Posted on 09/02/2005 9:28:23 PM PDT by onyx eyes
(Vanity) 9/03/05 Where is the compassion? Where is the feeling for another human being?
After a brief hiatus I come on here expecting to find an outpouring of outrage and/or sympathy for our fellow human beings, citizens of America trapped in New Orleans and all I can find so far is sniping at the other party and recriminations against Jesse Jackson or some such political wag. And I find paranoia all over the place here about how the media is treating Pres. Bush and even jokes about who is right or wrong about the hurricane aftermath.
Granted, that I have been at home during the daytime and maybe have seen more of the media coverage and that you turned it off instead. Believe me, I did turn my TV off or walked away from it many times this past week because it got too horrific for me to keep watching.
I really did think I'd find a great or greater outpouring of sympathy for the people stranded in New Orleans.
1. The hurricane is SOMEBODY'S fault.
2. I don't want MY tax dollars going to N.O.!
3. You people in Louisiana deserve everything you get because of the people you elected.
4. At least Cindy Sheehan's out of the news.
-Dan
There's a lot of compassion and prayers offered around here.
It's important that we discuss who the guilty parties really are...on many levels. Politically and ideologically.
The product of the welfare state is on display.
As they say, if the enemy is digging his own hole, hand him a shovel.
They say that don't they? ;^)
"How can blacks be locked out of the leadership, and trapped in the suffering?...It is that lack of sensitivity and compassion that represents a kind of incompetence." - mr. shakedown
"George Bush doesn't care about black people"- kanye west
Great minds!
Maybe Mayor Nagin should have kept his trap shut?
If a women is raped, and you are fingered as the rapist... would you consider it 'incompassionate' to defend yourself against the charge?
Huh?
Thats what I thought...
I know. It's just hard to watch people die right in front of you. I mean, our people. Nevermind, I don't know what I mean.
Like someone said above us, we are all shook up and shocked and confused at how horrific Katrina turned out....
Even if it looks like we are angry at the people still there for their unwillingness to help themselves, we are angrier still at the policies of the past 40 years that have rendered an entire demographic both physically and mentally unable and unwilling to care for themselves or their families. It's the mentality we're angry at, not the people themselves. They are breaking our hearts.
I agree with you. And to you folks who claim there's a "huge amount of compassion here" I am sickened to see the exact opposite. I've already taken it on the chin for defending some of the looters, who took supplies merely to survive, or to barter with for food and water.
I just read an article that said the Cheif of Police, Eddie Compass, admitted that even his own men were breaking into stores and taking food, water and other supplies. The article also said that many police were walking off their jobs. Yet all I've been reading in here is the deep hatred for the "looters". I understand clearly that there have been claims of rapes, shootings, and gang-style anarchy. But many these people are the resident criminals and gangs that already existed before the hurricane. Criminals and gangs that had been preying on citizens and travelers for years.
Evacuations to livable places are just now beginnnig to occur, and this is a situation where those who have lost everything, even family members, really do need government assistance. This is what government exists for, to serve the people in times of real need. For the love of God, these poor people are living in utter hell and chaos, hot, steamy weather, nothing to eat or drink, water up to their hips, rotting corpses floating around everywhere, rescuers unable to reach them, not knowing if a future even exists anymore for them, all in a city that looks like it was hit by a nuclear bomb. What the h-ll do people expect in a situation like this?
BTTT
But they chose to stay. They chose to be dependent on the government for everything. Compassion for morally irresponsible people? No thanks. I'll save it for people who deserve it.
The fault is mine, actually. I've never been able to be so pompous that I criticised those who formed a contrary opinion by expressing my moral superiority.
You speak words that demonstrate your deep feelings for the downtrodden and brag of your superiority to the rest of us for our failure to do the same. You are liberal scum!! That is what they do at every turn! Words are cheap! Have you sold your home to raise cash to buy food for the needy? I didn't think so!!!
Ah yes, onyx eyes, I almost forgot:
5. Your state's dead bodies aren't as important as my state's dead bodies.
-Dan
I dont think Onyx was trying to present her/hisself as a holy roller or anything of the sort.
-Dan
Has it occurred to you that a great many of these people had nowhere else to go, no money and no means to travel? The mayor warned everyone to leave before the hurricane hit land, but to those with no money, no vehicle and no means, he provided no place for them to go to.
You can't blame everyone who's poor for their own poverty. Capitalism is the greatest economic system on earth, but even capitalism inevitably lends to a case system of wealth distribution, from the wealthiest to the well off, to the middleclass to the poor, to the poorest of the poor. No economic system is perfect, and no economic system can prevent poverty for some of the population.
-Dan
Yeah. It occurred to me. But let me tell you something. I currently live in an area almost identical in many respects to pre-hurricane New Orleans. There is rampant poverty here. In fact, I think there are even more people on public funding here than there were in New Orleans. But do you know what all the folks in the projects around here have? They have cars. They have cars with big shiny spinning hubcaps and carpeted dashboards. And when they drive those cars, they are usually talking on cellphones. And I thought to myself...if I heard there was a Cat 5 hurricane headed my way, I would look at my wife and two kids, and I would put them into my pimped up Cadillac, and I would drive out of town until I was out of the storms track. We might have to sleep in the car, but at least we'd be safe.
So until I can read some stats that say the more than 200,000 plus people "trapped" in New Orleans had no access to ways of getting out of town...I will temper my sympathy for them.
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