Racism in Katrina pictures

[nolly]

I'm sure you've all seen the many variations of the "it's not looting if you're white" discussions and AP photos going around. I haven't read all of them, because it infuriates me too much. Not, however, for the reasons most of the people spreading it seem to be angered by, but because it's an overreaction to a non-existent slight.

First and foremost:
There are two people in the "finding food" picture. One is a Caucasian male. The other is a multi-racial woman. Not white.

Further:
Remember the old saying "Never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity/incompetence/etc."? Same thing. Many different photographers are at work. Many different people are writing captions. Editors are making their selections under all sorts of pressure -- and there's more than one editor, too! Perhaps one or more caption writers are avoiding the word "looting" altogether, and that "finding" photo landed on the desk of such a writer. Perhaps the writer who got the "looking through a shopping bag" photo wanted to refrain from making accusations about someone when there's no evidence -- we don't know what's in the shopping bag. The editors are more concerned about "Is it ready (cropped, etc.)? Is it in focus? Can we make the deadliine?"

Also, consider demographics. The people still in the city are, for the most part, the ones who couldn't afford to leave. The poorest of the poor. Now, I don't have numbers to hand, but I've lived in the South. Chances are very good that there are more non-Caucasian people than Caucasians in the city right now. There's white folks, too, of course, but I suspect that the balance in the photos is pretty close to the balance in the population.

There is no conspiracy here. I've seen no evidence whatsoever of racism. And it infuriates me that people are so quick to see what isn't there and blow it up when there are so many more important things to be concerned about, like the impact of the Iraq War on the availability of people and financial resources to deal with the aftermath -- people and money that probably could have reduced the impact in the first place, had they been available.

I'm not locking this, but I am screening comments by non-friends. I don't want to deal with random trolls.

Edit for clarity, since it's come up in comments a few times:
What bothers me is the immediate "It's the south, it must be all about race!" assumption, which seems to ignore real issues like "Is it really looting to grab food and other necessities, many of which are perishable?" and "Why wasn't more assisstance provided to help poorer folks evacuate?"

Edit the second: This is the post that put me over the edge on this. I initially refrained from linking to it to give the author a chance to reconsider it, but since he has made no response, there you go.

Comments

[davedujour.livejournal.com]

I don't think there needs to be a conspiracy for there to be racism. And I now that there are different caption writers, editors, etc. who are responsible for the different papers. I still found the juxtaposition of the two photos to be, well, frustrating.
I'll also note that I found the photo with "looting" on CNN's site too, and it said something entirely different.

[koyote.livejournal.com]

Hrm. See, there's a whole other picture people are missing.

In NOLA right now, taking food, water, daipers, formula, and first aid stuff from a closed store- or anywhere except a red cross station or working hospital- well, is it looting? Forget white and black and creole and whatever. When you are left behind by you larger society to fend for yourself in a disaster like this, getting food ain't looting.

Now, Police piling up on DVDs from walmart... that may be looting.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

You're right about that, and I probably should've mention that, but the looting-vs.-not looting discussions that don't bring race into it don't anger me the same way. It's the whole "It's the south so it must be All About Race!" attitude that infuriates me.

[koyote.livejournal.com]

I agree, it is infuriating. Especially in NO. (there's a lot of historical reason why NO has been less involved in the jim crow racism of the historical south in general)

I'm just offering up another possible reason an editor might choose to avoid the L word :)

[joxn.livejournal.com]

I disagree. I think it is extremely important to start pushing back on this, loud, and long; because the entire "looting" narrative is the nose of the "blame the victim" camel that is eager to come into the tent of discourse. Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon (http://www.pandagon.net/archives/2005/08/busting_out_the.html) has a great post detailing the rhetorical possibilities a "looting" myth opens up.

I think it has to be faced that New Orleans is practically destroyed. If it doesn't get rebuilt, and it's hard to see how that's going to happen, it's going to be our first post-apocalyptic urban wasteland. All that stuff that people are "looting"? It's not going to be salvageable anyway once the city has filled up with water.

As koyote points out, breaking into a Walgreens to get food and medicine is not looting. Anything else people manage to steal, they're going to have to leave behind anyway -- New Orleans is under a total evacuation order. And people who don't evacuate? ... well, see "urban wasteland" above.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

Which two are you referring to? The blackfolks post that seems to have started this had four picutes, sceencapped from yahoo, if I recall correctly.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

And as I said to koyote, the aspect that angers me is the "It's the South, it must be All About Race!" It's entirely possible to discuss whether the behavior is looting without bringing race into it, and that is the more important discussion.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Well... there's two types of racism.

When "driving while black" is still a crime, there is racism. A police officer who pulls over black people who "look suspicious" might be willing to share his or her last crust of bread with a hungry black person... but still feels suspicious about black folks when looking out for suspicious characters.

Just because a person isn't a hateful bigot doesn't mean s/he doesn't have any racist prejudices.

(Re: prejudices, when I was teaching math, I had a black student in a class. I felt bad, because he was falling behind, and I thought maybe, hey, a lot of black folks come from bad schools, maybe he doesn't have enough prep work. That's prejudice. It's not a bad or evil prejudice, but it is me making an uninformed guess based upon race.)

Herm. In Star Wars I, George Lucas had one of the bad guy races have a Fu Manchu-ish bad Asian accent. Was that bigotry or hatred? No. But I bet there was some unconscious racism involved. Ditto with Jar Jar. That doesn't mean I think Lucas is evil, or that I'd boycott the movie. I don't think he would have done it, if he understood how it looked. Nevertheless, he didn't see it, and I wish other folks did... not to stamp out bigotry (because there wasn't any) but to help reduce racism, even on the unconscious level.

