To jump to the current version of this post (...new address!), click this link.
It's All Working Out So Well for Them!
Barbara Bush makes a false step following a 'tour' of shelter facilities, because I'm sure she didn't mean it the way it sounded. Surely not.
So here’s Barbara Bush, grande dame that she undeniably is, ‘touring’ one or more hurricane center. And this, according to The Editor and Publisher, is what the she had to say about the general state of the displaced to whom she dispensed her graciousness:
Accompanying her husband, former President George H.W. Bush, on a tour of hurricane relief centers in Houston, Barbara Bush said today, referring to the poor who had lost everything back home and evacuated, “This is working very well for them.” Then she added, “What I’m hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this—this (she chuckles slightly) is working well for them.” (quote from article)
So it’s all good, right? Poor people who have lost their crappy little houses and meager possessions demonstrably think themselves lucky to be living in a nice, clean hurricane center with a lot of other ‘underprivileged people’----because what, really, did they lose? As Barbara Bush can attest, if you don’t have anything, you don’t lose anything.
Did your house fill up with water, did all your clothes and your rent-to-own TV and couch get flooded, did your 10 year old cat drown along with your daughter’s kitten and your son’s puppy? Never mind; just be glad you’re not Trent Lott, who lost a house that really meant something. For one thing, George W. Bush, on one or more occasions, actually sat on the front porch. Trent Lott's possessions cost a lot of money; some of them are irreplaceable. At least the inner city poor didn't have anything important to lose, right? You can stick them in a giant stadium, give them some free food and hugs, and they're as good as new!
Are the Bushes really this out of touch with the experience of people in America who don’t have an extra home or two where they can go if the waters start to rise? (Some of the people in the relief center didn’t even have an extra story to retreat to). Do they not know that the possessions of the poor can mean just as much to them as Trent Lott’s house meant to him? People living in tiny one-story tin-roofed houses like their houses too. So do people in rented apartments. I like my carefully chosen $300 living room rug that I saved to buy and bought on sale and that it took me four months to find just as much as someone else, as it might be Barbara Bush, likes the genuine hand-woven silk $50,000 antique silk rug presented to her by this or that emir or other personage of note (I’m sure she has one or several of them). I am quite sure that there is a woman somewhere mourning the loss of the rug that she bought on sale at Wal-Mart, along with her other no doubt pathetic possessions.
You could make an argument that the difficulty of acquiring a replacement is as much a part of the value of an object as its actual fair market value. Wealthy people---not just these wealthy people, but the rich everywhere---often don't get this. If you can't afford to replace something, then it's value is 'irreplaceable,' even if it's clear to everyone else that you couldn't get $10 for it at a yard sale. The poor don't generally have property insurance and when they lose their stuff, they lose it.
At any rate, being stripped of everything you had, however underprivileged you might be, and losing your place in one of the great cities of the U.S., and your city, is not what most people would call having things ‘working well’ for you. And I imagine that the charm of living together like cattle in a hurricane relief shelter, however expansive the hospitality, will eventually fade.
Mrs. Bush tells us that having all of these underprivileged people tell her they want to stay in Texas is a little ‘scary.’ I admit that I personally find their wanting to stay in Texas sort of scary myself---but that's just me; after all, I live in the state that her other son has rightly designated (except when hurricanes hit) 'Paradise.'
I do not take their wish to remain where they are as necessarily indicating that they find Texas superior to New Orleans before the flood or that they would have chosen to relocate their but for the flood. I take this as indicating that they do not necessarily wish to go back to the nothing that is left to them in New Orleans and start over from scratch. I don't think they necessarily prefer to live in Texas; I think they are overwhelmed by dread, grief, and fear when they consider returning home.
I've nothing against Mrs. Bush and I certainly do not wish to extend my frustration to members of the Bush family other than that elected government employee who is directly accountable to me---or rather the two elected government employees who are. But what Mrs. Bush said is in fact exactly the sort of thing I've been listening all my life from middle class white people who pride themselves on their 'charity' and the bounty they dispense.
It's not just Barbara Bush. It's a reflection of a national blind spot. Do any of us recognize the extent to which we really do measure the worth of a human being by the amount of property and money he or she manages to acquire? Do we admit the extent to which our assessment of 'respectability' depends on this? Do we realize that we tend to reckon up the worth of our fellow citizens based on their actual net worth?
There are a host of Americans who will say that the homeless, penniless, lost, and desperate people of New Orleans should be 'grateful for anything they can get.' And they too will think that the ones who are relocated to other areas and given basic necessities of life are (in the end) fortunate. It won't occur to any of these people---most of whom see themselves as generous and charitable 'to a fault'--- that no one in the world's wealthiest country should have to feel grateful for basic necessities such as food, shelter, clothing, and medical care or count themselves lucky for being provided with them.
And I don't know what will ever make them understand. I really don't.
(For Tim Grieve's take on this---his posting at Salon.com sent me to the article----click here.)
RELATED LINKS
“There by the Grace of God Goes Somebody Else”: The Demands of Charity
“There by the Grace of God Goes Somebody Else”: Empathy---that pity that is akin to love
Measure for Measure: How Much Charity Can I Afford?
“Walk Me Out in the Morning Dew, My Honey.”
Image drawn by Mr. Tenniel; painted by Damozel!
6:04:31 PM 
|
