There Is A Humanitarian Crisis In Louisiana & No One Is Talking About It

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Five days ago, a Category 4 hurricane tore through South Louisiana. It wiped out an entire town and leveled Lake Charles. Already, the mainstream media has moved on — almost as fast as the storm did. Friends in my hometown of Shreveport, which is in the northwest corner of Louisiana, have just had their power restored. I was one of the lucky ones in Baton Rouge who didn’t lose power. The storm did take out my neighbor’s banana tree, which had crops on it.

But in comparison to the devastation in Lake Charles, that’s nothing. What’s worse, unlike Katrina which remained in the news for several days after the storm had left, Hurricane Laura’s devastation has faded into the background in the midst of Trump’s ongoing drama, celebrity drama over OnlyFans, and Trump supporters rioting in Portland and starting gunfights.

I saw Victoria’s tweet show up in my feed. It reminded me, a native Louisianan who had the storm pass through my own neighborhood, just how fortunate I was that we were not in the direct path of the storm. Yesterday, Ebay was trending on Twitter because our joke of a president came to Louisiana, put his signature on some pieces of paper for a few people, and told them the pieces of paper would sell on Ebay for $10,000.

We expect more from our leaders. We expect more from our entertainers, for that matter. At this FEMA briefing, yet again we have the President of the United States obsessed with himself. We have a humanitarian crisis and all he can think about is selling autographs.

Perhaps it is a good thing he did that, though, as it was the only thing that got the mainstream media to again talk about what’s going on here in my home state. Perhaps we should be grateful for what little attention we did get.

“Why don’t you just move?” is a question that is often posed to me.

Louisiana is my home. It’s the place where I grew up, went to school, had my first kiss. It’s the place I returned to when I was broken and needed to rebuild my life. We have crawfish season and Mardi Gras. The cost of living isn’t as exorbitant, and I can afford to live here. Many communities in Louisiana are too poor to move, and/or are here due to their jobs — mostly jobs in the oil and gas industry.

https://twitter.com/brerobinsonnn/status/1300187375272951808

I want to share something with you. I did a Google search on “Louisiana humanitarian crisis” and “Lake Charles humanitarian crisis.” All the articles were from 3–5 days ago. There was nothing new. Yes, this is still current. We should be talking about what’s going on — now.

I can not stress this enough: there are people without power, running water, shelter, and food. There are American citizens struggling, and let’s not forget about Covid-19. Lake Charles is actually the city in Louisiana that was hit hardest by Covid-19 after we went into Level 2 coming out of lockdown.

“The situation is serious across the state, and it is most serious in Lake Charles,” said our governor on August 7, 2020. That was 19 days before the hurricane hit. Or 20 — if you count Thursday morning instead of Wednesday night. The point I am making is that our state is facing a severe humanitarian crisis and it seems as if the rest of the world has forgotten us already. It hasn’t even been a week.

Lafayette Mayor Refuses to Help Hurricane Victims

Some disturbing news that came out on Twitter was this article from The Acadiana Advocate that reported that Lafayette is refusing to open Hurricane Laura shelters. The mayor said that “bad actors will use our hospitality against us.”

Lafayette Parish Mayor-President Josh Guillory’s administration sent an email saying to “take a pause on any action to establish shelters at this time.”

How You Can Help With Hurricane Relief in Louisiana

Victoria shared a few links that were providing aid to hurricane victims in Lake Charles:

While the media may have collectively moved on, Twitter gives me hope.

 


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Johnna Crider

Johnna owns less than one share of $TSLA currently and supports Tesla's mission. She also gardens, collects interesting minerals and can be found on TikTok

Johnna Crider has 1996 posts and counting. See all posts by Johnna Crider