# Why are New Orleans Katrina refugees so reviled by the communities that took them in?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [August 28, 2006, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515 "2006-08-28T13:46:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/1 "2006-08-28T13:46:55Z")
Nationwide there seems to little, if any, love for the New Orleans Katrina refugees, and local news stories are generally about some donated trashed house they left behind, or a rise in the crime rate, or just how they’re ungrateful parasites.
What is it about these re-located refugees that make them such a PITA for so many communities?
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### Author:  [@Geobabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geobabe)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/2 "2006-08-28T14:02:14Z")
I’d be willing to bet it’s because people who go to work every day and live normal lives don’t make very interesting news stories.
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### Author:  [@kambuckta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kambuckta)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/3 "2006-08-28T14:06:37Z")
Not being a US citizen, but taking a couple of WAG’s from my understanding of the initial catastrophe and its repercussions:
1: Nobody likes guests OF ANY KIND to stay longer than two days. It’s lovely and gives a good feeling of bonhomie in the ‘honeymoon phase’, but after that, everyone wants them gone. Guests are a righteous pain in the arse.
2: The notion of\*\* internal\*\* refugees is unknown in the US and it’s not something that you guys (like most western nations) have ever had to encounter before.
3: The ‘refugees’ were already the dregs of society, people who had no-one or nowhere else to turn to, otherwise they would have found accomodation and work through friends/associates and would be working to get their lives together. Thus the revelation that they are now involved in crime and trashing houses is no great shakes really.
4: People REALLY don’t like their own status-quo threatened, nor the prospect that what has happened to the NO folk could easily happen to them given the right circumstances and conditions. Natural disasters can happen to anyone at anytime, regardless of where they live, and seeing the real-life effects brings home to all of us how precarious our lives and livelihoods really are. It’s an eyeopener that doesn’t make us feel good…it’s easier sometimes to blame the victims for THEIR ineptitude and lack of foresight.
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### Author:  [@NinetyWt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinetyWt)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/4 "2006-08-28T14:20:36Z")
In the case of Jackson, Miss., **Geobabe** has it right. There isn’t much news … good or bad … about those who came here because there isn’t much news to report. They go on about their daily lives without trashing houses etc. It’s not sensational so it’s not news.
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### Author:  [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/5 "2006-08-28T14:31:23Z")
Here’s a local news story that does not revile the refugees. [http://www.news-record.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060828/NEWSREC0101/60825030](http://www.news-record.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060828/NEWSREC0101/60825030)
Here’s another. [http://www.news-record.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060827/NEWSREC0101/60825029/1001/NEWSREC0201](http://www.news-record.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060827/NEWSREC0101/60825029/1001/NEWSREC0201)
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### Author:  [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/6 "2006-08-28T14:36:18Z")
I live in Houston, a community which (a) has lots of Katrina refugees, and (b) reviles them on a pretty much daily basis. Seriously, almost every night the evening news has some story of shootings or robberies, which they make sure to specify were committed “by Katrina refugees.”
As for the why, my guess is that a majority, maybe even an overwhelming majority, of the NO refugees in Houston are hard-working, law-abiding citizens. Hell, one of my best friends here is a lady tattoo artist who lost her home, her shop and all of her equipment to Katrina and has had to start over again here in Houston. But it seems that there is a very loud, very visible minority of refugees who were probably thugs in New Orleans and have continued to be thugs here. You can’t blame their adoptive city for being a little upset at that, though the neighborhoods they’ve settled in were far from crime-free even before they showed up.
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### Author:  [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/7 "2006-08-28T14:56:03Z")
> [@kambuckta](#):
>
> 2: The notion of\*\* internal\*\* refugees is unknown in the US and it’s not something that you guys (like most western nations) have ever had to encounter before.
California or bust. During the dust bowl thousands of people fled the areas around Oklahoma and headed west, many of them to California. Of course they weren’t referred to as refugees then but then I don’t think they’re generally referred to as refugees these days. They’re not fleeing persecution and they haven’t crossed any international borders but then maybe they define refugee different on television then most people do in real life.
