Julie R. Neidlinger: Lone Prairie Blog

What is compassion?

written by Julie R. Neidlinger 0 comments link this post

I've noticed a number of comments and blog posts linking to my recent Hurricane Katrina post as I browsed the web today. Some have said it was excellent, and I'm not sure I agree. Other bloggers and writers have accused it of lacking compassion and as just more evidence that I can't possibly expect people, particularly the poor or the African Americans involved in the aftermath, to do what I've called on all of us to do. I've been referred to as "uncompassionate", "judgmental", "racist" and basically, I'm getting nailed for not going along with the blame crowd. I definitely do not agree.

The obvious irony of one situation-outsider telling me I can't possibly understand what's going on because I'm removed from the scene is that, for the very same reason, they can't either. This is the assumption I see often from people proudly wearing the banner of "I have more compassion than you conservatives", the assumption that unless I have been wiped out personally by a hurricane in the past, or unless I am African American, or unless I've been stranded in the Superdome for four days, I can't make any comment. But let's forget about who has the supposed right to make a comment, and focus on compassion.

So what is compassion, then? And how does personal responsibility come into play?

You are not more compassionate than I if I demand personal responsibility, even in the worst of the worst, and you instead list excuses for why bad behavior was excusable.

You are not more compassionate than I if you allow people in horrific situations be victims, encouraging them to place blame on someone else. Even if it is well-deserved blame, the very act of allowing it to fester in the end hurts the person laying the blame.

You are not more compassionate than I if you bring up instances where people were done wrong and ignore the same number of instances where people were doing wrong. Just because I see that both are important to be noted and decide to take up the slack by mentioning the latter does not make me cruel.

You are not more compassionate than I because I refuse to play the racism card. As Rev. Jesse Jackson has said, the issue of race in this recent Katrina disaster is an issue that won't go away. And how could it? He keeps bringing it up, forbidding that it ever go away lest he lose his position as Blowhard Talk-a-lot for the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. All of this racism talk has now helped encourage conspiracy ideas that black neighborhoods were purposely flooded to save white neighborhoods, and that is only the beginning. Are you being compassionate by allowing this self-fulfilling racism talk fester?

Some people berating my post took to task my call to quit relying upon the government to help, and to try to make the best of our own situation. I don't make that statement lightly, living in a farming state which, like other farming states, receives more government money than you can shake a stick at. I say that to everyone, myself included. But I supposedly didn't understand that there were weaker people than I, though I count myself as the weakest of the weak.

Am I not allowed to make an observation on the importance of taking responsibility because the disaster is so recent and so devastating? Am I supposed to encourage people to rely upon government support because "they're owed it" even though this leaves them more vulnerable than a person who goes out and takes charge of life?

It isn't a question of what's owed. It's a question of doing right in the face of something wrong or disastrous. Personal responsibility is evidently impossible to do in tough situations because humans are supposed to revert to being animals when times are tough, is the take I get from people who make have taken me to task for asking this of people. Perhaps a review of our country's pioneer history is in order.

The problem with this anger at a call to personal responsibility is that there are numerous examples, some we haven't even read about yet, where the people at the convention center, the Superdome, in Gulfport and the rest of the region rose to the occasion and sacrificially gave to those in need. Some waited patiently instead of pushing and shoving, found food and gave it to the young and elderly, gave water and food to strangers -- that kind of thing. Why do we give so much camera time, so much allowance and pity, to the badly behaved?

When Grand Forks and East Grand Forks went under the waters of the Red River in 1997, it took President Clinton, our "first black president" according to Toni Morrison, a few days to come to this land of white people. In fact, his decision to come to see the entire Red River Valley going under water caught most people by surprise. I, along with many others, figured no president, "black" or not, would ever come here because no one really cares about North Dakota. Plus, the population of the cities and the smaller towns lining the Red River was so small that despite some coverage on CNN when the downtown of Grand Forks started burning in the midst of the flood waters, it was unlikely that anyone would really care.

Is that sizism, then? We're white up here, so it can't be racism. It must be sizism. Since we're not as vital as a larger city or state, we don't rate in importance.

I've overheard discussions in local coffee shops where people say there is no comparison between what happened in New Orleans and what happened here in 1997, and I would agree. Still, I wondered why I agree. Was it any less traumatic for the families who lost everything in the flood of 1997 to the families who have lost it all now? Granted, the biggest difference and probably the reason I think there is no comparison is in the death toll. The Flood of 1997's evacuation went well considering it had to happen almost immediately and the dikes breaking caught people by surprise though the presence of extremely high water was very evident. People got out. People here have cars because we do not have much of a public transportation system to speak of and so we don't rely on that. That's the difference, then: people were told to get out, they did, and they could.

I'm not comparing the disaster of New Orleans and Gulfport and Biloxi with the Flood of 1997 except to say that two cities went under water up here in 1997, and stayed that way for some time. There was no looting. When the dikes broke and the waters started coming in, people headed out. There were boat rescues for those that didn't leave or couldn't leave. Both cities' entire populations were displaced, fanned out across the state where all day, as the dikes failed and water poured in, the TV and radio stations listed the phone numbers of people in North Dakota and Minnesota who had homes the evacuees could go to. There was also a plan and the city followed it. Mayor Pat Owens hit the ground running and did the city of Grand Forks proud. My sister and her family moved in for about a year here, and we were jam-packed in this house.

Instead of consulting with the city's lawyers on the possible liability to the city if a forced evacuation was pronounced like New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin diddled around with, Owens told people to go and go now. This is also a reason why there's no comparison between the two disasters: Owens was competent in the face of a monstrous disaster, and Nagin has proven otherwise. Owens was in charge of a smaller city, but if you're not up to the task or whatever city you run, don't ask to be mayor.

