Let’s assume we have a city called Antville. The city has evolved over the centuries in the midst of huge colonies of fire ants. They keep the fire ants at bay and have learned to live with the occassional spikes in fire ant activity.
The population of this town is 30% South Pacific Islander and 70% Latvian.
Here come the fire ants…The biggest infestation ever seen. The defenses of the town are over whelmed and even thought they were given ample warning, many stayed to take their chances.
The government had to marshall its resources, and the requested help from everyone near and far. Help came slowly, sometimes to the wrong places, and sometimes too late.
It was devastating. After the wave of fire ants receded, there were dead and dying everywhere. Stung and bitten to death by the horde of voracious insects.
A disturbing trend emerges in the aftermath. It seems that though the South Pacific Island population was only 30% of the population of Antville, they represented 41% of the dead.
Should the South Pacific Islanders sue the government that allowed them to die in such numbers? Should they organize protests and marches to demonstrate against this blatant racism? Should they fight to have this social injustice righted?
If it can be shown that the government enacted evacuation procedures that would directly negatively affect them, yes. If it can be shown that the government passed up minority ants while they were stranded on the roof of their homes in favor of rich, well-connected ants, then I think the minority ants have a case. Especially when the gatekeepers of Antville have purposely stopped other ants from other colonies from getting in and helping, something which could have saved the lives of minority and majority ants alike.
Why didn’t you just make a Katrina thread instead of writing some obvious parable?
Nice strawman, newscrasher. The injustice being decried was not any inequality in the death statistics, but in the survivors who were stranded without any aid for a week. They were mostly black, in case you did not notice.
