The "Caption" race issue update.

[Useruser666]

I think this info needs to get out to those that claim race was entirely behind the captionaing of those images.


http://www.snopes.com/photos/katrina/looters.asp

Origins: Looting is an unfortunate and largely inevitable result of natural disasters. Many property owners have to evacuate their homes and businesses ahead of the coming disaster (or flee the area in its aftermath) without leaving behind anyone to protect their property, and law enforcement and other emergency services are generally so overwhelmed dealing with life-and-death issues that they can't spare the manpower to protect private property. People who are caught unprepared (or remain in the disaster area for other reasons) often have to shift into survival mode and take whatever supplies they can get wherever they can find them, and there are always a few who will take advantage of confusion and chaos to make off with other people's property for their own enrichment.

The onslaught of Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf Coast in late August 2005 brought the phenomenon of looting into the national spotlight once again, including the two new service photographs shown above, both of which were carried by Yahoo! News and other Internet news outlets and showed persons wading through chest-deep water in the New Orleans area with supplies taken from grocery stores. Many viewers noticed the seeming disparity of the darker-skinned subject's being described in the accompanying caption as "looting a grocery store," while the lighter-skinned subjects were described as "finding bread and soda from a local grocery store." Are these captions evidence of a subtle (or overt) racial prejudice in the news media?

It's difficult to draw any substantiated conclusions from these photographs' captions. Although they were both carried by many news outlets, they were taken by two different photographers and came from two different services, Associated Press (AP) and Getty Images via Agence France-Presse (AFP). These services may have different stylistic standards for how they caption photographs, or the dissimilar wordings may have been due to nothing more than the preferences of different photographers and editors, or the difference might be the coincidental result of a desire to avoid repe ive wording (similar photographs from the same news services variously describe the depicted actions as "looting," "raiding," "taking," "finding," and "making off"). The viewer also isn't privy to the contexts in which the photographs were taken — it's possible that in one case the photographer actually saw his subject exiting an unattended grocery store with an armful of goods, while in the other case the photographer came upon his subjects with supplies in hand and could only make assumptions about how they obtained them.

A Salon article on the photographs by Aaron Kinney suggests the captions were a result of a combination of contexual and stylistic differences:
Jack Stokes, AP's director of media relations, confirmed today that [photographer Dave] Martin says he witnessed the people in his images looting a grocery store. "He saw the person go into the shop and take the goods," Stokes said, "and that's why he wrote 'looting' in the caption."

Regarding the AFP/Getty "finding" photo by [photographer Chris] Graythen, Getty spokeswoman Bridget Russel said, "This is obviously a big tragedy down there, so we're being careful with how we credit these photos." Russel said that Graythen had discussed the image in question with his editor and that if Graythen didn't witness the two people in the image in the act of looting, then he couldn't say they were looting.
The photographer who took the Getty/AFP picture, Chris Graythen, also posted the reasons behind his caption:
I wrote the caption about the two people who 'found' the items. I believed in my opinion, that they did simply find them, and not 'looted' them in the definition of the word. The people were swimming in chest deep water, and there were other people in the water, both white and black. I looked for the best picture. there were a million items floating in the water — we were right near a grocery store that had 5+ feet of water in it. it had no doors. the water was moving, and the stuff was floating away. These people were not ducking into a store and busting down windows to get electronics. They picked up bread and cokes that were floating in the water. They would have floated away anyhow.

Last updated: 1 September 2005

[JoePublic]

Doesn't make it right.

[SpursWoman]

Doesn't make what right?

[Marcus Bryant]

What was interesting was that some seemed ready to transfer blame for the captions to parties other than the AP and AFP.

[SpursWoman]

What? You mean Bush didn't write them?

[Jelly]

Useruser666, thanks for that article. It confirms what I already believed to be the case. This looter vs. finder racism charge has no merit IMO and the story has been blown so out of proportion, both in the media and on this spurstalk board. And ALL of it seems to stem from one picture of a white couple with a loaf of bread. I've asked if anyone has other photos of these so-called prejudicial captions and so far no one has posted anything. This whole stupid claim seems to rest on one photograph, which is hardly evidence since all we see is someone with a loaf of bread. I could post plenty of similar photographs with blacks carrying various items which do not mention looting in the caption. It's all context, the woman has one, maybe two small items. The looters are filling up sacks of merchandise. Big difference.

