Looting vs. Borrowing

Why is it called "looting" when these guys do it, but "borrowing" when they do it? This reminds me of the times when I've seen what would be considered "assertive" behavior redefined as "menacing" when carried out by men of a darker skintone.

By the way, just for the record, let me make it clear that I consider all the people captioned "looters", not "borrowers" - even the nice, clean-cut suburbanites: I'm an equal-opportunity cynic.

[Via MetaFilter.]

Comments

[dsquared]

Yahoo has changed the caption to "finding". Which is fair enough I suppose; you can't loot what you can't find.

[dsquared]

btw, in the linked article above, one of the exploitative film posters is visibly for a version of the novel "Native Son" by Richard Wright!

[Abiola Lapite]

"Yahoo has changed the caption to "finding""

Indeed - good catch. "Finding" has a nice, propitious ring to it, wouldn't you say? Like manna falling out of the sky ...

"one of the exploitative film posters is visibly for a version of the novel "Native Son" by Richard Wright!"

No surprise there, really. Richard Wright was playing with fire writing about a black man killing a white woman, and he knew it: uncontrollable black brutes running after innocent blonde maidens was (and arguably still is) the ultimate nightmare for many of his countrymen.

[dsquared]

Hmm yes and he has a wily Jewish Communist for a lawyer too, and the innocent blonde maiden was a misguided social liberal ... it practically lends itself to making a film version that the author would (presumably) not have approved of.

[Abiola Lapite]

That's the danger of tackling controversial themes, whether in fiction or in the real world: either one churns out simplistic, "uplifting" goody-goody pap, or one runs the risk of having one's words hijacked to serve an agenda one despises. It's precisely why there's always some opposition amongst black people to individuals like Bill Cosby who engage in openly washing dirty laundry - as certain as the sun will rise tomorrow, some bigot or other will seize on it as conclusive "proof" that every lurid nightmare (or should that be fantasy?) he's had about "them" is true.

[Frank McGahon]

"some bigot or other will seize on it as conclusive "proof" that every lurid nightmare (or should that be fantasy?) he's had about "them" is true."

Which brings to mind the frequent references of a certain "reporter, movie critic [..] and founder of the Human Biodiversity Institute" to Thomas Sowell and Chris Rock.

[Abiola Lapite]

It's *exactly* idiots like him I had in mind: as if Rock or Sowell would give him the light of day if they knew he existed!

[odocoileus]

Not much of a movie critic or a reporter. A uniformly mediocre jack at all of his trades. Still, his influence grows, because he tells his audience what they want to hear: "You really are superior."

[Oliver]

The population has to be supplied with food and drink at least. If the supermarkets do not or cannot operate, alternative methods have to be found.

[Abiola Lapite]

Stealing to survive is one thing (though it's still stealing, however justifiable it may be), but from all the coverage and first-hand reports I'm reading, there's precious little scrambling for survival going on down in New Orleans, but plenty of outright theft of such essential items as CD players, TVs, jewellery, etc. Even the rescue workers are being robbed by the hoodlums rampaging on the scene - and by hoodlums I mean the police as well, who in some cases have been at the forefront of the pilfering.

[Jim]

The sitiuation has been changing since the looting began. Initially people were taking, not stealing - no stealth involved - food and beverages, along with all the other durable items people generally take when they are looting. The mayor of New oreans referred to this activity a few days ago when he said that news reports were exaggerated. The looting continued long after all the food was gone. The mayor has changed his approach too. Now he has shifted the police effort from SAR to suppressing the looting, and supporting that will probably be the priority for the arriving National Guard units.

The latest development is that some looters appear to have formed a gang. They looted weapons from a Wal-Mart, which was a smart move for them, but now they seem to be the ones who are shooting at NG helicopters evacuating people from the Superdome, which is a supremely stupid move, because nothing is more certain to invite a response.

[Andrew]

Check out this animated gif juxtaposing the two images:

http://www.beowt.com/images/looting.gif

[Jason Malloy]

Will you follow-up?

http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/44756

[Abiola Lapite]

"Will you follow-up?"

Are you paying my salary?

[Abiola Lapite]

Even if one takes this photographer at his word that events occurred as he said they did - and he has every incentive to lie, given the controversy this has stirred - he himself admits that there were black *and* white people "finding" things, yet he saw fit only to pick the white couple for *that* picture while selecting a black face for the "looter" one, and this despite the reality that *white policemen* are numbered amongst those known to have engaged in theft.

