FEATURES
The mayor's election
of 2010
by Lovell Beaulieu
The Elite Re-capture Of City Hall: End Of An Era,
Beginning Of An Era
by Dr. Mtangulizi Sanyika
Slavery And The Episcopal Church In The Diocese Of Louisiana
by Orissa Arend
The State of Public Education in New Orleans
A Progress In Work?
by Lovell Beaulieu
Columns & Departments
Letters to the Editor
Our Town
Blackonomic
Letter to the Editor
Why Are Children Killing Children in New Orleans?
Dear Editor:
The young teenagers engaged in violence today were mere children when Katrina struck. This “Katrina Generation” lived through the some of the most degrading and inhumane treatment ever inflicted on a community in the last century. Children returned to a city with no public medical care, no systematic trauma stress care; a city where authorities closed hospitals and mental health care units; where children lived in gutted houses and attended schools where they were forced to sit on floors because they had not chairs or desks. Yet we wonder what is wrong with our children?
Isn’t the question: “What is wrong with us?”
If we dehumanize children, can we not expect that they lose a part of their humanity? When children numb themselves to their own pain, can we not expect them to numb themselves to other people’s pain? The most dangerous form of violence is the silent violence of indifference to the suffering of others.
How can we ask children to heal themselves when we cannot heal ourselves of our own inhumanity? Nearly five years after Katrina, there is still no trauma screening program in New Orleans schools.
Why are children killing children in New Orleans? Because we make killing less painful than living.Lance Hill, Ph.D
Disappointed and Troubled
Dear Editor
I was disappointed and troubled by the recent comments from Mayor-Elect Mitch Landrieu regarding the four community representatives who resigned or were asked to resign from the Task Force involved in the selection process for a new police chief. All of these individuals (Danatus King, Baty Landis, Norris Henderson and Gina Womack) and their organizations (NAACP, Silenceisviolence, V.O.T.E. and Friends and Families of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children (FFLIC)) have been active in our community for years, providing non-violent alternatives to resolving conflicts, addressing the deep problems involving crime and community distrust of the police department, and advocating for best practices in the police department. They have been out there, sometimes alone, speaking out, organizing, building programs throughout our city, while many politicians and other city leaders have stood by and were silent.
For various, principled reasons, each of them is no longer part of the Task Force. Certainly, as members of the Task Force, they each had the right to disagree with the process and, as community leaders and advocates, the obligation to speak up and inform the communities they represent, of what was transpiring. Mayor-Elect Mitch Landrieu also has the right to express his disagreement with their various positions and to dis-invite them from being part of his Task Force if he doesn’t want to hear what they have to say or doesn’t like the way they are saying it.
But to suggest or to characterize these individuals as being “brick-throwers” and to lump them in with people who are not contributing in a positive way to the public discourse on how to restore our city, is offensive and alienating. If these individuals are not “brick-layers” I don’t know who is. And it is disturbing that, at the first sign of public dissent, the response of our Mayor-elect was to castigate.
Mitch’s background as a lawyer is in mediation and problem solving and he has a well-earned reputation for working hard to promote conflict resolution. I sincerely hope he will examine more closely the language that he used in this instance and adopt a more appropriate stance towards citizens who may disagree with him or his policies.
Sincerely,Mary E. Howell