[Shelly]

I've said it a million times...

Snopes is your friend.

[timvp]

I thought everyone was running with the "looter" vs "finder" captions as a joke. I don't think many took it as intentionally racist.

Thanks for clearing that up, though

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Doesn't make what right?

x100

I don't think many took it as intentionally racist.

I did. Simply because...i ask myself...when has something like this EVER happened with the situation reversed.
EVER???
the given explanations are valid but it still goes back to the same old to me "ohh its just coincidence, that the 'racists' were blacks, etc"

coincidence-my-ass

[Spurminator]

You realize that it was two different people that wrote the captions in those photos, right?

I agree it says something about racial perceptions, but I wouldn't go as far as to say it was intentionally racist.

[SpursWoman]

x100



I don't think many took it as intentionally racist.


I did. Simply because...i ask myself...when has something like this EVER happened with the situation reversed.
EVER???
the given explanations are valid but it still goes back to the same old to me "ohh its just coincidence, that the 'racists' were blacks, etc"

coincidence-my-ass

Actually, I was asking if he was referring to the looting or the question of racism in the captioning...but thanks for the " ". Not an unexpected response to a question that wasn't even directed at you.




And they've been talking about this on several news outlets as well as this forum, so at this point it's rather difficult to discern who is really joking anymore. Some of you have proven to be so far out there that it wouldn't have been surprising at all if you were serious.

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Actually, I was asking if he was referring to the looting or the question of racism in the captioning...but thanks for the " ". Not an unexpected response to a question that wasn't even directed at you.




And they've been talking about this on several news outlets as well as this forum, so at this point it's rather difficult to discern who is really joking anymore. Some of you have proven to be so far out there that it wouldn't have been surprising at all if you were serious.

ok, my bad.

and what you said makes sense

[Useruser666]

I thought everyone was running with the "looter" vs "finder" captions as a joke. I don't think many took it as intentionally racist.

Thanks for clearing that up, though

Yeah maybe you need to take a look at all the people that went running off at the mouth with those captions. Several politcal and community leaders were talking about the race issue and how it was obviously behind those captions. Al Sharpton was going on and on about it.

I simply thought it was interesting to see more of the story behind the captions. I always like to know a little bit of the back story before flying off the handle.

[The Ressurrected One]

x100





I did. Simply because...i ask myself...when has something like this EVER happened with the situation reversed.
EVER???
the given explanations are valid but it still goes back to the same old to me "ohh its just coincidence, that the 'racists' were blacks, etc"

coincidence-my-ass

Who's ever looked for the reverse?

And, sounds to me like the beef is with AP and AFP... I wonder if they colluded?

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Who's ever looked for the reverse?

And, sounds to me like the beef is with AP and AFP... I wonder if they colluded?

anyone who reads

[Useruser666]

For those of you that know this then don't post about it. It wasn't meant for you. Obviously it was meant for those running off at the mouth that this was an obvious display of racism. I have seen several people in both the media and politics bring this article issue up, and I decided it wouldn't hurt to actually get the facts behind what we were all seeing.

[timvp]

Does Santa exist?

Maybe Snopes can help.

[SpursWoman]

Does Santa exist?

Maybe Snopes can help.

That one is easy....if you don't believe in him, he's not bringing you . You don't need Snopes to figure that one out.

Too bad you can't say the thing about various people in the media and public eye creating racial issues where they don't exist.

[whottt]

I call Bull ...everyone knows Bush wrote those captions.

Even if he didn't...the AP's bias in favor of the Bush admin has been well do ented

[JoeChalupa]

I blame the damn liberal media!!!

[SpursWoman]

I blame the damn liberal media!!!

Actually, your buddy Al Sharpton had so many orgasms while going off about the captions you'd think he had a jackhammer strapped to his .

You might want to see if he's okay.

[Nbadan]

Bush is a pariah, but not a racist...

As New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin pleaded on national television for firefighters - his own are exhausted after working around the clock for a week - a battalion of highly trained men and women sat idle Sunday in a muggy Sheraton Hotel conference room in Atlanta.

Many of the firefighters, assembled from Utah and throughout the United States by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, thought they were going to be deployed as emergency workers.

Instead, they have learned they are going to be community-relations officers for FEMA, shuffled throughout the Gulf Coast region to disseminate fliers and a phone number: 1-800-621-FEMA.