Marc
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### Author:  [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/8 "2006-08-28T15:02:43Z")
> [@MGibson](#):
>
> California or bust. During the dust bowl thousands of people fled the areas around Oklahoma and headed west, many of them to California. Of course they weren’t referred to as refugees then but then I don’t think they’re generally referred to as refugees these days. They’re not fleeing persecution and they haven’t crossed any international borders but then maybe they define refugee different on television then most people do in real life.
>
> Marc
I can only speak for my own location and situation, but here in Houston “refugees” is the default term for the people who relocated after Katrina.
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### Author:  [@NinetyWt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinetyWt)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/9 "2006-08-28T15:30:26Z")
IIRC the term ‘refugee’ for the storm victims was nixed early on by some folks as being inappropriate or rude. “These are American citizens!” and all that.
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### Author:  [@Duke\_of\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke_of_Rat)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/10 "2006-08-28T15:31:11Z")
> [@MGibson](#):
>
> California or bust. During the dust bowl thousands of people fled the areas around Oklahoma and headed west, many of them to California. Of course they weren’t referred to as refugees then but then I don’t think they’re generally referred to as refugees these days. They’re not fleeing persecution and they haven’t crossed any international borders but then maybe they define refugee different on television then most people do in real life.
>
> Marc
If “The Grapes of Wrath” is an accurate depiction of those refugees, they were often not welcomed by the communities they moved to.
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### Author:  [@Bytegeist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bytegeist)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/11 "2006-08-28T15:39:51Z")
> [@kambuckta](#):
>
> 2: The notion of **internal** refugees is unknown in the US and it’s not something that you guys (like most western nations) have ever had to encounter before.
> [@MGibson](#):
>
> California or bust. During the dust bowl thousands of people fled the areas around Oklahoma and headed west, many of them to California.
Not to mention the American Civil War. Atlanta for instance took in tens of thousands of refugees coming from Tennessee and Mississippi — at least until the city itself was burned to the ground later in the war.
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### Author:  [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/12 "2006-08-28T15:46:39Z")
I wasn’t aware they _were_ reviled by the communities that took them in. The couple that came to my town haven’t been mentioned in the news hardly at all since the main furor over the storm died down, and I haven’t heard a bad thing about them.
If they _are_ reviled in some communities, I would guess the only real reason for it of **kumbuckta’s** suggestions is #3. New Orleans had an incredibly high crime rate, and it’s not surprising if many of those criminals continued in their ways once they moved out of N.O., and if so it’s not surprising that their adoptive communities would revile them for it. There was an interesting article in one of the news magazine recently (“Time” I think?) about the dispersal of New Orlean’s gangs into new communities, and how while some of them stop their crimes when they’re in a better environment, many keep right at it, and drag others into it with them. I would be plenty pissed off if the Katrina refugees we’ve welcomed into my normally placid town started shooting things up or dealing drugs on the corner.
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### Author:  [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/13 "2006-08-28T15:54:09Z")
> [@kambuckta](#):
>
> 3: The ‘refugees’ were already the dregs of society, people who had no-one or nowhere else to turn to, otherwise they would have found accomodation and work through friends/associates and would be working to get their lives together. Thus the revelation that they are now involved in crime and trashing houses is no great shakes really.
I think you got it here. New Orleans was a big city with a lot of classes of people.
You don’t hear much about the ones that left before the storm hit, hung out with friends and realtives, had hurricane insurance on their home, and despite the tragedy are trying to help themselves get their lives back in order.
The ‘refugees’ were the ones living off society looking for a free handout. Now they just want to jump on the bandwagon blaming Katrina, FEMA, and the government for their woes and want to be taken care of for the rest of their lives.
New Orleans is probably glad to be rid of them and doesn’t care if they come back.
They’re someone elses problem now.
