Racism and Katrina

[pegkerr]

In all my compulsive reading of the Katrina coverage, I've been mulling over the ugly questions that have been raised about how racism has made this whole story play out. I was withholding judgment for awhile. But then I read this, and this and saw this, among other things (there was one other link that I can't find right now). And I've decided that, yeah, chalk me up as one of the minority of whites who think that race does have something to do with the abysmal response. Along with class, I'll add.

I'm thinking about some advice I gave to two friends of mine recently who have been struggling with a troubled marriage: if one of you says, "I see a problem here" and the other says "you're imagining things, there is no problem here" then the proper response is: guess what, you both have a problem here, whether the second sees it or not. Because if it's a problem for the first one, it's a problem for the relationship.

So . . . what can a liberal but often clueless honkey woman like me do about it?

Comments

Re: My own take, for what it's worth...

[perigee.livejournal.com]

I, too, am sorry that you feel that way.

Re: My own take, for what it's worth...

[perigee.livejournal.com]

P.S. You may wish, in your statistical analysis, to take into account issues of access (to the Internet, to computers, to uncensored methods of publishing, etc.) when using that particular survey method. I think you may be making some unsafe implicit assumptions in your analysis.

Re: My own take, for what it's worth...

[perigee.livejournal.com]

Very nice use of rhetoric, but I'm afraid it's not doing a lot for me. Why not be honest and just say you're tired of having to deal with other people's priorities when you have enough to deal with in your own life. It's okay to be selfish and it doesn't make you come off as defensive and supercilious.