[trendywendy.livejournal.com]

I think the pictures are pretty representative because more blacks do live in the areas that the media is covering. I haven't seen anything from Uptown or Metairie/Kenner, which are much whiter areas - everything I'm seeing is from the Ninth Ward or Downtown, which isn't as white of an area. There are many, many black people in New Orleans on a normal day, which I think is what most people forget.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

Er, blackfolk, that is.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

But is highlighting the differences in captioning on the AP pictures, which may well be no more than coincidence, really, in any way, constructive? Since it's extremely unlikely that the same person used "looting" in cationing pictures showing only black folks, but chose not to in pictures with white folks in them, and more likely that different people wrote the captions, what is the point?

[nolly.livejournal.com]

I don't know NO geograhpy well -- I was last there more than 20 years ago for eye surgery at Tulane. Are the whiter areas you name also wealthier areas, where few people (if any) were unable to evacuate, or are they poor areas with remaining residnets, but which aren't getting the media attention?

[penguinicity.livejournal.com]

Yes to the first - uptown is very wealthy (and where Tulane university is located (but not the medical center which is near the CBD)). The 9th ward and east NO got hit harder earlier than Kenner and Metarie. Partly because they were closer to the center of the hurricane, partly because they are lower, and lower areas tend to be poorer in N.O.

well

[roobug.livejournal.com]

there's a difference between racism and unconscious negative bias. most people in america have an unconscious negative bias for black people, and it isn't the same as thinking the black people are bad, but it does result in discrimination (unconsious) and profiling and all that. and it's fucked up.

it's measurable though, have you seen the iat tests from https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/measureyourattitudes.html

you can also measure your implicit associations (good/bad) for fat people, elderly, disable, and a bunch of other minorites...

Re: well

[nolly.livejournal.com]

But how is that relevant? Is there any reason to believe that's playing a role here? I haven't seen one.

Re: well

[roobug.livejournal.com]

it's relevant because it affects decision-making, like word choice.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Well... how would it make things better if this were just blown off and ignored? What bad things would be avoided?

What bad things could happen if it was blown off, and there was some unconscious racism involved? It's a balancing act.

Keep in mind that, right now, what I've seen is people making noise. Is this worth making some noise over? I don't know; noise is such a funny thing.

Would it be worth diverting energy from something that is clearly going to have an effect, something that might actually make the world a bit better for a few people? Probably not.

So, I'm approaching this from the perspective of "okay, some people are making noise, but, really, it's no big deal."

Re: well

[roobug.livejournal.com]

oh, and the other half of that is words that were chosen as a result of negative association reinforce negative association. like the cyclic hell of child abuse, except it just makes people uncomfortable with black people for no reason, instead of physical abuse.

Re: well

[nolly.livejournal.com]

It can, and if we had any reason to believe that one person wrote all the captions in question, or if we had a large enough data set to see a pattern in word usage, then it would be a factor to consider. But neither of those criteria have been met -- we have, that I've seen, one picture with one white person and one black person, which applies "looting" to only the black person (who is exiting a store; the white person is not, but is carrying a shopping bag), two pictures of black people with large bags which use the word "looting", and one picture of a white person and a mixed-race person, which does not use the word "looting". Four pictures is a very small data set, particularly when it's likely that multiple writers are involved.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

I've seen an awful lot of people making an awful lot of noise.
I've seen more noise about this than about the fact that the National Guard were unavailable for preparation and recovery because they're in Iraq.
I've seen some extremely rude and hurtful noise about this.
The noises seems way out of proportion to the alleged offense, and distracts from other aspects of the story.

Re: well

[nolly.livejournal.com]

Do we know that? Do we know it's not just a matter of one caption writer using "looting" across the board and another avoiding it as much as possible?
Or some captions written early in a shift, and others later?
I thikn people are jumping to conclusions based on insufficient data when they attribute this to racism, unconscious or not.

Re: well

[roobug.livejournal.com]

do you have a reason to believe reporters are some sort of elite that don't share the unconsious negative bias of our culture at large and are producing bias-free captions and articles? I do agree with you--it is not racism. but it is a problem, and a troubling one in light of the fact that people aren't aware of their negative bias when choosing pictures, writing teasers and captions and articles, and hiring people and welcoming their neighbors.

I'm pretty sure they've made db of news reporting of actual crime, and black offenders are much more likely to be pictured that whites in proportion to the ratio they represent in the total numbers of lawbreakers. But I don't have a reference, so feel free to dismiss it... :)

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Fair enough; I've seen some rumblings, but nothing more than a scornful "how *dare* they! I will write a nasty letter about this!"

Re: well

[nolly.livejournal.com]

I'm not denying that bias exists. I'm just questioning a) whether this is really an example and b) the stregth of the response to it. (There's a specific post that really triggered my response, which I haven't linked to because I don't think the author has seen the comments and had a chance to reconsider yet. I'd rather not send a bunch of folks over there until zie has had that opportunity. If zie stands by it, I'll link.)

[dcart.livejournal.com]

There's a whole lot more at work here than just a couple of photos. I think if you really look into this on your own, you'll see a much larger pattern.

You may recall that I did my fair share of defending the south against the wrong perceptions of midwesterners on heinous/atrium/eschwa. I don't at all believe this is a "it's the south, it must be about race" issue. To me, it's more like "this is the american media and it's typical unthinking racism at work again" issue.

You can be racist without being malicious about it. I don't feel that most racism is of the hateful, malicious KKK type. It's the clueless, ignorant unself-conscious type. So this can be racist and be explained by stupidity.

A whole lot of the coverage of this tragedy, not just the photo captions have fallen into easily predictable racist patterns that our media is really quite famous for.