At 03:37 PM 9/5/2005, you wrote:

>The current New Orleans' version of the Middle Passage, however, is done not
>to arrive in New Orleans to sell slaves, but to banish them. These are
>people no longer valued for their labor. They are dispensable, long shut out
>from public view - considered a nuisance, a welfare expense, etc. I
>understand this is a broad generalization - one will point to those don't
>fit the category, cultural assets, etc. The Bush  administration does not
>refine categories. I won't further belabor the argument.
>
>Stephen V

Stephen, I'm not entirely sure this is strictly a Black or New 
Orleans phenomenon (I'm using "New Orleans" as shorthand to cover the 
affected Gulf tri-state area).  I can talk this trash only as someone 
who's worked in profit-oriented institutions since 1977: I say that 
with neither pride or shame, but as a fact.  With variations entrants 
to the Middle Passage could be anyone who works for a living, be that 
place of employment the overmaligned WalMart, Home Depot, or my 
current place of employment...like any have been better.  In essence, 
employees of any profit-making enterprise are treated like 
shit.  They are disposable, they will be cast into the sea, chained 
together, at the first sign of a problem such as a Navy cruiser 
approaching.  The Middle Passage can end abruptly not in the slave 
market or the HR office (there's a difference?) but in unemployment, 
whatever its cause.

I have worked in large, "heeled" companies that dropped us all over 
the side like so much trash, solely to maintain a profit for the 10 
guys left on the top deck.  Guaranteed: the victim--the cast-over 
worker of whatever rank or type--is the one who gets blamed.  "You 
cost too much."  "Your department didn't produce enough."  "Your 
skill is superfluous."  "You are redundant."  We return you now to 
New Orleans.  Some of the displaced will indeed become wild animals 
who will purloin weapons and shoot at rescue workers.  I almost hate 
to say this (ALMOST) but I almost cheered when I read that the N.O. 
cops blew away about eight of these infrahuman fiends.  AND yet 
(isn't there always an "AND yet"?) I do not believe people are born 
that way.  The mayor of the city himself said he was presiding over a 
junkie paradise which had turned to junkie hell because nobody could 
get their stuff.  Assess depravity as you will, but perhaps it was 
helped by a police department which may be doing heroic work now, but 
that had a long-term reputation for corruption and violence unmatched 
by any major department in the country.  Maybe we really do reap what we sow?

Worklife again.  If you live your worklife on the edge of being a 
disposable item, you will develop precisely the mentality that you 
suggest above: you WILL start to think of yourself as an expense, you 
will devalue yourself and feel free to cut corners because life's 
short and employment can be shorter.  Therefore instead of demanding 
more from your worklife, you will be "grateful" for any crap they 
throw to you, including your job itself.  This is not gratitude, it 
is groveling.  This is, I fear, a distinction of categories the Bush 
administration learned long ago.  Keep 'em on the edge, show them The 
Instruments, rattle the chains.  That's all you have to do to enforce consent.

I doubt the black OR white workers of New Orleans and environs will 
be out of work forever.  No, that's not true.  In fact, the idea of 
mass  permanent unemployment horrifies me because it portends not 
social rebellion or even revolution--necessary moments in a society's 
change--but mindless riot, more destruction of the type we have 
witnessed.  Then we will be putting ourselves over the side of the 
slave ship.  I don't think America is equipped to handle hordes of 
"sturdy beggars" wandering our roads.  This isn't the 17th century 
(he said in a prayerful tone).

Ken