Katrina, New Orleans, Biloxi, etc. (Page 4 of 8)

Lakme, the article you posted about this being "civilized America" (and the utter lack of any gov't planning or assistance) struck a deep nerve with me.  I wonder, what are all your impressions of how this has affected the general public?  People have already mentioned this on the thread, but if this was a "terrorist attack" without a doubt this whole country would be militarized and mobilized for total war against the entire world.  The destruction of an entire city by terrorists?  Can't you imagine the propaganda that would be issuing forth, the bloodlust, the calls for vengeance?

Yet terrorists *didn't* do this -- it was seemingly an act of nature.  My own impression is that at least here where I'm at (Los Angeles) it is far off everyone's personal agenda.  No real discussion about, just another event on the news.  Again, this would be in stark contrast to even a minor attack by "terrorists".

My conclusion is that people have just stopped caring about all the death and destruction in the world, only motivated to hate and feel emotion when told to by the authorities (something straight out of Orwell's 1984 I might add -- "two minutes of hate", anyone??).    I don't want to conclude this, because it would be devastating if it were true. It would mean that the public doesn't care about anything, and that those in power can truly get away with murder and oppression without any cause for concern.

So, I am interested to hear your all's impressions of the public.  I have been deeply saddened by this event, and it is clear from this thread that all of you have been thinking about this as well.  Bit I wonder -- is John Q Public being affected by the loss of New Orleans?  Is this a topic that you all hear other people talking about?

SSE

Hey all,

I thought these articles might be of some interest to people who wish to see coverage of the hurricane and its aftermath from an outsider's view. One thing I noted though which seemed strange was that this couple were told to evacuate from Miami and head towards New Orleans..... isn't it more logical to head north away from coastal areas altogether? I guess a lot of people are trusting others more than their own common sense.

Anyway here are the articles.....

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/austra … 69304.html

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=59641

Matt

When I was reading your post that's exactly what went through my mind, "2 minutes of hate!" from 1984.  Then I got to the part of your sentence where you mention it and I was nodding my head.  It's very true.

Actually, sadly enough, the people of the SoCal region didn't much care when 9/11 was happening either.  I know, because I lived there at the time.   They just don't care, period. 

On the morning of 9/11 my boss (who was Australian) and who would give me rides to work (she was a cool person) showed up late to get me, but her being late didn't have to do with what was going on.  In fact, she was oblivious to what was happening in NY/DC , hadn't heard or seen any news.  So she heard about it first from me.   Her response was more like, "Huh!  Wow!"   Not upset though.  Then we get to work and I'm thinking Okay, you know, the country's under attack and all, south Manhatten is burning, the Pentagon is in flames, another plane crashed or was shot down, who knows what's going to happen next, we should all go home....right?   The country's in a crisis here.....right?!   No, of course not.  Instead, I find they've got a TV set up in the graphics department room, and the graphics design people are casually watching it while working, sometimes even making funny comments in between giving a halfhearted "oh wow..." then casually turning back to their work like it was nothing.   There was no genuine upsetness or concern at ALL from them.   Then the boss himself whizzes into the room.  He's got a meeting, and no 9/11 is gonna get in the way of that dammit!   He's all over the place trying to get his blueprints together from the graphics people, barely even glancing at the TV.  He doesn't care.  He's got this intense look on his face, but it's about the meeting, and trying to get his graphic prints in order, not about 9/11.  Then he races out the door, and the graphics people have more emotion about that situation (it seemed, anyway) then about anything going on on t.v.   And on a sidenote, one of the field geologists showed up, a young kid, 25, and he's watching the news reports with fire in his eyes, TOTALLY buying this story about angry A-rabs who hate us and therefore want to fly planes into our buildings on behalf of Allah and he's spewing all this fiery rhetoric about nuking them and blowing them up and whatnot.  But the weird part was, even though he had "fire" in his eyes, there didn't seem to be true emotion involved.  He would say his comments with fire, then kind of look around the room with a nervous smile / laugh, waiting for confirmation and approval from people.  So it was more like he was saying what he felt he was *supposed* to say.  And by the next day at work, forget it, most everybody (save for one woman, the receptionist) was so over it.  It was business as usual.

Let me tell you, it was bizarre.   I left SoCal 2 months later for various reasons, but the people was one of them.  Although it was far down on the list, it was still one of the reasons I was glad to leave.

Yes, but like zonabi said it's more about this:

Coincidentally, first thing this morning as I'm getting into my office at my temp job, one of the scientists comes down the hall to talk to the Director who's standing outside my office at the printer.  So I can hear the whole conversation right there.  And the scientist wants to relay a "funny story" to the Director.  It was all about how this morning he was at the gas station, and as he's pumping his gas, and then a woman goes out to change the price sign, raising the gas price by 20 cents more a gallon.

"But of course I didn't have to pay the new price, I was still able to pay the old price!"   (insert chuckling and head nodding here.) 

