now they`re using corpses as roadblock

[neutral]

Haiti Quake: Corpses Used In Aid Protest

11:50am UK, Friday January 15, 2010

Damien Pearse, Sky News Online
Desperate earthquake victims have set up roadblocks using corpses in Haiti to protest at the delay in emergency aid.

Rescue efforts intensified today as survivors - including many children - were pulled from beneath rubble three days after the quake struck.

Makeshift hospitals were set up across the capital Port-au-Prince as children slept among the dead in the streets.

The wails of victims could be heard from the debris as US President Barack Obama promised $100m (£61.4m) for the relief effort.

They are starting to block the roads with bodies, it's getting ugly out there, people are fed up with getting no help.

The now lawless Port-au-Prince quickly fell victim to gangs of armed looters with reports of gunshots in the devastated city overnight.

Amid the suffering, extraordinary tales of survival and compassion have begun to emerge.
Babies were pulled alive from collapsed buildings while the dead were stacked up by the side of the road and placed into car boots.

Around three million people are without food and water and the Red Cross said up to 50,000 had died.

Shaul Schwarz, a photographer for Time magazine, said he saw at least two downtown roadblocks formed with bodies of victims and rocks.

"They are starting to block the roads with bodies, it's getting ugly out there, people are fed up with getting no help," he told Reuters.

Haitians living in the capital's growing tent cities say they do not expect help anytime soon.

"People are waiting for someone to take care of them," said Michel Reau, 27, who brought his wife and young child to the park after their home collapsed.

"We are out of food. We are out of water.

LINK

[neutral]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

I have always thought of the haitians as a corrupted,ignorant set of people driven more by religious mumbo jumbo rather than common sense,but I can also now add uncivilised and stupid to the list.

Damn fools,the first place they set up a refugee camp was on the tarmac of the only airport,preventing aid from being able to land.

[Fyah]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

You might have company!

January 15, 2010
Op-Ed Columnist
The Underlying Tragedy
By DAVID BROOKS

On Oct. 17, 1989, a major earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 struck the Bay Area in Northern California. Sixty-three people were killed. This week, a major earthquake, also measuring a magnitude of 7.0, struck near Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The Red Cross estimates that between 45,000 and 50,000 people have died.

This is not a natural disaster story. This is a poverty story. It’s a story about poorly constructed buildings, bad infrastructure and terrible public services. On Thursday, President Obama told the people of Haiti: “You will not be forsaken; you will not be forgotten.” If he is going to remain faithful to that vow then he is going to have to use this tragedy as an occasion to rethink our approach to global poverty. He’s going to have to acknowledge a few difficult truths.

The first of those truths is that we don’t know how to use aid to reduce poverty. Over the past few decades, the world has spent trillions of dollars to generate growth in the developing world. The countries that have not received much aid, like China, have seen tremendous growth and tremendous poverty reductions. The countries that have received aid, like Haiti, have not.

In the recent anthology “What Works in Development?,” a group of economists try to sort out what we’ve learned. The picture is grim. There are no policy levers that consistently correlate to increased growth. There is nearly zero correlation between how a developing economy does one decade and how it does the next. There is no consistently proven way to reduce corruption. Even improving governing institutions doesn’t seem to produce the expected results.

The chastened tone of these essays is captured by the economist Abhijit Banerjee: “It is not clear to us that the best way to get growth is to do growth policy of any form. Perhaps making growth happen is ultimately beyond our control.”

The second hard truth is that micro-aid is vital but insufficient. Given the failures of macrodevelopment, aid organizations often focus on microprojects. More than 10,000 organizations perform missions of this sort in Haiti. By some estimates, Haiti has more nongovernmental organizations per capita than any other place on earth. They are doing the Lord’s work, especially these days, but even a blizzard of these efforts does not seem to add up to comprehensive change.

