everyneworleanian January 12, 2007
Yesterday was the march on City Hall. I spent the morning sending out resumes for law clerk jobs, and one firm actually called me to schedule an interview while we were marching. Shannon called and said she was sick and couldn’t march. She sounded awful. Katherine and I went downtown without her, and we gave her sign to a friend of Loki’s.
We met Adrastos, Loki and Alexis, Maitri and her brand new (sweet, cute, tall) husband, D, Celsus, Schroeder and a few others at the foot of Canal Street, next to the World Trade Center. Adrastos later told me that Dave Cash was there, but I didn’t see him. I also missed Traveling Mermaid, G-Bitch and others. Adrastos posted about all the bloggers who were there, and Maitri is cataloging the press, posts and pictures. Scout Prime, who blogs at First Draft, lives in Wisconsin but has devotedly followed events in New Orleans, has posted a video of Anderson Cooper’s interview with blogger Bart Everson and Julia Reed.
I couldn’t be prouder to know Bart and Karen Gadbois. I don’t think either one of them set out to be spokespeople for a bunch of pissed off New Orleanians who feel like we have been put through hell, but they have risen to the occasion. Of all the talking I have heard in the last 17 months, they are the ones who most truly represent my feelings. Thank you to both of them.
While we were forming up to march, a contingent of students and teachers from Rabouin High School arrived carrying signs. These were Dick Shavers’ music students and his colleagues. Seeing them, Katherine, a Ben Franklin graduate, burst into tears. She collected herself, and we introduced ourselves and told them that we were sorry for their loss. It’s hard for me to express what a serious-looking group of kids they were, and the chaperones presented an image that I am all too familiar with - middle-aged black women in dignified grief. Whatever other people think of when they think of black people in New Orleans, I think of middle-aged black women in dignified grief. As many people said yesterday, this has been going on a long, long time. Every time someone is killed in New Orleans, or anywhere, that is somebody’s child.
There were several large groups of school kids besides Rabouin’s. I talked to some girls from McGehee’s, and there were some kids from Newman. I saw many other kids in school uniforms that I couldn’t recognize. The kids, like the rest of the marchers, were amazingly solemn. Remember, this is New Orleans, where a march is usually accompanied by a jazz band and carnival throws.
Maitri commented on the hundreds of people who lined the streets and watched us pass. They had mostly come from the office buildings on Poydras, and they weren’t very enthusiastic. I’m glad it wasn’t a Mardi Gras parade, because as entertainment, the march was a flop. It wasn’t for the benefit of the onlookers, it was for the people in it. Katherine and I saw a few people we knew outside of their workpalces, and they said they would be marching if they could.
There were inumerable signs, and this being New Orleans, some got right to the point: “Nagin, Blanco, Bush - Get Off Your Ass.” Many people had signs representing their neighborhoods - Mid-City, Marigny, Bywater, Lake Vista, Uptown, Irish Channel, Garden District. Katherine held a sign that said “Do Your Jobs” on one side and “Fix This Mess” on the other. My sign said “No More Xcuses” on one side and “Corrupt & Stupid” on the other.
When the head of the march turned the corner onto Tchoupitoulas, I could see that there was a huge number of people. I was looking at more than a thousand people, easily. By the time we got to City Hall, I think the crowd numbered over 3,000 people. I would be interested if anyone took an official estimate of the numbers. I was never in a position to see the whole crowd at once. This morning, I saw reports of 5,000 people. The Picayune has good coverage, using words like “extraordinary” and “unprecedented.”
At City Hall, we ran into Morwen and saw Ashley, who had joined up with an impromptu drum corps. Blake Haney was also there. Later, we saw Donnie McDaniel. We also saw Anderson Cooper, very busily reporting. I probably won’t see his report, but I hope it gets the attention it should. (Hmmm. I’m seeing bits and pieces of his report all over the internet this morning. Thanks, ya’ll.)
After we made it to Perdido Street, suddenly the crowd broke into applause. We saw a large group of mostly black people marching in behind a banner. I learned later that it was the group from Central City, lead by a minister who appears to be taking a long-time proactive attitude against crime. This guy was addressing violence before it was cool, so to speak.
