hands up if you think everything's fine

There really are two Americas. According to a poll by the PEW center, American whites and blacks have very different views of the role that race plays in society. For anyone who knows both black and white people, this should come as no surprise. What is shocking, however, is the degree to which the disparity in opinion is manifested. A majority of whites do not think that race is a “particularly important lesson” from the devastation of Katrina, while two thirds of blacks believe that the response would have been more effective had the victims been white.

"Seven-in-ten blacks (71%) say the disaster shows that racial inequality remains a major problem in the country; a majority of whites (56%) say this was not a particularly important lesson of the disaster. More striking, there is widespread agreement among blacks that the government's response to the crisis would have been faster if most of the storm's victims had been white; fully two-thirds of African Americans express that view. Whites, by an even wider margin (77%-17%), feel this would not have made a difference in the government's response.”

White denial cuts across the political spectrum. From conservative spin, which started as soon as the levies broke, that state and local authorities share the blame for the disaster, to “liberal” arguments that class, not race is the key to understanding Katrina’s deadly effects, the white chattering classes have been resistant to accepting the obvious: race profoundly determines our chances of survival in post-New Deal America.

It is impossible to extricate race and racism from any honest discussion of Katrina. Race and poverty are clearly correlated- it’s not a random coincidence that black people are poor and live in harm’s way, nor that they are unlikely to be able to relocate easily. More acutely, the swift removal of tourists and the energy and attention given to protecting property while people suffered under the dual threat of natural disaster and human chaos speaks to a bias on the part of the authorities. Quite simply, where were the buses?

This is not to say that class and economic status are irrelevant. Rich whites enjoy privileges that poor whites do not, and class disadvantage is not savage and real for poor and working-class white people. No doubt, had this disaster struck rich white folks, there would have been better response (as well as increased means of self-preservation) than if most of the victims were poor and white. However, the victims were majority black, and they are both poor and underserved because they are black.

No doubt some of white America’s inability to grasp the situation is due to an understandable, but willful ignorance. Who wants to believe that their government and social structure actually conspire, through direct policy and apathy, to allow black people to die needlessly? Such a conclusion is a sensory, emotional and intellectual shock that many people simply do not want to endure.

What is clear is that whites and people of color live in completely different counties, with completely different perceptions of reality. America may be split down the middle, red and blue, but it is also starkly divided into white and black.