I went to Pages to Prisoners tonight and on Monday nights, its mostly students in the service learning program, a program where students get college credit for volunteering with community organizations and writing about/discussing their experience and social issues related to the volunteering or organization. Tonight, Megan, who is the volunteer coordinator, read some news reports and anectdotes from hurricane survivors that talked about the charictarization of crimes like looting, race, class, and prison issues in the wake of the storm. She made the statement, regarding media bias, that most of the people seen on TV are poor and black, which, probably has a lot to do with the population demographics as 67.25% of the city’s residents are Black or African American and 23.2% of individuals living in Orleans Parish living below the poverty level.
This made me think about the more institutionalized issues of race and class. This past week’s This American Life episode asks why so much of the blame for the mishandling of hurricane of humanitarian efforts was placed on state/local authorities. It makes me think about how a whole region could be ill-equipped to deal with catastrophe and that this can go largely ignored because of the demographics of the region. It also makes me think that this makes for an easy scapegoat. Does a region inhabited largely by those marginalized in mainstream society get fewer resources in general? Are their govermental officials more corrupt and more inept? The recent events seem to remind us that this could very well be the case.
Tonight, when talking about prisoners being left locked in some jails and prisons, many students asked, “how could someone just leave another human being there to possibly die?”, and wondered whether prison guards and officials would be held accountable. With my background, and perspective, and politics, I would like to think that in their situation, I would make a more humane, concerned decision. I guess there should be some accountability for individual’s lack of concern for people they watch over or care for, but more than anything, I’m not surprised that when it comes down to making tough decisions and weighing ones own concerns like family, property, and all the other things that comprise one’s life in our culuure and the concerns of those who are pushed to the edge of our culture, that people make bad decisions. I imagine that the low-level people who could have made some decisions to help people weren’t getting a whole lot of guidance from their superiors and the lack of anticipation or taking responsibility for taking care of prisoners or the homeless, elderly, and hospitalized probably reflects an institutionalized disregard on a local level. Again, the national response, whether from the government, media, or people on the street that localizes the blame for all the tragedies is equally representative. I think that we’re all pretty ill-equipped to have concern for others, and as we get caught up in notions of race and class, it makes this even harder. Its sad.