Changing sentiments
It's interesting to me how events like hurricane katrina, and the tsunami before it, can have such an impact on how people perceive and talk about the world. I mean, it certainly wasn't as if there weren't poor people in the South before Katrina, and it clearly wasn't the case that the racial divisions that have been so visible since were caused by the storm. So why do these topics make regular fodder for TV news shows and newspaper columns only now?
David Broder seems to be answering a similar question:
Those were good words that President Bush spoke last week, when he pledged "bold action" to confront the poverty of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, which he correctly said "has roots in a history of racial discrimination, which cut off generations from the opportunity of America."
We have heard similar words from presidents in the past. In 1992, when African Americans rioted in Los Angeles after the acquittal of the white police officers who had beaten Rodney King, the first President Bush decried the violence but said, "After peace is restored . . . we must then turn again to the underlying causes of such tragic events. We must keep on working to create a climate of understanding and tolerance, a climate that refuses to accept racism, bigotry, anti-Semitism and hate of any kind, anytime, anywhere."
But the capacity of us comfortable, affluent white Americans to put aside any lasting concern about those who are isolated by poverty or race from the mainstream of society is almost limitless.
Yeah, it isn't that we've never seen or talked about these problems before - it's just that certain people get pretty uncomfortable about talking about them for long. Maybe they don't want to feel guilty, or maybe it just doesn't affect their lives regularly enough to be of constant concern. Either way, unless something significant changes, I'd bet we're in for another onset of media forgetfulness regarding all the economic and race issues that seem so current now. That likely being the case, we should work now, while we still have media attention and sympathy for these issues, to correct the situation for all those Americans left behind by America. We don't have long.
David Broder seems to be answering a similar question:
Those were good words that President Bush spoke last week, when he pledged "bold action" to confront the poverty of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, which he correctly said "has roots in a history of racial discrimination, which cut off generations from the opportunity of America."
We have heard similar words from presidents in the past. In 1992, when African Americans rioted in Los Angeles after the acquittal of the white police officers who had beaten Rodney King, the first President Bush decried the violence but said, "After peace is restored . . . we must then turn again to the underlying causes of such tragic events. We must keep on working to create a climate of understanding and tolerance, a climate that refuses to accept racism, bigotry, anti-Semitism and hate of any kind, anytime, anywhere."
But the capacity of us comfortable, affluent white Americans to put aside any lasting concern about those who are isolated by poverty or race from the mainstream of society is almost limitless.
Yeah, it isn't that we've never seen or talked about these problems before - it's just that certain people get pretty uncomfortable about talking about them for long. Maybe they don't want to feel guilty, or maybe it just doesn't affect their lives regularly enough to be of constant concern. Either way, unless something significant changes, I'd bet we're in for another onset of media forgetfulness regarding all the economic and race issues that seem so current now. That likely being the case, we should work now, while we still have media attention and sympathy for these issues, to correct the situation for all those Americans left behind by America. We don't have long.
posted by onlooker at 12:16 PM
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