Claim: E-mails by a volunteer relief worker detail behavior of New Orleans evacuees.
Status: Undetermined.
Examples: [Collected on the Internet, 2005]
I thought I might inform the few friends I have on my recent traumatic experience. I am going to tell it straight, blunt, raw, and I don't give a damn. Long read, I know but please do read! I went to volunteer on Saturday at the George R. Brown convention for two reasons. A: I wanted to help people to get a warm fuzzy. I've been watching the news lately and have seen scenes that have made me want to vomit. And no it wasn't dead bodies, the city under water, or the sludge everywhere. It was PEOPLE'S BEHAVIOR. The people on T.V. (99% being Black) were DEMANDING help. They were not asking nicely but demanding as Help should be asked for in a kind manner and then appreciated. This is not what the press (FOX in particular) was showing, what I was seeing was a group of people who are yelling, demanding, looting, killing, raping, and SHOOTING back at the demanded help! So I'm thinking this can't possibly be true can it? So I decide to submit to the DEMAND for help out of SHOCK. I couldn't believe this to be true of the majority of the people who are the weakest of society. So I went to volunteer and help folks out and see the truth. So I will tell the following story and you decide: I arrived at the astrodome only to find out that there are too many volunteers and that volunteers were needed at the George R. Brown Convention Center. As I was walking up to the Convention Center I noticed I toured the place to get familiar with my surrounding; the entire place is probably around So that was the layout: great food, comfy beds, clean showers, free medical help, by the way there was a library, and a theatre room I forgot to mention. Great stuff right? Well here is what happened on my journey - I started by handing out COLD water bottles to evacuees as they got off the bus. Many would take them and only 20% or less said thank you. Lots of them would shake their heads and ask for sodas! So this went on for about The following statements are graphic, truthful, and discuss UNRATIONAL behavior. Evacuees come slowly to receive this mountain of food that is worth serving to a king! I tell them that we have They complained that we didn't have good enough food. They refused food and laughed at us. They treated us volunteers as if we where SLAVES. No not all of them of course... but 70% did! 20% where appreciative, 10% took the food without any comment and the other 70% had some disgusting comment They would eat their food and leave their mess on the table... some would pick up their stuff, many would leave it for the volunteers to pick up. I left that real quick to go down and help set up some more beds. I saw many young ladies carrying mattresses and I helped for a while. Then I realized something... there were hundreds of able bodied young men who could help! I asked a group of young evacuees in their teens and early twenties to help. I got cursed at for asking them to help! One said "We just lost our ****ing homes and you want us to work!" The next said "Ya Cracker, you got a home we don't" I looked at them in disbelief. Here are women WHY THE **** SHOULD I HELP PEOPLE WHO DON'T WANT TO HELP THEMESELVES! I waved them off and turned away and was laughed at and more "white boy jokes" where made at me. I felt no need to waste my breath on a bunch of pitiful losers. I went to a nearby restroom where I noticed a man shaving. I used the restroom, washed my hands and saw this man throw his razor towards the trash can... he missed... he walked out leaving his disgusting razor on the floor for some other "cracker" to pick up. Even the little kids were demanding. I saw only ONE white family and only TWO Hispanic families. The rest where blacks...sorry 20% to 30% decent blacks... and 70% LOSERS! I would call them ******S, but the actual definition of a ****** is one who is ignorant, these people were not ignorant......they were ARROGANT S. The majority of which are thugs and lifetime lazy ass welfare recipients. We are inviting the lowest of the low to Houston. And like idiots we are serving the people who will soon steal our cars, rape, murder, and destroy our city while stealing from our pockets on a daily basis through the welfare checks they take. We will fund our own destruction. By "US" I don't mean a specific race, I mean the people who work hard, work smart, have values and morals. Only people who want to help themselves should be helped, the others should be allowed to destroy themselves. I do not want to work hard, give the government close to half the money I earn so they can in turn give it to a bunch of losers. I don't believe in being poor for life. My family immigrated here, we came here poor, and now thank God, and due to HARD WORK we are doing fine. If immigrants, who come here, don't know the language can work and become successful... WHY THE **** CAN'T THE MAJORITY OF THE HOMEGROWN DO IT! If we continue to reward these losers then we will soon destroy our great country. I just witnessed selfish, arrogant, unappreciative behavior by the very people who need help the most. Now these same people who cursed me, refused my cities generosity, who refuse to help themselves are DEMANDING handouts on their own terms! They prance around as if they are owed something, and when they do receive a handout, they say it's not good enough! Well you know what......these types of people can go to hell for A little information you won't read in the papers. I can only relate what was told to me by my daughter who works for AA [American Airlines] as a flight attendant. AA donated the planes and fuels. The crews, cabin crews and all people that worked on the ground were volunteers. One flight was a 757 to MSY and back to DFW. This flight was to evacuate AA personnel and anyone else that they could get aboard. They flew in relief supplies including bottled water. On the return flight the survivors, not AA personnel were griping that there was no food or drinks. There was water at the water fountains. There was a lot of griping that the AA people filled up first class, now mind you they didn't pay a dime. When they got back to DFW the people were put up in the flight academy hotel and fed some where in the training center. These people didn't like this arrangement so they trashed the hotel. As far as damage was AA volunteered 6 flights a day from SAT to MSY. I'm not sure which AF base they flew out of but were able to buy military fuel. On inbound flights they carried all of the relief supplies they could and had to Several of the volunteers informed AA that they had had it and they weren't going anymore. AA threatened to cancel the trips if this could not be controlled. I'm not sure just how this turned out but here is more |
Origins: Within a few days of evacuees from New Orleans arriving in Houston to be temporarily housed at the Astrodome and the
them.