Reading the accounts in the media, the only person who says the march was a white thing is Adam Nossiter of the NYT. It’s been frustrating to me since the hurricane that even when New Orleanians of all colors come together, like they did yesterday and do on a small scale every day, the media emphasizes the things that divide us. I don’t know how to put this, and I’ll probably get in trouble, but let’s just do a thought experiment. White New Orleanians, for the most part, don’t have to live here, and we all know dozens, if not hundreds of people who have moved across the lake or out to the parish. If a white person is still living in New Orleans, assuming it’s not against their will, what are the chances that he or she is a racist? To a racist, New Orleans, with it’s numb-nut Mayor, horrible congressman, and mostly black underclass (”the poor, deprived and useless,” as a former boss once said to me), would be the last place on earth to live. I would be willing to bet my white bread recipe that no white person at that march yesterday thinks he or she is any different from a black person. Most New Orleanians, black and white, just think we are lucky we don’t live on Clara Street between Washington Ave. and downtown. The media makes a bigger deal about our races than Dyan French Cole.
I have to admit that I’ve noticed a subtle shift in The Official Story, particularly in comments to Anderson Cooper and others. Now that we have made so much news because of Helen Hill’s death, the public is beginning to feel sorry for us. Bush is escalating the war in Iraq at the same time we are marching on City Hall with a Washington, D.C.-sized crowd. Anyone with a brain is asking 1) why so much money is being spent on the Middle East Misadventure when we have neglected one of America’s greatest cities, and 2) how can we trust the people who left New Orleans’ population to fight for itself to fight this war without disastrous results?
Katherine and I made our way up onto the steps of City Hall, where we could hear the speakers, but we could not see them. First, a minister spoke, hitting a lot of good inspirational notes, but the crowd was not really there for inspiration or affirmation, having already been inspired and affirmed. Next, Karen Gadbois, who blogs at Northwest Carrollton and Squandered Heritage, gave a very pasionate, brief speech wherein she threw Ray Nagin’s 2005 Hurricane Hissy-Fit right back in his face. She has posted the text of her speech. Karen is a dedicated advocate for New Orleans, and I hope these politicians will start listening to her.
Next, Bart Everson, who blogs at BRox and was a personal friend of Helen Hill’s, gave a very moving, smart, pointed speech in which he told city officials that we are afraid they just don’t get it. His speech is also on his blog. If you need to put your vote of no confidence into some kind of words, his pretty much spell it out. Since I started reading Bart’s blog, over a year ago, I’ve often thought that he and his wife are just the kind of people we need more of in New Orleans. Every time something shitty happens to them, I worry that they will leave and go back to the midwest. They are young and smart, they would thrive anywhere. I have wondered what keeps them from saying, “You know what? We don’t need this.” Yesterday, I thought of a really good reason for them to stay here, in addition to all the things that keep most of us here.
Bart has sort of inadvertently stumbled into the role of the spokesperson for Everyneworleanian. He and his wife are educators/artists, not poor, but definitely not rich, they live in Mid-City (what neighborhood name could be more appropriate for Everyneworleanian, I ask you?), they love pets, their beautiful old house was flooded, they came back, their jobs are still here, they still haven’t been able to get all the repair work done on their house and they know more about house crap than they ever wanted to, there is every sort of drama going on around them, including personal setbacks, murder and exploitation of the poor in their neighborhood, and now the murder of their good friend. Bart says things that Every New Orleanian should be saying, and he’s had a lot of responsibility put on him because of it. In return, he is held in great esteem and affection by everyone who knows him. Bart, you can’t ever leave now, because no matter where you go, even if it’s your actual birthplace, you will never have greater admiration than you have from people here. It’s pretty clear to me that your destiny is here, whether you like it or not. I hope you and Xy feel the love.
Nakita Shavers, Dick Shavers’ young sister, next spoke about her family’s loss. She said that she was living away at college now, but that she wanted to come and live in New Orleans and be a major force in politics like her brother was a major force in music. I couldn’t see her, but her speech was powerful. Katherine again broke out in tears.
A woman named Raj Ponnu spoke for New Orleans East, saying that she had lost three businesses and she was trying to rebuild. It should go without saying that people can’t rebuild here if they can’t be assured of a reasonable level of public safety. Unfortunately, this simple concept is one of the things our officials don’t seem to get, so it has to be said. Ms. Pannu said it very well. Because of the lack of any leadership, everyone is just rebuilding on their own, where they were before, dangerous or not. Nagin’s plan, by default, is “it’s the Wild West.” Nagin is still waiting for John Wayne to show up.
Several young men spoke about the lack of educational opportunities for young people and the removal of the athletic and music programs from the middle schools. A sour note for me came when one young man said we needed to get God into the schools, proclaiming that “if gays can marry,” religion should be taught in school. I felt a religious gay-bashing gearing up and I booed loudly, along with many others. Fuck that. Don’t use people’s deaths as an excuse to scapegoat the gays.
