Anthea Butler

Assistant Professor of Religion, University of Rochester (Rochester, NY)

Anthea wrote this just a few days after Hurricane Katrina, 2005....

The port that took in the bodies and souls of Africans to enslave them in America is the same place in which their descendents are dying because of the neglect -- and virtual genocide -- foisted upon them by a lame duck and lame president and an ineffectual government.
That's right, America. Slavery has never ended for generations of African Americans in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. New Orleans, a major slave port, will be the place of death once again, for a thousand of Africa's descendents. In these states, persons of African descent are the ones who are most impoverished, hurting, and dismayed. Yet our news broadcasters continue to ask inane questions, such as "Why didn't they leave?" Or, "Why are they looting?"

The mainstream press is partially to blame for this rapidly unfolding debacle. We haven't heard much about people being rescued, but to hear it told from CNN, Fox, and other television news outlets, there is mass looting, raping, and stealing. Is there racial bias to this coverage? These pictures tell the tale: Of course, the continual loop of black bodies screaming and sweating dosen't help either. The occasional white person who pops up is probably worth 100 Chinook helicopters flying in at this point. The fact is, God help whomever is still in New Orleans, because it's hell on earth. A hell that politicians and greedy developers made.

Why are those left behind looting? People are looting because they are tired of being at the bottom. If you don't have gas money, or a working car, or the government check that would come on September 1, you could not leave New Orleans. Never mind the fact that New Orleans, as a tourist capital, never funneled any of that money back into impoverished communities. Katrina didn't care that monthly stipend hadn't come yet. She came instead.

The majority of persons in this desperate plight simply want to get out, anyway they can. And the help that was so delicately listed by our ever-vacationing president in his address to the nation is taking its own sweet time getting there. This started as a natural disaster, but the aftermath is genocide of black people, once again.

Folks, it is time to take a good hard look at this nation. We have an administration that wants to rebuild Iraq, to bring Freedom, but generations of black people in this country have never been free, they have just been poor. We can't even fix our own infrastructure, yet Halliburton gets the contracts to rebuild Iraq? Who will rebuild the gulf coast? When will the hordes of flag-waving, Christians realize that we are as sheep without a shepherd?

Whatever you believe, it is time to start calling the emperor Bush naked, and not clothed. Once again, in a time of national crisis, he has floundered and been found wanting. If they can attempt to impeach Clinton for oral sex, how much more are we going to take from Bush for lying about the war in Iraq, mismanaging the government, imprisoning "detainees" falsely, and now, practically withholding federal aid from thousands of imperiled citizens of New Orleans?  Meanwhile, I am sending money and hoping to participate in helping those refugees find peace, much like those who helped freed blacks after the Civil War.