For me, what this comes down to is this: there is a way of reporting the news which can appear on the surface to be impeccably factual, and yet is profoundly dishonest even so. If you're going to share with the rest of the world that the representative looter is black, you ought to share as well that so is the representative non-looter: anything else and you're heading into "Der Stürmer" territory, selectively sifting through the whole world's press for every last bad thing that a member of a despised minority does wrong while ignoring the great majority who aren't criminals, or even the reality that people of other groups also do terrible things.

Of course, I don't really expect any of this to register with you, seeing as you devote so much time and energy to "proving" that black people are genetically under-endowed with grey matter anyway ...

[Jason Malloy]

"yet he saw fit only to pick the white couple for *that* picture while selecting a black face for the "looter" one"

No, they were two different photographers working for two independent news agencies, photographing two different situations in different areas. Both have been contacted and defend their word choices separately based on what they saw. Furthermore, and even more telling, people in the original Metafilter thread showed that even at the time the 'finding' photo (the only one of its kind) was juxtaposed to prove how racist the media was, there were also some AP pictures with value neutral captions for black people and others with white people labeled as looters. The sample size of 1 photo to demonstrate media racism dropped to a sample size of 0.

Now some media coverage may very well have been racially biased, but *this* was the primary example favored to exemplify it, and it spread to well over 6000 blogs according to Technorati and made international papers, and a number of high profile web sites. It was also a hoax. As is usual with Internet hoaxes, they are waved about passionately and uncritically as they spread like wild-fire, and few are seen to care or retract when its essential basis is over-turned, because it was right "in spirit" if light on truth. I wondered if maybe this is your way of dealing with these things too, or if you were more of a Snopes type.

[Abiola Lapite]

"I wondered if maybe this is your way of dealing with these things too, or if you were more of a Snopes type."

The fact is that I don't owe you or anybody else anything, and being challenged in such a manner by you has only made it *less* likely than ever that I'll do what you want me to: I refuse to jump to someone else's tune, especially when that someone else devotes his energies to "proving" that people who of the same origins as myself are mostly ineducable savages. Were it someone with a proven record of sympathy and fair-mindedness on racial matters who were asking me to re-examine my assumptions, I would pay attention, but you are categorically *not* such a person.

[Jason Malloy]

"Of course, I don't really expect any of this to register with you, seeing as you devote so much time and energy to "proving" that black people are genetically under-endowed with grey matter anyway "

"when that someone else devotes his energies to "proving" that people who of the same origins as myself are mostly ineducable savages."

Why does the wounded ego so easily strike back with lies? I mostly certainly do *not* think of you, or any other person based on their race, as an "ineducable savage". And I can assure you that that statement hurts my feelings far more than anything I've ever said hurts yours. Not that you care in the slightest. Secondly, I never purported to "prove" anything about race, and I've explicitly disavowed this a number of tmes:

http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/001197.html

There are simply positions I think are more likely and reasonable based on my knowledge of the available research and applicable sciences. Competing arguments have been more emotional/desperate and filled with mistakes than they have been logical and persuasive, and obviously less cognizant of the sociological/psychological data. Arguing about race and/or intelligence is simply like argung about god or evolution or the holocaust (all of which I've spent a considerable amount of leisure time on over the years); skeptics sniff out the BS, and obsess on it, it's an addiction.

Third, isn't it just so very easy to summarily dismiss every opinion of mine that orbits a race issue as 'bad faith' simply because I'm a "genetic determinist" so I'm *obviously* a black-hating racist, white nationalist, and social Darwinist. How very easy this make it for you to remain unaccountable or unchallenged in your arguments. Unfortunately for this characterization, I've expressed a number of opinions in public on racial matters that are clearly not biased in a single direction or self-interested. Among them - the studies I've read indicate that affirmative action has a positive and worthwhile effect and I've supported the policy, that there is unacceptable bias in the criminal justice system, and that the methodology behind the IAT was sound, and that it may even have good uses in employment. I've argued with godless over the extent of white racism and I've fired back at any number of racists making snide anti-black comments on a number of boards. How ironic than that adding up our politics, and leaving out our race and our assessments of sociobiology, I imagine most if not all liberals would judge me as the "objective" one and you as the safely ignorable "racist". In fact how many times on liberal blogs have you had to bring up your non-white race just to try to breech the very "ignore this opinion" prejudice you're attempting to justify here (it would fun to count them up)?