That e-mailed report regarding the attitude and behavior of evacuees doesn't seem to jibe with the experience of Rick Barrett, a volunteer who served at the Astrodome. According to his account, he found people "were so grateful for people taking care of them and being there for them after what they'd been through" and "their eyes lit up when you just gave them a cold can of Coke." Additional reports from other volunteers at the Astrodome describe kindly, supportive, and touching interactions between volunteers and evacuees.
We've looked at other blog entries from volunteers working with the evacuees in Houston only to find that among the ones we located there is no mention of arrogance or a rampaging sense of entitlement among the evacuees, no description of trashed washrooms or food spurned because it wasn't what the displaced citizens from New Orleans wanted. While it is possible the author of the much-circulated account did encounter the behavior and attitudes he chronicled, one has to wonder why even outside the confines of mainstream media other mentions of similar ill-treatment of the volunteers and the facilities are so hard to come by.
Instead, stories abound of what it's like to be living in one of the many centers the uprooted have been taken to, such as Kristin Finan's account of spending the night as an evacuee and an Associated Press article about a day in the lives of Kiesha and Darren Keller, two of the many temporarily housed at the Astrodome. Those stories and others paint a very different picture of the evacuees.
The "So I volunteered . . ." editorial was penned as a MySpace entry on
The piece has subsequently become associated with a doctor at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson.
I've never been to the George R. Brown Convention Center, and I have not been to Houston in more than I did not write the email about the Brown Convention Center, but I did receive it and did forward it to several friends. The forwarded message included my signature block and that's why it was assumed that I wrote the email. However, in forwarding the message, I made a very bad error in judgment, and I deeply apologize for any hurt or discomfort I've caused others by doing so. I've learned a hard and difficult lesson and I hope those of you who read this have also. Too much of what we all mindlessly forward through cyberspace can only be termed fictious, unsubstantiated trash. The
My name is Richard L. Johnston. I'm the physician who allegedly wrote the long email about my experience at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston where Katrina evacuees from New Orleans were housed.
appropriate receptacle is a garbage can.
Regarding the second item quoted in our Examples section above, numerous airlines began flying supplies and personnel into New Orleans and refugees out on
The various airlines are engaging in this effort on their own. Jack Evans, a spokesman for the Air Transport Association, said FEMA agreed to reimburse the airlines for jet fuel used in the airlift, "but other than that, the airlines are doing this on a volunteer basis. The crews on board are all volunteers."
Once again, we've so far found nothing to substantiate the claims made in the
Regarding the second e-mail's claim that there was water to be had by the evacuees in the airport before taking the flights they supposedly acted so badly on:
I work at MSY (New Orleans Intl) for the New Orleans Aviation Board. Regarding comment "There was water at the water fountains" is inaccurate. Yes, there was water, but it was not drinkable. I placed the "do not drink" signs there over every water fountain on American Airlines concourse myself.
Both e-mails tend to confirm a widely-held suspicion those evacuated from the wreckage of
Regarding the Katrina evacuees, there are going to be abuses of the kindness of others because that is simply human nature: among any group, there will always be rotten apples, those who behave badly no matter where they are or under what circumstances. The question remains whether among this particular group if the rotten apples are the exception or comprise the majority.
Barbara "apples weigh" Mikkelson
Last updated: 23 September 2005
Sources: