Jackson Free Press

Here's one for the dumbasses who tried to blame the victims, saying they just should have evacuated like the other folks did. The Associated Press is reporting that an analysis of Census data show that, surprise!, many of the victims were simply too poor to evacuate. It seems—alert the media—that not everyone can afford a car, or even the fuel to run one.

three dozen hardest-hit neighborhoods in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama
also were disproportionately minority and had incomes $10,000 below the
national average.

The AP analysis showed:

Median household income in the most devastated neighborhood was $32,000, or $10,000 less than the national average.
Two in 10 households in the disaster area had no car, compared with 1 in 10 in nationwide.
Nearly 25 percent of those living in the hardest-hit areas were below the poverty line, about double the national average. About 4.5 percent in the disaster area received public assistance; nationwide, the number was about 3.5 percent.
About 60 percent of the 700,000 people in the three dozen neighborhoods were minority. Nationwide, about 1 in 3 Americans is a racial minority.
One in 200 American households doesn't have adequate plumbing. One in 100 households in the most affected areas didn't have decent plumbing, which, according to the Census, includes running hot and cold water, a shower or bath and an indoor toilet.
Nationwide, about 7 percent of households with children are headed by a single mother. In the three dozen neighborhoods, 12 percent were single-mother households.

"It's the same people who don't have the wherewithal to get out of Dodge," explained National Guard Lt. Col. Connie McNabb, who was running a medical unit at the besieged convention center in New Orleans.

The disparities were even more glaring in large, urban areas. One of the worst-hit neighborhoods in the heart of New Orleans, for example, had a median household income of less than $7,500. Nearly three of every four residents fell below the poverty line, and barely 1 in 3 people had a car.

Previous Comments

ID

134257

Comment

Part about Mississippi: The Ground Zero victims of Mississippi have much the same story. In one Pascagoula neighborhood, where 30 percent of residents are minorities, more than 20 percent live in poverty. In Alabama, where Katrina wasn't as severe, one of the hardest hit areas was a downtown Mobile neighborhood, where the median household income is barely $25,000 and 1 of every 4 residents lives below the poverty line.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-04T19:48:16-06:00

ID

134258

Comment

FROM THE HOUSTON CHRONICLE (A "must read" !!!!) BEGIN ARTICLE[/A] Sept. 3, 2005, 8:19PM Is Katrina whispering in our ears? By RICK CASEY Some preachers tell us Katrina is God's way of telling us to repent. New Orleans is, to them, Sodom. Biloxi, I suppose, is collateral damage. I think God's message is much less sexy. God is lecturing us on economics. Katrina is God's way of telling us that for all the power of the free enterprise system, it doesn't take care of everything. In other words, thou shall not worship free markets. Actually, a friend from New Orleans pointed out that the most free market in America over the past few days has been on the rubble-filled streets of his hometown. It's a market totally without regulation. You have armed thugs taking advantage of a crisis with all the moral depravity of Enron traders holding up California. So let's begin by saying we need government to protect us from thugs, whether they be armed with guns or power switches. But Katrina speaks of more than the terrors of anarchy. It speaks of the decaying concept of community. Let them rent limos One of the messages I've been receiving is that those people in New Orleans have only themselves to blame. They should have left when the evacuation was ordered. For some that is probably true. New Orleans is a laid-back city. But for many, being told to evacuate was like being told to flap their wings and fly. Nearly one in four residents is below the poverty line. Many don't have cars. Yet the evacuation plan was based on private autos. There was no mechanism to evacuate those without cars, much less those in nursing homes and hospitals. Have they no cars? Let them rent limos. It is no accident that the poor weren't included in evacuation plans, if anything that can seriously be called a plan exists. There is a growing prejudice against the poor, one that results in not-so-benign neglect. It encompasses a belief that if you are poor in the Land of Opportunity, it's your own fault. God wants you to be rich This wasn't true, for obvious reasons, during the Great Depression or World War II. Yet this belief has become part of our national religion, from Washington to the pulpit. Listen to a televised preacher this Sunday or go to a megachurch. The best of the megachurches are great centers of private charity. They are raising vast sums and sending out great armies of volunteers to help with this disaster. But in many of them you will regularly hear that God wants you to be rich. If you just give yourself up to Jesus, he will reward you not just with spiritual wealth but with monetary wealth as well. That sounds like a harmless message, but it holds a dark implication. If you are poor, it is because you are not in God's favor. You lack faith. It's not that these people don't deserve our charity when their need is dire. God wants us to save the sinners. It's that when we think of our community, they're not in it. Churchgoers aren't the only ones responding to this crisis with great generosity. But community means more than charity. At its most basic, it means pooling our resources to protect the common good. It means maintaining the levees that keep out the floods. The widely reported cuts in funding for upgrading the levees of New Orleans are a metaphor for America today. We have adopted a mantra of smaller government, but there are some things too big and too important for private charity and the private sector to handle. These include educating our children, protecting our people from tempests as well as terrorists, and policing our neighborhoods from armed thugs and our markets from corporate thugs. It also includes bringing the poor, most of whom work and many of whom go to church, into the community. To do this requires a change of consciousness. But it also requires governmental action. There's always been a tension between America's sense of community and its creed of individualism. It's possible that the winds of Katrina are so powerful that they are blowing back into the same boat. You can write to Rick Casey at P.O. Box 4260, Houston, TX 77210, or e-mail him at [email][email protected][/email] END STORY

Author

Philip

Date

2005-09-04T21:38:17-06:00

ID

134259

Comment

Thank you, Mr. Casey. Halleujehah, praise be, amen. It is time to stand up and proudly reclaim the idea that government is a good thing. Helping people is a good thing. Caring about people with less is a good thing. The bell is tolling on the conservative revolution to starve the beast and let the fittest, and richest, survive. Loudly. Shame is the word.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-04T22:37:30-06:00

ID

134260

Comment

I love this part: "It also includes bringing the poor, most of whom work and many of whom go to church, into the community." Damn right. And that means calling out all the closet racists around us who go around whining about thugs and proclaiming that cities breed criminals. So what if they call you names in return: Do you want people like that liking you anyway? I don't. Ding, ding.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-04T22:40:32-06:00

ID

134261

Comment

One of the most disgusting things I've ever read came from this article: Richard Gibbs said Mississippi needs help and he's disgusted by reports of looting in New Orleans. ``I say burn the bridges and let 'em all rot there,'' he said. But then I looked at the context. The guy is stuck in a house with no air conditioning, no clean water, little gasoline, and limited food. Not a sure thing that he'll survive. A certain amount of heat delirium, if nothing else, is forgivable. What bothers me more is that I've heard this same general sentiment expressed by Jackson whites in comfortable air-conditioned homes. But one thing to it: Pat Robertson never said to let the folks left over in New Orleans rot. Jerry Falwell never said to let the folks left over in New Orleans rot. James Dobson never said to let the folks left over in New Orleans rot. They also haven't claimed (yet) that the hurricane is God's way of postponing Southern Decadence. They know better. They're raising funds to help folks who have been affected by this. They're not perfect people, but in this specific way at least they're good people. Can people like this be nudged to the point where they acknowledge racism? I think we need to look at what's good about the Religious Right, and the first thing that comes to mind is that most of them are not true social Darwinists. Remember the ONE campaign ad? Pat Robertson and Ellen DeGeneres finishing each other's sentences on the same commercial. We need to see more of that kind of thing. I mentioned in an earlier post--and never got back to you on this--that I think it's the wrong time for some of the criticism that has been directed against the Bush administration over this. I might not have articulated that as well as I should have. I think it's entirely appropriate for responses such as that of Mayor Nagin, or the Congressional Black Caucus, or most mainstream journalists, or certain alternative journalists (*nudge*). What I find objectionable is garbage like the RFKjr op-ed (which I realize you dislike as much as I do), and heartlessly glib bullshit like Michael Moore's open letter to the president. The second I read that, I understood exactly why conservatives hate Michael Moore. I want to tell Michael Moore and his ilk: This is NOT an opportunity to put Democrats in office in 2006 or 2008. This is NOT an opportunity to defeat Bush's estate tax proposal. This is NOT an opportunity to get moderates on the Supreme Court. This is NOT (just) about Bush or Barbour. Criticism should never resemble drum-beating for Democratic candidates, or the actual process of reform will be threatened in favor of a zero sum game where these issues will be dealt with IF candidate X, or party X, is given enough power. If national politicians have to be antiracists who care about the poor to get elected, then you will suddenly find a slew of conservative candidates who model antiracism and care about the poor. And as far as this particular issue is concerned, that should be good enough for us. Bottom line: Taking care of the poor has to be an end, not a means. Acknowledging the racism that white American culture bathes in has to be an end, not a means. We need to give conservatives an out, or folks will read this as manipulation. This can't just be a red state-blue state thing. I mean, let's look at the Philadelphia Coalition: Jim Prince III with his Reagan photo. Offended a lot of people. Rightfully. But if he wants to do the right thing, we should not be afraid to let him score political points off that. Dunn Lampton with the Dee/Moore case. Ariel Sharon and the Gaza pullout. And so on. Conservatives who "get it" on occasion, who are willing to go out on a limb to do the right thing, should never hear "No, that's one of OUR issues." When they are willing to take a hard, serious look at what's wrong with this country, and depart from conventional wisdom, and risk losing support from their own loyalists, we should have their backs. And we shouldn't try to force them into a corner preemptively with rhetoric that says that Democrats care about urban blacks and Republicans don't, because the sad truth is that Democrats don't seem to care all that much about urban blacks, either. This problem is much, much bigger than the next election. You get that, and I get that. But some folks on the left don't, and I'm tired of reading op-eds where they salivate over the political fallout from all this, just like they did in the aftermath of 9/11. More vulture-ism. It makes me ashamed to call myself a liberal. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-09-04T23:24:50-06:00

ID

134262

Comment

I pretty much agree with you again, Tom, if not totally. I've already said I didn't like the RFK piece, and I wish someone hadn't originally linked to Michael Moore. We really don't need him speaking for anyone right now. But a different problem is that the conservative vulturesóand we know some way too wellówill jump all over ANY criticism of their president, or mayor, or any other elected official they support as liberal nutball-ism ó even, for God's sakes, at times like this when they have done, or not done, such egregious things. My point, I think, is that we can't really worry ourselves about the loudmouthes who are going to defend their guy no matter what. People like that, on the right or the left, do not make society better. And I'm actually a firm believer that we're in a lot of the messes we're in right now not only because we now have an inept president, but because not enough Dems spoke out against the problems with Clintonówho I firmly believe opened the door that allowed this posse into the White House. I have no doubt that Democrats can also be blamed for not doing more to shore up those levees. Certainly, Clinton can be. The point now, to me, is that we cannot put off talking about this issues because apologists are going to start accusing us of being "political." That's a bullsh!t excuse to shut up a dialogue ó about the poor ó that needs to happen with everyone in this country, no matter what their party or ideology. Yes, that is a disgusting quote you started with, and I'm happy to say I haven't been in the company of anyone who has said that or, hopefully, would say that. It would take a really low human being to feel such a way -- or that it's the victims' fault because they didn't leave. I'm talking pond scum, even if they wear Brooks Brothers suits. Truth is, when I criticize "conservatives" in this context, I don't mean religious conservatives. They have been co-opted, too. As you say, everyone needs to have a dialogue about race and poverty. Everyone. Even President Clintonóhe may have been able to get along well with black folk, but he didn't always have their best interests at heart.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-05T00:26:59-06:00

ID

134263

Comment

Tom, can I reprint your comments on another forum? I don't agree with each and every nuance of what you are saying, but you're making some good points that I basically agree with, and some that most people are not willing to acknowledge. Moore's letter really bothered me, but I haven't expressed that anywhere else, and maybe I should have. I am ashamed of those who use every disaster as an opportunity to score points, and I see them on both sides, but they hurt more if I have perceived them to be on "my" side in any other issue.

Author

C.W.

Date

2005-09-05T08:29:30-06:00

ID

134264

Comment

"Thousands didn't leave New Orleans because they couldn't leave. They didn't have the money. They didn't have the vehicles. They didn't have any place to go. They are the poor, black and white, who dwell in any city in great numbers."-- Anne Rice "Excuse me, Senator, I'm sorry for interrupting. I haven't heard that, because, for the last four days, I've been seeing dead bodies in the streets here in Mississippi. And to listen to politicians thanking each other and complimenting each other, you know, I got to tell you, there are a lot of people here who are very upset, and very angry, and very frustrated."- Anderson Cooper, CNN "You see a black family, it says, "They're looting." You see a white family, it says,"They're looking for food."-- Multiplatinum selling musician Kanye West, on live TV "[US media finally wakes up] The most spectacular example came last Friday night on Fox News, the cable network that has become the darling of the Republican heartland. With the sick and the dying forced to sit in their own excrement behind him in New Orleans, its early-evening anchor Shepard Smith declared civil war against the studio-driven notion that the biggest problem was still stopping the looters."-- BBC

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-05T10:35:15-06:00

ID

134265

Comment

Donna, is there any way you can disable the Michael Moore links and remove the excerpt? I hate I found it now. I didn't know so many people had a problem with him, and I didn't mean to offend anyone.

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2005-09-05T19:45:55-06:00

ID

134266

Comment

L.W., Had I realized you or anyone else here had posted any of the Michael Moore stuff, I would have chosen my words a little more carefully (I saw the link on Alternet, and have gotten several copies in my inbox). I find what Michael Moore had to say offensive, but please know that many of my friends didn't. You didn't offend me. He did, but you certainly didn't. C.W., I'm flattered. Of course you can distribute my post! Donna, Agreed and well said. The opportunism on the right is just as offensive to me as the opportunism on the left; it's just that the opportunism on the left comes from "my" ideological ballpark. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-09-05T20:21:01-06:00

ID

134267

Comment

Nicholas Kristof in The New York Times: The wretchedness coming across our television screens from Louisiana has illuminated the way children sometimes pay with their lives, even in America, for being born to poor families. It has also underscored the Bush administration's ongoing reluctance or ineptitude in helping the poorest Americans. The scenes in New Orleans reminded me of the suffering I saw after a similar storm killed 130,000 people in Bangladesh in 1991 - except that Bangladesh's government showed more urgency in trying to save its most vulnerable citizens. But Hurricane Katrina also underscores a much larger problem: the growing number of Americans trapped in a never-ending cyclone of poverty. And while it may be too early to apportion blame definitively for the mishandling of the hurricane, even President Bush's own administration acknowledges that America's poverty is worsening on his watch. The U.S. Census Bureau reported a few days ago that the poverty rate rose again last year, with 1.1 million more Americans living in poverty in 2004 than a year earlier. After declining sharply under Bill Clinton, the number of poor people has now risen 17 percent under Mr. Bush. If it's shameful that we have bloated corpses on New Orleans streets, it's even more disgraceful that the infant mortality rate in America's capital is twice as high as in China's capital. That's right - the number of babies who died before their first birthdays amounted to 11.5 per thousand live births in 2002 in Washington, compared with 4.6 in Beijing. Indeed, according to the United Nations Development Program, an African-American baby in Washington has less chance of surviving its first year than a baby born in urban parts of the state of Kerala in India.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-06T18:21:34-06:00

ID

134268

Comment

Indeed, according to the United Nations Development Program, an African-American baby in Washington has less chance of surviving its first year than a baby born in urban parts of the state of Kerala in India. I almost had a Kanye West moment. Help me, Holy Ghost!

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2005-09-06T19:52:31-06:00

ID

134269

Comment

That post about babies reminded me, L.W., I forgot to post this one: They were holding hands. Three of the children were about 2 years old, and one was wearing only diapers. A 3-year-old girl, who wore colorful barrettes on the ends of her braids, had her 14-month-old brother in tow. The 6-year-old spoke for all of them, and he told rescuers his name was Deamonte Love. Thousands of human stories have flown past relief workers in the last week, but few have touched them as much as the seven children who were found wandering together Thursday at an evacuation point in downtown New Orleans. In the Baton Rouge headquarters of the rescue operation, paramedics tried to coax their names out of them; nurses who examined them stayed up that night, brooding. Transporting the children alone was "the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, knowing that their parents are either dead" or that they had been abandoned, said Pat Coveney, a Houston emergency medical technician who put them into the back of his ambulance and drove them out of New Orleans. "It goes back to the same thing," he said. "How did a 6-year-old end up being in charge of six babies?" So far, parents displaced by flooding have reported 220 children missing, but that number is expected to rise, said Mike Kenner of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which will help reunite families. With crowds churning at evacuation points, many children were parted from their parents accidentally; one woman handed her baby up onto a bus, turned around to pick up her suitcase and turned back to find that the bus had left. Full story. Out now. Peace, all.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-06T19:58:38-06:00

ID

134270

Comment

Hey, L.W., I wouldn't worry about it. I was thrilled with Moore's documentary on Bush (for the most part), but I'm not crazy about him and he can be very crass at times. Doesn't mean he ought to be shut up, though. :-)

Author

C.W.

Date

2005-09-06T20:13:48-06:00

ID

134271

Comment

Oh, Tom, you're welcome. My cousin (very right wing and somewhat fundamentalist) sent me one of those things implying that N.O. was Sodom and was being punished (according to the one he sent me, someone had a "prophesy" about it before it happened). You better believe I blistered his ears about my friend in N.O. who was disconnected from her husband for two days (he wouldn't leave when she did) who is a good Christian and one of the nicest people I know (much nicer than me - she'd have been too polite to give him the ear-blistering), and my relatives on the other side of the family down on the coast, some of whom I hadn't been able to find at that time, also good Christian people. Not that it would have mattered if they weren't - I don't think they would have deserved what they got with Katrina, I just knew that's what he would be more concerned with. I let him know that this kind of mess was damning all kinds of good people while it was about the business of tarring and feathering N.O. and consigning it to the depths of hell. And that means calling out all the closet racists around us who go around whining about thugs and proclaiming that cities breed criminals. So what if they call you names in return: Do you want people like that liking you anyway? I don't. Ding, ding. I didn't notice this one before, Donna; now that I did, amen, sister. Ah - and the fact about our babies in D.C. not surviving as well as the ones in India. Oh my dear Lord. Yes, L.W., Kayne West moment, indeed. Third World America.

Author

C.W.

Date

2005-09-06T20:25:12-06:00

ID

134272

Comment

C.W., and what a nasty God folks ostensibly believe in, that he'd wipe out thousands of people, including children, to interrupt a street party. Never mind that so much of the damage was in regions of Mississippi which are less than kind to gays and lesbians. The mayor of Gulfport once made a point of saying something to the effect that he didn't want gay tourists in his city, prompting a boycott by Equality Mississippi. I'm not referring to your cousin here or below, but may I say that in general I am so tired of intellectually dishonest bigots who can believe things simply by wishing to. New Orleans is just Sodom part two? *click* Those in poverty deserve to be? *click* Racism is no longer a problem in the United States? *click* God created the world in six days 6,000 years ago? *click* Saddam Hussein was involved in the 9/11 attacks? *click* Armageddon will happen within our lifetimes? *click* (Never mind that even the Bible states very clearly what the sin of Sodom was, and it was much closer to home for these jackasses than homosexuality. See Isaiah 3:8-15 and Ezekiel 16:49. But if they want to pretend those verses don't exist, they can. All they have to do is... *click*) As I posted on the wonderful Humanist News blog: Believing in God: A leap of faith. Believing that God is a personal being: A bigger leap of faith. Believing that God is a personal being who created the universe: An even bigger leap of faith. Believing that God is a personal being who created the universe, and humanity in his own image: A still bigger leap of faith. Believing that God is a jealous, dimwitted, passive-aggressive redneck with a bad temper and worse aim: Priceless. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-09-06T21:57:49-06:00

ID

134273

Comment

Tom, don't get me started... I have to admit, I used to believe that New Orleans was the Sodom and Gomorrah of the South, but it was based on the opinions of judgmental, holier-than-thou individuals whom I no longer listen to. After coming out of that "fog" and being able to think more clearly, I realize some major differences: - Sodom and Gomorrah were fully corrupt except for Lot and his immediat family, so they were the only ones able to escape. This did not apply to New Orleans. The good and bad escaped and died just the same. - If all the bad ones were supposed to be wiped out, why would those who would eventually steal guns, rape people and try to kidnap the police chief be spared? - No one turned into a pillar of salt so far for looking back. And look back they will, when the mess is cleaned up and the city is rebuilt. There was no one left to rebuild Sodom and Gomorrah, as I recall. The bottom line is that those who are not God are not in a position to act in God's stead and condemn people to Hell. I've been to New Orleans a couple of times, and there were things I liked and didn't like, but I can say the same about Jackson. I have family from Kenner, they are in Texas right now, and their beautiful homes were destroyed. I would not appreciate it if ANYONE said that my cousins deserved what they got. The Bible says that all things happen to all men alike (Ecclesiates 9:2). So, it could have happened to anyone. Hey, Jesus ate with publicans and sinners. Give Him some credit, people!

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2005-09-06T22:46:41-06:00

ID

134274

Comment

Tom, you are so inspiring me. Thank you for a jolt of biblical reality, like this: What mean ye that ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord GOD of hosts. and this: Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. Thank you. This was just what I needed tonight. "Grind the faces of the poor" seems such an apropos description right now, as the worst among humanity are blaming the poor for not being able to crawl out of New Orleans or the Coast on their hands and feet, through rising water. There are some people in town rather now who deserve to be spit in the face for such sentiments ó but, thank God, they are a sad minority in our midst, and live in their own personal hells, so they're not our problem. I like to think of people like that as beacons that the rest of us are on the right track. The uglier they get about people who love and care for the needy, the wider we can smileóbecause it means things are happening that mean, disgusting people have absolutely no control over. The uglier their epithets, the greater the victory for the little guy. If there's one thing this hurricane is doing, it's making the truly cruel and inhumane among us come to the surface, so to speak, and that's a good thing. People need to understand what people among us "grind the faces of the poor" to satisfy their own ego, narcissism and self-hatred. That way, we know who to really feel sorry for ó and who to avoid in our quest to be good people.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-06T23:17:18-06:00

ID

134275

Comment

Well, as they say, if people start to talk about you, you must be doing something right. However, this is something else that hurts my heart: In Baton Rouge, a Cool Welcome: Class Divisions Among Blacks Greet New Orleans Evacuees BATON ROUGE, La., Sept. 5 -- When this city's mayor, Melvin "Kip" Holden, issued a stem-winding warning that he would not tolerate "lawlessness" from arriving Hurricane Katrina evacuees, it seemed a page torn from the playbook of the celebrated former governor Huey Long, exposing an us-against-them dictate. But many blacks here -- and those arriving from New Orleans -- were suddenly wondering whether this city was about to turn into a kind of ground zero of class warfare between blacks and blacks. Holden himself is black, which had the potency of lifting the debate above the usual black-white fault lines. "We know we don't want that criminal element," Sheila Mosby, 40, said while sitting on her front porch on the south side of this city and recalling scenes of recent looting in New Orleans. "I can understand trying to survive. But that element coming here, well, they might try to rob stores. To tell you the truth, it's really going to be something." . . . Holden's comments seemed to bring to the surface the reality that local resources may well be strapped; that the holding-on blacks of this community realize there is sudden competition, from other blacks, for help in escaping poverty. All day Sunday, hundreds had lined up at the Department of Social Services office to get assistance, especially food stamps. Many were Katrina evacuees, but hardly all. "Now my biggest concern is the schools," said Tara Willimas, 34, a medical transcriber who is black and resides in Baton Rouge. "We don't mind sharing, but there's going to be competition for jobs." I am so sick of the "crabs in a barrel" mentality.

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2005-09-07T02:38:33-06:00

ID

134276

Comment

Tom, First off, I am not one of those people who believes God did this to NOLA as punishment. He doesn't tell me what He does, when He does it or why He does it. I always shake my head when I hear people say those things. Ignorance. A preacher friend once warned me, "Be careful what you lay at the feet of God." Second, while I know the verses you cited, and agree this played a part in the destruction of Sodom, don't forget to mention ALL of the reasons why God said He destroyed Sodom. "Even Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, GIVING THEMSELVES OVER TO FORNICATION, AND GOING AFTER STRANGE FLESH, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire" (Jude 1:7). While referencing the verses from Ezekiel and Isaiah, make sure you don't pretend this verse (Jude 1:7) doesn't exist. ;)

Author

brandon/jade

Date

2005-09-07T15:20:22-06:00

ID

134277

Comment

I'm not the biblical expert here, but BJ, that doesn't exactly scream homosexuality. It could also speak to folks to "pay" for sex or cheat on their wives/husbands, couldn't it? Last time I looked, "fornicate" doesn't mean with the same sexóit means sex without marriage, right? There's a difference between being sexually loose and promiscuous and being gay. Homosexuality isn't only about sex; it also happens to be about love. And faithfulness and devotion in its best forms. Just like heterosexuality. It certainly strikes me, common sense wise, that a happily married gay couple would not be in violation of Jude 1:7. I think you're reading in what you want to hear. I'm not convinced.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-08T00:46:38-06:00

ID

134278

Comment

I also just realized that this thread has taken a serious turn off-topic. Let's take it to the forums if y'all wish to continue the discussion about homosexuality past this post. Thanks, Donna

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-09-08T00:47:50-06:00

ID

134279

Comment

"Be careful what you lay at the feet of God." Good advice, chief. Those who would say that human suffering is God's revenge should read the beautiful Book of Job, where he insists on his own righteousness in the face of his suffering, his friends disagree and insist that he must have done something wrong, and God intervenes, and agrees to spare Job's three friends only if Job himself will pray for them (42:7-9)--which Job, being a nice guy, does. God's soliloquy in 38-41 is a good response to those who have the heartlessness to say that God destroyed New Orleans because of its purported sin: "Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loinsm like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me. "Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements--surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?" My last word on the homosexuality issue, and then no more gay sex for me in this thread (wait, let me rephrase that...): I urge folks to check the Isaiah (3:5-8) and Ezekiel (16:49-50) references, which are more explicit than Jude verse 7. Donna is correct, incidentally, that the Jude verse refers in general to porneia and not solely to homosexuality; "strange flesh" is a reference to orgies. It seems probable to me that the author of the letter probably would have considered homosexuality to be a form of porneia, but this is not explicated, nor is there any clear cause and effect relationship suggested between porneia and the city's destruction (as there is in, for example, Ezekiel, where Sodom's treatment of the poor is given as the reason for its doom). But it's more your Bible than mine, really; I belong to the school of thought that says human beings wrote the thing. Jude, in particular, seems to me to be the product of a second- or third-generation Christian author writing near AD 95, and I suspect the story of Sodom itself was written after the fact to explain the destruction of a metropolitan city somewhere in the Fertile Crescent. So go with whichever interpretation works for you. As long as you don't lay horrors at the feet of God, I see no need to argue. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-09-08T01:43:40-06:00