The truth is that you weasel and insult your way out of every argument you can't win on merit, regardless if it has anything to do with race, and this is just your easy excuse for the moment. As usual it isn't a very good one.

[dsquared]

For what it's worth, I make my living by being a shrewd judge of when people are bluffing or not and I would bet quids that this is an after-the-fact rationalisation which might or might not be a conscious fib. Based on the following observation; when you're wading in waist-deep muddy water, who the fuck picks up a floating loaf of bread?

[Jason Malloy]

d,

she's dragging the bread through the water in the picture:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/09/01/photo_controversy/story.jpg

(they pulled the linked picture)

I guess desperate people pick up a floating loaf of bread.

[Abiola Lapite]

"Why does the wounded ego so easily strike back with lies? I mostly certainly do *not* think of you, or any other person based on their race, as an "ineducable savage"."

Since when has it been a "lie" that you guys spend half your time "investigating" racist rubbish cranked out by charlatans and fools associated with xenophobic, racist, pro-eugenics foundations, and the other half congratulating yourselves on how "brave" you are for pandering to widely held prejudices?

"I imagine most if not all liberals would judge me as the "objective" one and you as the safely ignorable "racist". "

I love your moronic fantasies of heroics and martyrdom. They're incredibly amusing. Go back to your tinkering with crackpot "research" by Richard Lynn about the mental defectives of Africa, why don't you?

"The truth is that you weasel and insult your way out of every argument you can't win on merit, regardless if it has anything to do with race, and this is just your easy excuse for the moment."

Bullshit. You're actually describing yourself there, not me, as there have been far too many occasions on which I've exposed your pseudo-scientific and illogical rubbish for what it is but you've refused to own up to error.

This "conversation" is over. I've expended more effort than it's worth replying to you: go waste someone else's time with your racist offal (oh, pardon me, they're "theories", right?) and stop petulantly demanding from me a satisfaction I will *never* give you.

[odocoileus]

So Malloy is a friend of the black man? With friends like these...

I don't know how anybody can accept Pioneer Fund backed research uncritically. The motivations are clear.

[Chuckles]

Where's all that Christian compassion?

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/usnw/20050831/pl_usnw/adl__bigots_gloat_over_hurricane_victims__spew_racist_and_anti_semitic_hate_online153_xml

[...As Hurricane Katrina made its way across the Gulf of Mexico, heading for a Louisiana landfall, white supremacists speculated on its possible effects. Many, realizing that over two-thirds of New Orleans residents were African-American, hoped that the hurricane would be deadly:

-- "It almost appears to me that the hand of gods (sic) is reaching down to smite the Southern Babylon."

-- "I'm of the opinion that Mother Nature would be doing everybody a favor by cleansing the inner city."

-- "It would be great if all the Whites could be evacuated and they could leave the groids/muds behind but we know that won't happen. The best we can hope for is that the best architecture stands and the casualties keep the n----r funeral homes busy."

Wishes for mass casualties became common among white supremacists as the hurricane approached:

-- "Let us bow our heads and pray together that half the jig population of New Orleans stayed behind to do some lootin' and this one finishes them all off. And Lord, let's hope all the faggots in the French Quarters stay as well."

-- Another poster was quick to add, "Don't forget the jews, dotheads, and latrines that have infested N.O. like the termites invasion they have been having."

Other comments included the following:

-- "Let us pray and pray hard that nature's ethnic cleansing takes place."

-- "Mother Nature is a bitch and I don't have a problem with that at all. Especially when it leads to the possible culling of species detrimental to my race and country."

-- "For real excitement, imagine New Awleenz after that Category 5 n----r-killer hitz, oh baby, the stench!"

-- "They should pile up all the n-----s and use them as human sand bags against the rising storm surge."

-- "Too bad there wasn't an NAACP and LaRaza convention there this weekend."

-- "That's why Hurricane Katrina needs to wipe out the French Quarter and every faggot in it, along with the rest of that n----r-infested city."

-- "Nature is washing the city out and if every n----r, fag, fruitloop and Third World POS drowned today, the country would be better off."

When mass deaths did not occur, white supremacists expressed disappointment. "8,000 n----s piled into a football stadium and God has his one chance to throw a hurricane at them and misses," complained one member of the neo-Nazi group White Revolution...]

Yep, I just knew this was coming. I saw those images on T.V and I knew it was coming.