First off, the hurricanes. Katrina whacked the Gulf Coast, Rita gave Texas a bloody nose and Tammy has just moved away from this area of the world (where we received more rain in three days than the whole of the summer). Do I think the way people in New Orleans were left to die was racist? I think it's worse: I think it was poorist. I had to make up a word for it because we don't have a word for it. The way that people will discriminate against you because you're poor. Poorist.
There was a lot of it. News crews were able to get people and supplies in and out by road easily enough, but the poor were left to fend for themselves as FEMA claimed it was news to them over half a week later. It suited some people just fine that way, keeping the people they hate oppressed and confusing the issue further by claiming they weren't racists to boot. Even though some of them were racist, like the boat owner who only rescued whites (story here) because, as he said, "a nigger is a nigger is a nigger." Oh yeah, he was racist. Poorist too, because it was fine by him to have people living in toxic swill with no money to get out. It just suited him a little more that the poor were black.
Want another example? Suburban police closed at least one bridge to keep a handful of blacks from fleeing to white areas. Both the boat-owner and police stories were reported in Newsweek. We're constantly sold this American dream where everybody is equal, but now the world can see it's not true. There are so many subtle differences that are now obvious and just screaming at us. The blacks were kept poor, and the poorists could keep them that way and claim they weren't racist. But the end result was the same. The dead were mainly poor, the poor were mainly black, the poorists still had a level of semantics protecting their fragile world-view of tax-cuts helping all.
Being poorist is sneakier than just being misogynistic, racist or xenophobic. It's more weasely, must nastier. It's really sticking it to people who need assistance. It gives nasty bastards the ability to hate their fellow man and not get called out on it. So I'm calling them out on it. They'll hide behind their coded language and their "stop blaming us" cries as they use the confusion to cement their own twisted 'I'm better that you' mentality. But we know what they are. They're poorist scum, pure and simple.
Oh, and if I hear one more scheming politician complaining because they're being investigated for illegally handling more money than most of us will ever see in one place I'm going to be sick. You're meant to invite transparency, you're meant to be a supporter of openness... and if you're innocent, why the song-and-dance routine? Got something to hide?
Here's how I see it. If you got caught with your sticky fingers in the jar, suck it up and take what's due to you. Start using some of that "personal responsibility" you preach about to the oppressed for a change instead of complaining about how the judges are out to get you. It makes you sound like a petty crook, for Pete's sake.
Rolling Stone magazine did a great piece on Katrina, by the way. Read it here if you have ten minutes to spare. They were there, so I'd take their word for it over some political hack.
In other personal news: the house-building can now commence after the discovery of a sewer-pipe stub on our land. I have decided that the blog will be full of too much house news and not enough of my thoughts (this is, after all, an online diary) so I have started Our House. It's a step-by-step guide for anyone brave enough to want to build their own dream home from scratch. Or, in my case, to have a team of professional builders do the heavy listing for us!
I occasionally talk about web design in this blog (some people make cuckoo clocks for a hobby, I like messing with animated GIFs and HTML). There was a vacancy posted at work for someone that can write training material and knows web authoring software. Hey, that's me! So I applied for it. Apparently, they want someone to make a company intranet site that houses all our training material. I'll do it!
Listen : New Orleans Is Sinking - Tragically Hip ... You Could Have It So Much Better - Franz Ferdinand ... Circuitry - Project 86.
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