Then there was Ada, Minnesota, that same infamous year, whose river roared up over the banks, flooded the town and farms, then froze to solid ice, trapping buildings and farm animals and livlihoods in its grip. Was that enough of a disaster to make it OK for people to loose control and start bitching about where the help was and how President Clinton was sizist? How he didn't care for the rural white people of the northern plains? Where was the National Association for White People when we needed them, helping us place the blame? There were taxpayers, poor people, desperate people, emotionally crushed people involved. Why didn't they get what was owed them right away?

Or how about blizzard Hannah, which started the flooding mess of 1997, roaring in and snapping down utility poles leaving some people up here without power for up to five weeks in a North Dakota winter? Ever had a fantasy about cooking on an outdoor grill for five weeks in a North Dakota winter? Your house without heat? No running water? Or at best, using gas generators from other caring North Dakotans to give you minimal power?

Damn FEMA. Stupid Clinton. Those power poles should've been back up in a week. Never mind the physics of having enough snow that some houses were buried and had to be dug out with a backhoe. Somehow traditional government red tape and the laws of physics of water and snow should not have been a reason for slow reaction.

But you know, I bet you didn't even hear about much of this because, as I've said, nobody really cares about North Dakota. We don't have oil refineries, strategic ports, millions of people, and special interest groups looking out for us up here. There's just 600,000 North Dakotans, less than a city's population.

Our disasters aren't true disasters in the national sense of the word, though they are to the people involved just as much as anywhere else. Which is fine I suppose, but why should I weep for your state, then, if you don't for mine? I'll tell you why: I do care about other human beings, just like I know you do. And so for someone to call me uncompassionate because I dare expect people in dire straights to still act like humans when it is entirely possible to do so is way out of line.

And this same scenario, where the thousands of disasters that happen all over the nation that get little coverage because it isn't sensational or carry the promise of political or personal gain? They happen all the time and it seems as if no one cares. People of all races are involved but without media coverage, no one cares as much.

Is there a contest to see who is more compassionate, the conservatives or the liberals? What would be the point in that? And is the physical expression of compassion a non-thinking action that doesn't allow us to point out its abuses? Am I cold-hearted to say that a city's disaster plan which calls for the use of buses to evacuate and then doesn't do it is the failure of the city? That dragging your feet to force evacuation and then not even going to all corners of the city to announce and heed it along is a failure of the city? That telling frightened people to go to a convention center and a sports arena per a disaster plan, and then not even stocking these locations with enough food, water, security, sanitary supplies or chemical toilets is a failure of the city? And that the mayor of a city can't invoke federal help, but the governor instead, is a failure of the state? Does this make me uncompassionate, just pointing this out?

If you're going to get angry with President Bush on anything, go after him for his appointment of Michael Brown as head of FEMA. But has anyone ever seen FEMA move faster than molasses in any disaster? Of course, in most other disasters the people didn't run off with a cart-full of TVs and shoot at the construction workers trying to seal up the levee, and so the slowness of FEMA and troops and the Red Cross wasn't maybe as striking. Did New York fall to anarchy during the blackout? During 9-11? No. And there are African Americans there. It has nothing to do with race.

The call to personal responsibility always makes people stiff-necked because we are too used to being excused to make excuses. No one wants to state the obvious that instead of complaining about who's wronged you and what you're owed, you need to get up and take charge of your own life. There is no situation where we as humans are given an allowance to become animals or monsters. None. Even in the worst of times, we are humans.

One of the comments I remember most from my first trip to Nicaragua, made by a leader down there, touched on this point. If you want to see abject poverty and horrible conditions that last more than four days and aren't covered by CNN, go to Nicaragua. The poverty and hurt there can't be touched by anything we've seen this past week. I, as well as others in the group, were very aware how rich we Americans seemed to many of the people we were working with. It was common knowledge that if you laid a tool down out at the work site it would probably walk off. Our first reaction, in an effort to not judge and to be compassionate and take into account the "situation" was to look the other way. But the leader put it bluntly: Stealing is stealing in any culture. The meaning was very clear. Awful circumstances do not excuse awful behavior.

Compassion isn't about making excuses and allowing bad behavior during bad times. It isn't about pointing fingers and serving as a cheerleader for survivors who, clamoring for a direction to push their strong and confusing emotions in, easily fall victim to outsiders looking to make political gain. Compassion isn't about agreeing how awful they've been treated.

This is what compassion is: If a man is hungry, you give him food. You don't ask if he has a job, you just give him food. If he needs shelter, you find him shelter. If he has lost a loved one, you listen, you hold his hand, you never let go because that is a hurt above all hurts. When the cameras leave, you stay, and stay a presence in his life as long as it takes. And if he can't quit blaming others for his lot in life, you help him get back on his feet by refusing to allow him that destructive luxury. You don't remind him how much others owe him.

If you were to put me face to face with some of the Hurrican Katrina evacuees, black or white, there is no question what I'd say and do. Do you need clothes? Go through mine, take what you need, I'll help find you more. Food? I'll get you food. A place to stay? We have an empty house. Get the kids in school? I'll help you. I'll even help tutor. Money? I don't have much, but I'll do what I can. Transportation? I'll help. That is the truth. Anyone who knows me knows I would do this. But if you put a man in front of me who just cleaned out a Wal-Mart store, stocking up on electronics and DVDs, I'd tell him he already had his reward.

Jude 1:22 has always been a challenging verse, but as I grow older and see life unfolding, I begin to understand it. It isn't a black thing, a white thing, a poor thing, a rich thing. It's a people thing. On some have compassion, because stealing is stealing in any culture.