Richard’s Looking Glass

The media affected the rebuilding of Louisiana during post-Katrina due to the negative portrayal of the African-American citizens. With all the attention that the area received during the hurricane, and the publicity of the destruction, one would think that the rebuilding effort would have been stronger. Even though the Civil Rights movement in the 1960’s fought to destroy these types of negative connotations brought upon African-Americans, the media still seems to look for harmful news involving the people. Throughout the years, no matter the situation, African-Americans have been targeted in ways that seem to be unhelpful in fighting for their rights, even today. With the media’s negative portrayal of the people, it seemed less was done in order to help rebuild their cities and ways of life after such a ferocious force hit and destroyed Louisiana.

From August 23rd to the 31st, the Caribbean area was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, the one of the most destructive hurricanes to hit the area in history. The government’s response to the hurricane was delayed, which proved to be controversial in the long run due to the amount of devastation caused by the storm. FEMA, lead then by Michael Brown, was slow to react in the processing of the evacuation plans that had been set up by the US Coast Guard and National Hurricane Center, or the NHC. While the NHC was tracking the storm, they found that their predictions of its landfall being in Florida were wrong, and recalculated the storm to be headed for Louisiana. Unfortunately, this change in the prediction did not help the residents of the area. A concern that arose at the same time were the levees, flood zones, and hurricane barriers would hold up to such a storm. Being the age of such protection structures, many experts expected failure to occur, and informed Local and Federal governments of such predications. The damage that was caused by the hurricane making downfall cost over 81 billion dollars in 2005, with a total of 1,836 fatalities. This Category 5 hurricane caused eighty percent of the city of New Orleans to be submerged in water, and over 23,000 citizens were forced to stay in the Superdome, the cities stadium, for the duration of the storm.

We ran out of food and water, just like everybody else. SO we ventured down and we went into one of the stores. People don’t understand. When you’re desperate, you’ve got to be resourceful. We tried to get some food. So we looted. – Nadeline Jarmon, Ph.D., Executive Director of the New Orleans Housing Authority, Katrina survivor (Dyson 140)

During the storm, the people of Louisiana and all the surrounding affected states were suffering. With the failure of FEMA to bring in the necessary food and supplies for the survivors, residents of all race, age, gender, and creed began to look for any way to survive. These survivors were not trying to steal to get rich or make a profit. These survivors were trying to do just that what the label say- survive. Unfortunately, the media that had swarmed into the area not even hours after the storm saw a completely different picture. Broadcasting images to the world, showing the aftermath of the storm, the media was then in control and there was nobody there to stop them. As they would walk around the destroyed towns and cites, they would film these acts of survival, but twist the story when reporting to the nation. The media was not trying to survive, so they had no idea what it was like, what the other people were going through just to get nutrients and fresh water. The media, for the most part, was then clueless of exactly what was going on around them. Always on the look out for the next big scandal, the images being broadcasted to televisions around the United States would be of what was reported as looting and mayhem.

A young man walks through chest deep flood water after looting a grocery store in New Orleans on Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2005. Flood waters continue to rise in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina did extensive damage when it made landfall on Monday – Associated Press

Captions such as these littered the print media under pictures of black residents walking with food and other necessary items in their hands that were needed for survival. The fact that the people of these affected areas were scrounging for food to survive with the failure of FEMA to provide the necessary provisions was displayed not as an act of survival, but as an act of stealing.

The media’s role in framing blacks as outlaws and savages achieved a rare blatancy when it endlessly looped on television the same few frames of stranded blacks “looting” for food and other items, largely survival (Dyson 166)

This is not to say that there were not individuals out there that were taking advantage of the lawless areas, but for the most part, the people were just trying to survive. With the media broadcasting images of this “looting”, and unconfirmed reports coming back saying that chaos had erupted, the government began to focus more of its attention on the “crimes” and less on helping the people. Police from other states were deputized in Louisiana, troops from the National Guard and Army 82^nd Airborne were brought in to take control of the city. Unfortunately, for the mot part, these resources were misused, and despite the overall sense of care being shared by the citizens of New Orleans, these so-called peacekeepers continues to look for conflict. The media tagged along with the troops on their searches, and when someone was caught breaking the law, it became the biggest news that instance.

The people around America watched this storm as it was being reported throughout the whole ordeal. With these negative issues being displayed, the overall feeling was that help was needed, be it in the form of volunteer work or money and food donations. Relief funds were set up left and right, and people began to help. But the authorities were not allowing most people to enter the affected areas to help. They still felt that it was too dangerous, too lawless, in order to protect anyone. The media continued to portray the black citizens of the areas in a negative manner, and the authorities did not do their own investigation to these allegations being broadcasted over the news. Sadly, the relief began to back up and stay undistributed for weeks after the storm. The generosity of the American people allowed for a continuous stream of needed supplies, foods, and money to poor in, but all these relief items would stop at the authorities door. Everywhere from the Red Cross to FEMA to the independent charities, these needed supplies were being squandered until the officials in charge felt that the citizens, mainly blacks, were in control and no longer “lawless”.

My only challenge is with the news media. Because they’re making blacks look [bad with] the few thugs and knuckleheads they’ve shown at the Astrodome and the Superdome. And that’s not a correct portrayal of the majority of black people that are here from New Orleans. We don’t mind working; we’re looking for jobs. Unfortunately, though, the media only likes to show the negative side of the African American community. We’re a lot stronger and more intelligent than what’s being shown. And I think through this [disaster] people are going to start seeing that. – Dwayne Woodfox, Katrina survivor (Dyson 140)

Overall, the relief of the citizens of New Orleans and surrounding areas was a bigger disaster than could ever be described on paper. Supplies were backed up to the point of running out of storage space, distribution was limited to areas deemed “safe” by authorities with no other information other than what was reported over the news, and money was squandered by relief agencies. While the blame can be put on everyone from the Mayor of New Orleans to the President of the United States to the untrained relief workers, the fact remains that the media was in more control than anyone else. They reported the news that they felt would cause controversy, even if it was not fact based. These reports were sometimes all the authorities had and could get, so using this information, they held off. If the media had portrayed every citizen, be it they were black or white or Hispanic or Native American or oriental, all in an equal matter, showing them trying to survive, the story would be different. Unfortunately, the media’s lust for controversy did not allow for this to happen, and because of that, less was done in in rebuilding of lives of the people of Louisiana.

Bibliography

Dyson, Michael Eric. Come Hell or High Water. Cambridge,

MA: Basic Civitas, 2006.

Giroux, Henry A. . Stormy Weather. Boulder, CO: Paradigm

Publishers, 2006.

Zillman, Bryant. Media Effects. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum

Associates, Publishers, 2006.

Vollen, Lola, and Chris Ying. Voices from the Storm. San

Francisco: McSweeney’s Books, 2006.