They then proceed to have this conversation all about gas prices.

Not one mention of New Orleans, the people, or what's happening down there.  And you know, I didn't feel anything bad as I listened, not really any judgment or disgust towards them.  It was more like neutral noticing of what's going on.  Then I was logging onto Noble Realms (YES, IT'S THE FIRST THING I CHECK IN THE A.M., BUT I'M NOT AN ADDICT! ) and I read what SS Elephant and zonabi were saying.   So to answer your question SS, no, John Q. Public is not being affected, at least that I can see, and zonabi nailed it pretty accurately.  Unfortunately.   (edit:  In all fairness, I need to add that an email did go at yesterday at this company from a woman who works in human resources, in regards to making $10 donations to the fund that she had set up on the company's website.  She did sound genuinely concerned and affected about things in her email.)

But I hear Hollywood stars are going to hold a telethon for this.  That should help!  (??)  I don't know, that just struck me as ??? when I heard.   I mean, yeah, I guess they're "doing something", but the reality of what's happening there (looters roaming the city on a rampage, people getting mugged and shot indiscriminantly - hospital workers and cops included, no water or food, people sleeping on the highways, etc.) versus Hollywood's little glitzy head-in-the-clouds "solution" seems so ridiculous.  Yes, a telethon will help!  And I bet the people sleeping on the highway with no water will really see that money, and any time soon too.  !

(Caption: "An armed policeman stands guard next to a fuel truck in New Orleans, Louisiana, following Hurricane Katrina. With most of New Orleans submerged and thousands of people trapped by waters strewn with bodies, authorities also fought an outbreak of plundering by locals taking away food, appliances, jewels, clothes and even guns."

I had to add this one in, because of the way things line up in this photo.  The freeway "exit" sign arrow points directly at the helicopter which is there to pluck the evacuees.  Just a weird coincidental allignment.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4205074.stm

This whole situation has been constantly in my thoughts over the past few days.  To be honest in some ways it is really getting to me - and part of me is having trouble understanding why that is.

I think Lyra hit it very well when she said she is seeing this whole event from so many different perspectives.  For the first time I am also doing the same.  And I am finding it very difficult to assimilate the information in all these multi-faceted perspectives.

Firstly as a number of people have already mentioned, this whole situation just doesn't seem to add up correctly...take the above quote for example.  Finally the people in the Superdome are being evacuated out of appalling conditions to some where supposedly better.  Yet the crowd are shooting at the rescuers.  What gives?  Are the people just confused?  I don't have an answer but I do know it doesn't seem to make any sense.

Then there is the sub-dued reaction everywhere to all this.  Over the past few years I have learnt a lot about the mass conditioning of the populations.  Unyet I never expected that to play out on such a level like this.  I mean in the UK 9/11 was a massive thing, and it really shocked a lot of people.  The tsunami created a similar reaction; yet the situation in New Orleans barely causes people to lift an eyebrow.  It is almost like something as snapped.

Metaphorically peoples minds can be like an elastic band - as each shocking event happens, their minds stretch and become more and more tight.  Eventually the mind - like the elastic band - reaches a point where it can stretch no more.  Then one of two things happens, it "slips" and jumps back in place...or it simple snaps.

It feels to me like so many peoples mindsets have snapped.  They no longer react any further than; "Oh, it's just another disaster."  Someone I was speaking with about this actually said they didn't understand the problem - quarter of a million people died in the tsunami, and only 80 people have died in New Orleans..."What's the big deal?"  There was no point taking that conversation any further - and I didn't react to it.

But it is a great display of how far the public conscious has changed!  The concept of ever increasing polarities between humanities viewpoints and attitudes seems to be coming into play here in a vast way.

Then further there is the US Governments response to all this (or lack of); and watching how this is all playing out is now - for me at least - the single largest confirmation that indeed all the conspiracies I have read up on are now coming into play.  Maybe the problem is I had intellectually accepted it all - but deep within it hadn't settled into my mind.  I don't know.  But either way - this whole situation is continuously unfolding "evidence".

Then there are the metaphysical viewpoints on this - which I don't want to get into too much here as it is all very involved...and I really haven't assimilated it all.  But the fact that New Orleans has for a long time now been a den of low vibration - which now just happens to be washed away, is a stunning revelation!

I don't know.  But for me - at this moment the most telling thing, and the thing I keep focusing on - is how this is playing out on the collective conscious.  I feel that somehow it is a key "event" that is going to have a massive affect on how things play out in the future.  There is just so much to all this.

A friend just wrote:

Yeah, I've just seen that on the tv news here in the UK. Gas is $6 a gallon in some places. There are queues of cars up to a mile long waiting to fill up, with people fighting and arguing at the pumps. It's all going crazy!

Anyway, the BBC have finally caught up. Today it's been almost nonstop coverage of this event. God knows what took them so long.

this seems to support the idea that this was an unexpected event. else they would have had their lines well rehearsed and cue cards in place.