.....
But as specific orders began arriving to the firefighters in Atlanta, a team of 50 Monday morning quickly was ushered onto a flight headed for Louisiana. The crew's first assignment: to stand beside President Bush as he tours devastated areas.

Link

This thread should have been led, 'How people confuse inep ude with blatant discrimination".

[SpursWoman]

This thread should have been led, 'How people confuse inep ude with blatant discrimination".

I can see where they might make such a mistake, considering the Mayor is himself African-American.

[JoeChalupa]

I still don't see how some cannot see the "racial" content of the captions even though they were not done "intentionally". I guess I just view things from a different perspective than others. But the wife, who is African-American, and I discuss these issues on a daily basis so I get it from her perspective as well.

Again I don't think it was intentional but it doesn't mean it wasn't there.

But that is just me.

[The Ressurrected One]

I blame the damn liberal media!!!

Yeah, let's talk about the damn liberal media for a minute...

The New York Times is in full hysteria mode, trying to turn the human tragedy associated with Hurricane Katrina into political fodder for the Democrats. Paul Krugman, probably one of Nbadan's heroes, is one cog in the Times' wheel; on cue, he chimed in with a strident denunciation of the Bush administration's response to the hurricane. It was, of course terrible; Krugman begins:

Each day since Katrina brings more evidence of the lethal inep ude of federal officials. I'm not letting state and local officials off the hook, but federal officials had access to resources that could have made all the difference, but were never mobilized.

Characteristically, Krugman avoids facts whenever possible. His columns consist almost entirely of invective; he grudgingly throws in a fact only when it can't be helped. Yesterday's column included exactly one fact, one instance of a "resource" that "could have made all the difference," but was "never mobilized." Krugman's one such example was the U.S.S. Bataan:

Here's one of many examples: The Chicago Tribune reports that the U.S.S. Bataan, equipped with six operating rooms, hundreds of hospital beds and the ability to produce 100,000 gallons of fresh water a day, has been sitting off the Gulf Coast since last Monday - without patients.

Experts say that the first 72 hours after a natural disaster are the crucial window during which prompt action can save many lives. Yet action after Katrina was anything but prompt. Newsweek reports that a "strange paralysis" set in among Bush administration officials, who debated lines of authority while thousands died.

So, according to Krugman, the Bataan, with its hospital and fresh water, cons uted a resource that was "never mobilized," apparently because of "paralysis" on the part of the administration. In citing the Bataan as his best example of federal inep ude, Krugman relied, as he so often does, on an urban legend that circulated on left-wing blogs: that the Bataan, which had been cruising in the Caribbean when Katrina struck, was ready and able to aid the hurricane's victims, but was prevented from doing so because the Defense Department never gave the order authorizing it to act. Apparently, this rumor has became so persistent that one of the ship's officers, Lt. Commander Sean Kelly, wrote to one of the left-wing sites to debunk the myth:

USNORTHCOM was prepositioned for response to the hurricane, but as per the National Response Plan, we support the lead federal agency in disaster relief — in this case, FEMA. The simple description of the process is the state requests federal assistance from FEMA which in turn may request assistance from the military upon approval by the president or Secretary of Defense. Having worked the hurricanes from last year as well as Dennis this year, we knew that FEMA would make requests of the military — primarily in the areas of transportation, communications, logistics, and medicine. Thus we began staging such assets and waited for the storm to hit.

The biggest hurdles to responding to the storm were the storm itself — couldn't begin really helping until it passed — and damage assessment — figuring out which roads were passable, where communications and power were out, etc. Military helos began damage assessment and SAR on Tuesday. Thus we had permission to operate as soon as it was possible. We even brought in night SAR helos to continue the mission on Tuesday night.

The President and Secretary of Defense did authorize us to act right away and are not to blame on this end. Yes, we have to wait for authorization, but it was given in a timely manner.

Poor Paul, always a day late and a dollar short, apparently didn't get the memo.

Still, if I were writing a column that I expected to be read by many thousands of people and if I were going to rest my column on a single "example" on the basis of which I intended to charge government officials with "lethal inep ude," I would do a little fact-checking. Sadly, however, research is something of which Paul Krugman (and most of the left, for that matter) is simply incapable.

