Katrina: Rumors, Lies, and Racist Fantasies

KATRINA: RUMORS, LIES AND RACIST
FANTASIES

Slavoj Zizek, In These Times.

A look at the frenzy of fantasies and
rumors that the media reported as facts
while New Orleans flooded.

http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/27442/

According to a well-known anecdote, anthropologists studying "primitives" who supposedly held certain superstitious beliefs (that they descend from a fish or from a bird, for example) asked them directly whether they "really" believed such things. They answered: "Of course not -- we 're not stupid! But I was told that some of our ancestors actually did believe that." In short, they transferred their belief onto another.

We do the same thing with our children by going through the ritual of Santa Claus. Since our children (are supposed to) believe in him and we do not want to disappoint them, they pretend to believe so as not to disappoint us by puncturing our belief in their naivety (and to get the presents, of course). Isn't this also the usual excuse of the mythical crooked politician who turns honest? "I cannot disappoint the ordinary people who believe in me." Furthermore, this need to find another who "really believes" is also what propels us to stigmatize the Other as a (religious or ethnic) "fundamentalist." In an uncanny way, some beliefs always seem to function "at a distance." In order for the belief to function, there has to be some ultimate guarantor of it, and yet this guarantor is always deferred, displaced, never present in persona. The point, of course, is that this other subject who directly believes does not need to actually exist for the belief to be operative: It is enough precisely to presuppose his existence, i.e. to believe in it, either in the guise of the primitive Other or in the guise of the impersonal "one" ("one believes…").

The events in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina struck the city provide a new addition to this series of "subjects supposed to..."-- the subject supposed to loot and rape. We all remember the reports on the disintegration of public order, the explosion of black violence, rape and looting. However, later inquiries demonstrated that, in the large majority of cases, these alleged orgies of violence did not occur: Non-verified rumors were simply reported as facts by the media. For example, on September 3, the Superintendent of the New Orleans Police Department told The New York Times about conditions at the Convention Center: "The tourists are walking around there, and as soon as these individuals see them, they're being preyed upon. They are beating, they are raping them in the streets." In an interview just weeks later, he conceded that some of his most shocking statements turned out to be untrue: "We have no official reports to document any murder. Not one official report of rape or sexual assault."

The reality of poor blacks, abandoned and left without means to survive, was thus transformed into the specter of blacks exploding violently, of tourists robbed and killed on streets that had slid into anarchy, of the Superdome ruled by gangs that were raping women and children. These reports were not merely words, they were words that had precise material effects: They generated fears that caused some police officers to quit and led the authorities to change troop deployments, delay medical evacuations and ground helicopters. Acadian Ambulance Company, for example, locked down its cars after word came that armed robbers had looted all of the water from a firehouse in Covington -- a report that proved totally untrue.
..more..

that we, here on DU, spread some of these stories ourselves.

as I was posting this.
I also got into a bunch of debates with people who said what was going on had nothing to do with racism. I found some of this quite telling, to say the least.

for buying into it. And I suppose there was an element of racism, but I have to defend myself just a bit. I think it is more a cultural thing. The folks that were there in that dome, I knew were the lowest class of a very violent city. Most happened to be black, but in honesty, that probably did not mean as much to my dinosaur brain. My boss is black, many colleagues are, and I live in a truly integrated neighborhood. What I was guilty of most, I think (in believing the rape, beatings, etc. rumors) was classism. And I'm sorry I did because in retrospect the people there behaved very civilly in an impossible situation.

something like, oh please don't let this be true! It was horrifying. Rumors were being reported by the media without stating they were rumors.
It was a cumulative effect of many factors that created such hysteria in the end. I just hope we all learned something from this.
Sadly, most have probably not heard much follow up on these stories.

odd example you choose to give -- Acadian Ambulance Company, for example, locked down its cars after word came that armed robbers had looted all of the water from a firehouse in Covington -- sounds like the fears weren't abt race, they were abt being out of communication & away from our homes & not knowing what was happening

the author of this inpenetrable mess clearly doesn't know the area & i have little use for ppl who don't know what the hell they are talking abt telling us who lived thru it what actually happened

guess what, the crack lords did not declare a holiday in honor of the hurricane, crimes happened, as they had been happening all summer, some of these crimes horrendous

lying abt rape victims, refusing to report and record the crime of rape, has been occurring in the greater new orleans area since the 70s at least, so i'm not too surprised that during a crisis of this size they were not taking rape reports at all

even cops participated in the looting this man says didn't occur, there have been arrests, the looted cars found in baton rouge, but it's all cool since this dude says nothing happened -- and tellingly he says even if it did happen then it doesn't matter

it is insult to the victims, many if not most of whom are also black, to join the ranks of those who deny the crime of rape

you should indeed be ashamed at this re-writing of history, which serves only the real estate developers but harms the heart & soul of the crime victims

i wonder why you didn't include THIS over the top quote:

Even if all the reports on violence and rapes had proven to be factually true, the stories circulating about them would still be "pathological" and racist, since what motivated these stories were not facts, but racist prejudices, the satisfaction felt by those who would be able to say...

seems to me pretty clear the writer is the racist, looking for ways to divide us when we most needed not to be divided -- and worse, assuming that all victims are automatically white, all perpetrators automatically black, most crime victims in new orleans are BLACK

too many in the media, too many on the internet, played right into that game

of rapes, since you claim the author of the article 'denies the crime of rape'. links?

from the Huffington Post, eyewitnesses, etc. After four days!
Can't find the link, but the thread was there and here.