I had no idea until I read this morning’s coverage of the march that Nagin and Riley were there. I realized that I have gotten very used to disappointment. I had no idea what to expect when we got to City Hall, except that I knew Bart and Karen were speaking. I would not have been surprised to hear Ray Nagin get up there and talk more bullshit. It is getting so that the last thing I expect from a politician is anything resembling an honest spoken sentence. The last thing I expect from our leaders is anything resembling a solution. I was just hoping people didn’t start pelting him with rocks. I was sure he was hiding in his office.
Fortunately, the march organizers, more new heroes of mine, knew better than to have Nagin blather on any more, or any of these other people who just make you want to puke with their transparent phoniness. They shut him down. I know that my fellow blogger, Jeffrey at Library Chronicles, will happily admit he was wrong about one thing. No one in their right mind could have taken the marchers, the signs or the speakers to be expressing support for the measures that have been announced by the mayor. Also, I think the size of that crowd, on a Thursday afternoon, probably made some people think, “my god, how many could they turn out on a weekend?” More than anyone would believe if the NOPD responds by harassing our innocent citizens who have already been through so much. More than that if we don’t start getting some of these gun-wielding killers into prison.
Jeffrey was right about one thing, but it didn’t turn out like either one of us feared. There is not much talk in the media about white New Orleanians remaining apathetic until a nice white lady was killed. Dick Shavers’ murder is a recognized catalyst, something that broke the whole city’s heart. Black people know we are together on this. Even the media seems to get it, except for the NYT. The public outside New Orleans, though, seems to be more sympathetic with our plight now that a nice white lady was killed. It shows you how hard it is to wrap your mind around the dynamics going on here. The outrage over white Helen Hill’s murder has made the rest of America start to care more about the majority-black city that they wanted to abandon after they saw that it wasn’t Dixie Disneyland but a big city full of poor black people. Jeffrey, it’s a small mind after all, but we’ll take help any way we can get it.
I have two additional media observations. I keep hearing, in regard to Eddie Jordan’s statement about the cops who killed a retarded guy on Danziger Bridge, that Jordan “called the cops ‘rabid dogs.’” Ashley, correct me if I’m wrong, but I think he said the cops shot down the citizens like rabid dogs, with rabid dogs referring to the citizens who were shot. People shoot rabid dogs, rabid dogs don’t shoot anything. And people shoot rabid dogs without asking any questions first, because you can spot a rabid dog from far away and you don’t want to get anywhere near it. So, I think he was saying that the cops treated the citizens like the citizens were rabid dogs that needed to be put down, not that the cops were acting like rabid dogs.
Also, I saw Julia Reed being interviewed by Anderson Cooper. She is originally from Greenville and now lives in New Orleans. I loved it when she said, “well, we know we have an incompetent mayor…” [but we're just moving along in spite of him]. In the theater, we call that “throwing it away.” Normally, one would be circumspect about calling the mayor incompetent on TV, and act as though “gee, I just hate to say this, but….” By throwing that line away, Reed called quadruple-bullshit on the mayor. She told everyone in America that New Orleans is being driven by a moron, we all know it, and we are just desperately hanging on the wheel to keep from going into the ditch. New Orleanians are now the underdogs, and America loves an underdog.
After the march, I was hanging out with Adrastos when he got a drunken phone call from Ashley Morris. We met Dr. Morris at Johnny White’s Hole in the Wall on Bourbon, where he had been scandalously overserved. There he was with his snare drum and beret, waxing lyrical about how beautiful the day was. A guy from Texas bought us drinks when he heard we had been in the march. We saw WWL’s coverage but we couldn’t hear it. The helicopter shots were great. Adrastos, Ashley and I ate at the Bourbon House, then we met Meredith and Josh at Tommy’s, formerly the Wine Loft. Meredith was too busy prosecuting criminals to attend the, um, march against her boss, but she wanted to hear all about it. Ashley was trying to grill her on the Danziger case, but she hung tough. Not stupid, our girl.
We agreed that it was one of those magical days when everything just seems to go right. I think the march exceeded everyone’s expectations. It was a good commingling of people who don’t know each other, but share a common outrage at not only the murder rate, but the lack of leadership and how little they have accomplished, even accidently. If you wondered who the people are who are bringing New Orleans back, almost all of them were marching to City Hall yesterday.
- Posted in : main, new orleans
- Author : dangerblond
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