that unaware of the level of poverty afflicting a large segment of the now displaced population of New Orleans. "Forget those looters," whines the Idiot," I'm more concerned about gas prices. I mean, we have to drive out to the Hamptons this weekend." Ugh.

More than anything though I think what people are missing is that this isn't just about a hurricane or an administration that's bungled, oh I don't know, EVERYTHING it's touched in the last six years. It's about race and poverty and the connection between the two. It's about the things no one wants to talk about. It's about things that I, as an upper middle class white Jewish kid who got sent to private school, certainly don't know shit about. I don't even feel that I have the right to comment. (Yes I recognize the inherent contradiction in me saying I don't have the right to comment in the middle of what is surely the longest comment I have ever made on this here blog. Whatever. I keep trying to tell you people- I'm a moron.)

I guess to me this whole thing begs the question: why in this country and in this time in the history of man are there people so poverty stricken? Whose responsibility is it to care for them and more importantly (and less paternalistic) whose responsibility is it to identify and deal with the root causes? Is is a personal, state or federal issue?

I've always said and thought- the basic difference between the left and the right is that the left thinks the system has failed the people and the right thinks that the people have failed the system. But in the end it's not a binary problem- the answer (as with every other elusive issue that's plagued man and society) certainly lies somewhere is the nebulous grey area between the two. And anyone who tells you different is either too dogmatic or just trying to get on TV. No?

But like I said in the title of this post- I don't know shit about shit. So don't ask me.
Posted by LMM14_1 :: 11:46 AM :: 0 Comments:

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