A lot has happened in the last hundred or so pages (105-202) of Zeitoun I read this week. What stood out to me the most out of everything that happened in this section was the strong presence of armed guards and the question of what where they really doing there? The official story is that the National Guard and other various mercenaries where they to protect American citizens from the looters, murders, rapists, etc. that infested the city after the hurricane. But why were there so many of them. Many claim that the report of murders and rapes, not only in the city but in the Superdome as well, were over exaggerated causing police and armed guards to overreact themselves.
Because of the "animalistic" state that survivors of the hurricane went into, it was decided that the National Guard would confiscate firearms from any remaining citizen. I don't know if I think this is a good idea or a horribly stupid one. Get rid of the remaining firearms and maybe murders and looting will go down, but take away firearms and people are not as well protected. Maybe the citizens in New Orleans needed to protect themselves from the government and it's National Guard that overzealously believed they could not be left to their own devices. According to some news reports (used in hyperlinks) many citizens were harmed or even killed by the police when they were just trying to get help, and in some cases the police tried to cover their mistakes but hiding the bodies of the innocent victims they murdered. The whole situation confuses me. Maybe because I grew up in California, and liberal Los Angeles at that, but I do not think all this force is necessary. Even months after Hurricane Katrina, the National Guard was still being called back into the city whenever order seemed to go awry. Thinking that the citizens felt “very safe” with these armed guards around, the government seemed to use them almost as a threatening tactic against future anarchy.
Similarly, Zeitoun witnessed the over population of armed guards when he stayed behind after Hurricane Katrina. The guards did not seem to be any help when Zeitoun encountered them. He repeatedly needed their help and he was shut down every time. First, when an over weight woman was stuck in her house and needed help getting out. Zeitoun tried to flag down several passing boats with armed guards on it but was simply ignored. Maybe they had a mission they were on, but would it have really hurt for just one of the boats to stop to help if it meant saving lives? Another event where the armed guards let him down is when Zeitoun goes to elicit help to get his elderly neighbors out of their house and evacuated from the city. Zeitoun asks the man and the man just brushes him off; first telling him he needs to go to the a different compound and then by telling Zeitoun it will be down and eventually doing nothing about it. In this instance, and probably many others like it, Zeitoun has to help himself. The citizens of New Orleans where not allowed to protect themselves but had to save themselves. This does not seem right to me.
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