Via Boing Boing I learned of this BBC news report entitled “Survivors reveal Superdome horror”. Chilling, and deeply upsetting, but essential reading if we are to be reminded of how close we are to decending into chaos, no matter how “civilized” we think we are as a people.
“One guy jumped off a balcony,” said Charles Womack, a 30-year-old roofer who was beaten and injured during his time at the Superdome.
“I saw him do it. He was talking to a lady about it. He said it reminded him of the war and he couldn’t leave.”
“They killed a man here last night,” Steve Banka, 28, told the Reuters news agency before he left on Sunday.
A body lies face down in water next to the Superdome
Death was everywhere, both inside and outside the Superdome
“A young lady was being raped and stabbed.“And the sounds of her screaming got to this man and so he ran out into the street to get help from troops, to try to flag down a passing truck of them.
“He jumped up on the truck’s windscreen and they shot him dead,” Mr Banka said.
Another man died in mysterious circumstances on Friday as a police car passed the New Orleans Convention Center, where equally squalid conditions forced many to sleep outside among streets full of rubbish.
More than 24 hours later, his body, like so many others, had not been moved.
“Right where he fell,” Larry Martin told the Los Angeles Times. “Like roadkill.”
“We found a young girl raped and killed in the bathroom. Then the crowd got the man and they beat him to death.”
-cvj
September 4th, 2005 at 6:11 pm
Sponsor The Veterans For Peace Bus in Covington, LA
The Pine View Middle School
1115 West 28th Street Covington, LA.
We are using the school to support Veterans For Peace hurricane relief efforts from Covington, LA.
This petition is to the US government to open closed military bases to house the Hurricane victims- please sign and pass on
http://www.petitiononline.com/10000008/petition.html
paypal donation to Chapter 116
http://www.vfproadtrips.org
AS OF Sept 2nd 2005 WE HAVE RAISED $10,000.
We will use this money for the relief efforts.
We still Need Trained Volunteers & Specific Donations
#1 Nurses are need in Missisippi ASAP!
#2 FOOD BANK & DELIVERY VOLUNTEERS & TRUCKS, VANS
#3 KITCHENS (SELF CONTAINED) with generators, utencils, workers
#4 OFFICE & MEDIA EQUIPMENT:
Computers Printers, & Copiers, See Below
Our Mobile Media Center is on the bus with wireless Internet via Satellite. We need to have more tools and software!
Have:
(1) Satelite Mobile Internet Unit
(Installed and workiong to provide Mobile Internet access for Camp Casey.
(3) PC’s
(1) iBook.
(3) Digital still
(1) Video Camera.
On The Way:
LAN network For Covington, LA
5KW – 10KW Generator
Commercial Ice Maker
NEEDS:
(5) Apple iMac G5 Computer 20″ Monitor = $3,000 each
(5) 500 Gigabyte Firewire Harddrive = $500 each
(5) Canon XL2 Digital Video Camera = $4,500 each
(2) Digital Projector (3000 lumens) =$1,000 each
(5) Apple iPods with recording mics = $600 each
Monthly Satelite Access and Website Hosting Fee = $200 pr/mo
Donations for our multi media equipment will support refugees, volunteers, Red Cross, staff, press, keep in touch through via email, web, blogs, and teleconferencing to insure our message gets out
Cash donations are always needed and are Tax Decuctable!
Contact:
Veterans For Peace Chapter 116
28500 Sherwood Rd
Willits CA 95490
pjtate@sonic.net
Cell PH 707-536-3001
September 5th, 2005 at 7:28 pm
From:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/05/scene.blog/index.html
September 6th, 2005 at 10:44 am
From dslprime.com
September 6th, 2005 at 10:36 pm
“reminded of how close we are to decending into chaos”
Who is “we”?
Yes, Americans are one step away from savagery, thanks to 25yrs of vicious Republicanism, and 300 yrs of racism, but I remain unconvinced that the descent into savagery would have happened as fast in many other nations, eg Sweden, Japan, probably Cuba.
September 6th, 2005 at 11:18 pm
In 2005, the most atrocious thing anyone should ever have been expected to see in a football stadium is a Cincinatti Bengals game. I am not trying to make a sick joke here, I am actually being serious. This whole Superdome thing was totally horrendous. A complete nightmare that should simply never have happened in the US in 2005.
September 7th, 2005 at 1:33 am
Guys. I agree that it was a nightmare that should never have happened. I wish I was as optimisitic as you that we’re all so terribly enlightened that our behaviour would never deteriorate under extreme circumstances. I wish it were true. I believe it to be true of several individuals – myself included, I hope- but I’m just not sure what would happen in the right circumstances in a group dynamic, when your life has been stripped away all of a sudden along with a lot of the structures which holds things in check. I’m a firm believer in seeing the best in people, but looking at the sort of behaviour everyday people can resort to with little provocation (road rage, drunken unruliness on a saturday night, fighting over the last supertoy in the store at christmastime…), I do wonder how far we are from chaos.
And I certainly don’t think the Americans are any more or less capable of bad behaviour than anyone else, Maynard, so there I firmly disagree.
Cheers,
-cvj
September 7th, 2005 at 8:42 am
Clifford: I’m not a firm believer in seeing the best in people. I’m a firm believer in seeing things as they really are, then considering how much better they could be. The question is not how far “we” are from chaos, the question is how far New Orleans was from chaos. The answer is that it had one foot in chaos even before the hurricane. It was one of the worst-run cities in the nation. In 2004, it had a homicide rate of 54 per 100,000. In New York City it was 7 per 100,000. The hurricane hit a region of America with problems that should shame the whole country. For now, at least, the country is ashamed. So now is a good time to take action.
September 7th, 2005 at 10:52 am
Greg. Perhaps you’re right. I don’t consider myself wise enough to say one way or another.
Cheers,
-cvj
September 8th, 2005 at 12:35 am
Bob Herbert expands on the point that I was trying to make. See also Nicholas Kristof.
September 8th, 2005 at 10:02 am
I think its Bloody sick what happened, people with sick criminal convictions should not have been allowed in the superdome. they should have been told to go play by the lake.