Perhaps Krugman doesn't know that large naval vessels like the U.S.S. Bataan all have web sites. Perhaps he doesn't know that there is a tool called "Google" that would enable him to find the Bataan's web site in less than ten seconds. Or perhaps he just didn't care enough to go here and read up on the Bataan's contributions to hurricane relief efforts.

If Krugman had taken the trouble, he would have found that on August 30, the same day on which New Orleans' levees burst, precipitating the crisis, men and women from the Bataan were already in action, and by the following day they were busy saving lives:

The crews flew off Tuesday night towards New Orleans and were tasked by the on-scene rescue coordinators. “Our first mission was to provide food and water and to take some people to a safer haven and to help with the levee by providing sandbags,” said AS2(AW/NAC) Johnny Ramirez, MH-53 Aircrewman for HM-15. “We weren't able to complete our assigned mission Tuesday night because it got too dark and it was too risky to land anywhere with all of the water and power lines. Instead, we just flew Tuesday night to survey the area.”

On Wednesday, a crew from HM-15 assisted with lifting numerous stranded citizens in a very short period of time. “My crew and I airlifted nearly 100 people from the roof of a building and onto a field where ambulances and busses were waiting for them,” said LCDR David Hopper, detachment Officer in Charge of HM-15. “Ten of those who we rescued couldn't even walk; my crewmen had to carry them.”

One of the missions of the MH-60 aircraft is search and rescue. HSC-28 personnel have rescued 71 people in their first two days of operation, seven in the first 30 minutes. HSC-28 has three crews and two aircraft and is alternating flight and crew rest time.

Here is a summary of the Bataan's efforts as of yesterday, when Krugman's column implied that the ship was a "resource" that was "never mobilized":

“We've been extremely busy this past week with more tasks than there are hours in a day,” said Cmdr. Jeffrey Bocchicchio, Bataan 's Air Boss. “The shortest day the department has had was 16 hours long, but they understand that everything we do is critical to the mission.”
"All of the divisions and Combat Cargo working together allows the ship to have a 24-hour flight deck with the manning for 10-hour days,” said Bocchicchio. “Military units are the nation's biggest assets and what better use for them than to save our own people.”

To date, the two squadrons have transported 1,613 displaced people and delivered more than 100,000 pounds of cargo. Bataan also provided 8,000 gallons of fresh drinking water to the ravished Gulfport, Mississippi area. Sailors filled eight 500-gallon water bladders with the ship's potable water and HM 15's MH-53 helicopters transported them from the flight deck of Bataan to land.

How about the unused operating rooms and empty hospital beds? It seems not to have occurred to Krugman that the most efficient way to get medical treatment to hurricane survivors is not to helicopter them, individually or in small groups, to a ship at sea. Instead, what happened was that medical personnel were assembled and equipped on board the Bataan, then flown to shore where they could treat the sick and wounded:

Two medical fly-away teams from the Navy's Casualty Receiving and Treatment Ship Team (CRTS) 8, based at Naval Hospital Jacksonville, Fla., left the multipurpose amphibious assault ship USS Bataan (LHD 5) on Sunday, Sept. 4, 2005 , to provide medical support to Hurricane Katrina survivors at the New Orleans International Airport and a high school in Biloxi , Mississippi .

A 26-member primary care treatment team consisting of a pediatrician, family practice physician, an obstetrician along with seven nurses and 16 hospital corpsman departed early Sunday morning for New Orleans International Airport . They expect to return to the ship on Monday.

The second flyaway team, which consisted of an internal medicine physician, two nurses, a respiratory therapy technician and two general hospital corpsman, flew to Biloxi High School to take care of patients with respiratory illnesses. The team's main mission is to provide treatment for those who have respiratory problems. They are expected to return to the ship in two or three days.

The diversity of CRTS 8's composition allows the flexibility of establishing multiple mission-specific medical teams within a short time period. “The CRTS 8 team is glad to be onboard Bataan participating in the relief efforts,” said Cmdr. Michael Illovsky, MC, USN, Director of Medical Services for CRTS 8. “We are ready and willing to help out in any way possible. We are enthused about the opportunity to send groups into the affected areas where they are needed most.”

The 24-member medical team who left Saturday for the New Orleans Convention Center returned to Bataan Sunday afternoon.

This all happened during the three days prior to the appearance of Krugman's column describing the "hospital beds" "without patients" aboard the Bataan.

Much of the MSM reporting has been this void of fact.