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### Author:  [@Tully\_Mars](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tully_Mars)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/14 "2006-08-28T17:22:38Z")
> [@MGibson](#):
>
> California or bust. During the dust bowl thousands of people fled the areas around Oklahoma and headed west, many of them to California. Of course they weren’t referred to as refugees …
> Marc
They were referred to as Okies and the label was considered derogatory, suggesting that they were not welcomed with open arms.
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### Author:  [@lisacurl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisacurl)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/15 "2006-08-28T17:27:25Z")
\*\*Geobabe \*\*and \*\*kambuckta \*\*summed it up, I think.
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### Author:  [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/16 "2006-08-28T18:21:29Z")
> [@kambuckta](#):
>
> [S]eeing the real-life effects brings home to all of us how precarious our lives and livelihoods really are. It’s an eyeopener that doesn’t make us feel good…it’s easier sometimes to blame the victims for THEIR ineptitude and lack of foresight.
> [@Hampshire](#):
>
> The ‘refugees’ were the ones living off society looking for a free handout. Now they just want to jump on the bandwagon blaming Katrina, FEMA, and the government for their woes and want to be taken care of for the rest of their lives.
> New Orleans is probably glad to be rid of them and doesn’t care if they come back.
Now there’s a juxtaposition for you.
I think many poeple had unrealistic expectations about the [refugees](http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/carroll/bal-md.ca.house02dec02,0,1836406.story?coll=bal-newsaol-headlines). Regarding the family that left behind a trashed house in Maryland:
> [@](#):
>
> Rosalind Blakey, who connected the two families through her grassroots organization, Home Resources Services, said church members would “come into their house and not knock and tell them it was time to get up and not to sleep so late. … Treating them as if they were their project or their assignment.”
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### Author:  [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/17 "2006-08-28T19:10:52Z")
> [@Duke of Rat](#):
>
> If “The Grapes of Wrath” is an accurate depiction of those refugees, they were often not welcomed by the communities they moved to.
One thing I’ve always wondered about the Grapes of Wrath; why did they have to pass through customs to go from Arizona to California?
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### Author:  [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/18 "2006-08-28T19:28:55Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#):
>
> One thing I’ve always wondered about the Grapes of Wrath; why did they have to pass through customs to go from Arizona to California?
I’ve never read the book, but there are currently agriculture inspection stations at all California border crossings. Trying to keep bugs from hitchhiking into the state and devastating the agricultural economy.
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### Author:  [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/19 "2006-08-28T19:40:16Z")
> [@astro](#):
>
> Nationwide there seems to little, if any, love for the New Orleans Katrina refugees, and local news stories are generally about some donated trashed house they left behind, or a rise in the crime rate, or just how they’re ungrateful parasites.
>
> What is it about these re-located refugees that make them such a PITA for so many communities?
Houston resident here.
We’re not knocking the people who came from New Orleans and got jobs and put their kids in school and mainstreamed themselves. We are glad they’re here. We’re knocking the few that do trash houses, commit crimes or are ungrateful parasites.
When we opened the doors after Katrina, we got everybody: the good, the bad and the in-between. The majority of the folks were good people, but we had a load of scumbags come in as well. We got some folks that have been so used to sucking on the government teat that they don’t know any other way of life. We got a lot of hard-core criminals. A lot of them continued their screwed-up ways and they have caused the hard spike in the crime rate here in Houston.
No good deed goes unpunished…
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### Author:  [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2006, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-new-orleans-katrina-refugees-so-reviled-by-the-communities-that-took-them-in/370515/20 "2006-08-28T22:54:57Z")
I hear a lot about the Houston refugees; I don’t hear so much about the ones that settled near me in San Antonio, despite the fact that I taught several of their kids last year.
I regard it as an extension of the Fast Food Jerk Syndrome: when you are serving up burgers or pizza, you can have a hundred customers who pay you and walk off with their food whose faces you forget instantly… but the ONE GUY who decides it’s your fault that the place doesn’t take Discover cards or whatever, HE sticks out in your memory forever…
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