Disaster Awareness
“I thought they would do a lot for us, but so far they haven’t given us anything. Most of the people here are waiting on the road to recovery” –Albert Walker, 75
Disaster Awareness: Our Government’s Role in Disaster Relief
Throughout our Comparative Literature course, we have examined and discussed how both society and our government respond and react to disaster and repression. Hurricane Katrina was one of the many disastrous events we examined in depth. This disaster did not only destroy hundreds of homes — but it also impacted and shifted the society in New Orleans. Our government continuously uses times of shock and disaster to implement new regulations, to privatize and to cut social benefits and protections.
It is crazy to wrap your head around the idea that our government has orchestrated and taken part in various disasters, including Hurricane Katrina. The government is held up to the standard that they have the people’s best interest in mind. However, through further research and a more in depth examination of the government’s role in disasters, the true negligence and disregard for lower income people becomes clear. The steps taken by the government after a disaster occurs are strategic- their aim is not to help all but to help the wealthy/upper-class and to leave the poor to struggle on their own. They manipulate and take control of disasters in order to get any type of financial or political gain.
Disaster is highly profitable. The government uses the instability disaster brings in order to get financial gain/market growth and to gentrify and make changes to the societies affected. Hurricane Katrina, for example, left many people displaced. The people who lost their homes and were left weeks without food or water waiting for rescue were not wealthy people — they were poor people. These people were potentially “washed out” of their homes. The government’s “lack of preparation” and aid has been highly criticized.
“The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) took days to establish operations in New Orleans, and even then did not seem to have a sound plan of action. Officials seemed unaware of just how bad things were in New Orleans and elsewhere: how many people were stranded or missing; how many homes and businesses had been damaged; how much food, water and aid was needed”. https://www.history.com/topics/hurricane-katrina
Their lack of response to the disaster as it was affecting hundreds of people’s lives and homes could be considered to be a tactic to gain control of the areas that were greatly affected in hopes to gentrify and inevitably “kick the poor people out”.
The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina left destruction and poverty. After the hurricane, the majority of New Orleans’ poorest were left outside of the city. They could not come back to their homes because of the shortage of housing reconstruction and the increase of prices. “More than 200,000 former residents are in the nationwide diaspora that Katrina created, about 80% of them black” (Richard Wolf). The government failed to aid the residents who were left without homes. They did however, implement changes in tearing down old run down homes and investing in charter schools. Consequently, further raising prices and “screwing” over hundreds of poor people who once called New Orleans home. https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-12-21-new-orleans-poverty_x.htm
In Naomi Klein’s, The Shock Doctrine ,Klein discusses the ideology of Disaster Capitalism and the Disaster Capitalism Complex. Disaster Capitalism is defined as the field dedicated to disaster management. It is orchestrated raids in the public sphere in the ways of disaster relief to create new market opportunities. Disaster Capitalism Complex is the profiting of these disasters and not allowing/wanting the disaster to end in fear of losing these profits. As discussed earlier, Hurricane Katrina allowed the government to come in and make changes to the neighborhoods that were destroyed — it allowed for an immense amount of gentrification. The changes brought on only benefited the wealthy and powerful, while the poor were faced with wage drops/loss of jobs, cost of living increases, and healthcare/welfare decreases. The hurricane is an example of Disaster Capitalism at play. It stripped the poor from control and limited their resources — while the wealthy gained power. https://focalizalaatencion.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/tsd_nk.pdf
It is important to note how our society and media responds to disasters such as Hurricane Katrina. Kanye West was featured in a video where he says, “Bush doesn’t care about black people”, criticizing Bush’s efforts in the disaster response for the hurricane. Beyonce made a music video for her popular song “Formation”, where she depicted life during Hurricane Katrina. Media responses are important in shining light on these disasters and to raise awareness for aid and change.
We can all conclude one thing: our government only cares about economic and political growth. However, as our economy continues to grow, so does poverty. It is important we all understand how the government responds to disaster and their potential benefit from it.