Third, it is time to put the thorny issue of culture at the center of efforts to tackle global poverty. Why is Haiti so poor? Well, it has a history of oppression, slavery and colonialism. But so does Barbados, and Barbados is doing pretty well. Haiti has endured ruthless dictators, corruption and foreign invasions. But so has the Dominican Republic, and the D.R. is in much better shape. Haiti and the Dominican Republic share the same island and the same basic environment, yet the border between the two societies offers one of the starkest contrasts on earth — with trees and progress on one side, and deforestation and poverty and early death on the other.

As Lawrence E. Harrison explained in his book “The Central Liberal Truth,” Haiti, like most of the world’s poorest nations, suffers from a complex web of progress-resistant cultural influences. There is the influence of the voodoo religion, which spreads the message that life is capricious and planning futile. There are high levels of social mistrust. Responsibility is often not internalized. Child-rearing practices often involve neglect in the early years and harsh retribution when kids hit 9 or 10.

We’re all supposed to politely respect each other’s cultures. But some cultures are more progress-resistant than others, and a horrible tragedy was just exacerbated by one of them.

Fourth, it’s time to promote locally led paternalism. In this country, we first tried to tackle poverty by throwing money at it, just as we did abroad. Then we tried microcommunity efforts, just as we did abroad. But the programs that really work involve intrusive paternalism.

These programs, like the Harlem Children’s Zone and the No Excuses schools, are led by people who figure they don’t understand all the factors that have contributed to poverty, but they don’t care. They are going to replace parts of the local culture with a highly demanding, highly intensive culture of achievement — involving everything from new child-rearing practices to stricter schools to better job performance.

It’s time to take that approach abroad, too. It’s time to find self-confident local leaders who will create No Excuses countercultures in places like Haiti, surrounding people — maybe just in a neighborhood or a school — with middle-class assumptions, an achievement ethos and tough, measurable demands.

The late political scientist Samuel P. Huntington used to acknowledge that cultural change is hard, but cultures do change after major traumas. This earthquake is certainly a trauma. The only question is whether the outside world continues with the same old, same old.

[H_O]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

its a society of complete and utmost Anarchcy.
In a few more days when food and water are distibuted, armed thugs will terrorize the unarmed and weak.

And its reason why to have a safely stored firarm and ammunition as well as emegency supplies..because in times like this the have nots will kill the haves for even such things as a simple bottle of water and crackers

[halfwaytree]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

Now that the initial shock of what happened wears off and the hope of finding anyone still alive under the rubble fades the battle for survival is beginning.

This could really get very ugly very quickly. God help the weak among them.

[RichD]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

maybe this disaster is what will bring out the best in human nature and we will see brother helping brother and all that stuff.

[H_O]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: RichD</div><div class="ubbcode-body">maybe this disaster is what will bring out the best in human nature and we will see brother helping brother and all that stuff. </div></div>yeah...sure. its also going to bring out the cocroaches from the woodwork

[loops]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

i'm sorry...but if i were in this desperate situation...you can be damn sure i'd be looting the food stores too.

[H_O]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: loops</div><div class="ubbcode-body">i'm sorry...but if i were in this desperate situation...you can be damn sure i'd be looting the food stores too. </div></div>absolutely. but would you do it to your neighbour or someone else on the street armed with a gun or weapon?

[loops]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

given that the whole idea of looting the food is to LIVE, NO.

[RichD]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

unless u feel sey you better wid di gun dan your neighbour

[Xavier]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

When people are desperate they will do anything to get attention. I can't imagine what they are going through but I certainly may do something real desperate when hunger, pain and disillusion sets in.

[H_O]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

im just saying.. better to have a gun and not need it than to need it and not have one.

because when the going gets ruff, i would sooner have one to protect my supply of water and food.

[H_O]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

im wondering when there going to start eating one another

[LusciousJohnson]

Re: now they`re using corpses as roadblock

i just saw a live report from CNN and the man was talking about the looting and things that was about to be really bad

then they showed all these dead bodies in the street and how the ppl tryna &quot;respect their dead&quot; and keep ppl from walking over them or something and give them a &quot;proper burial.&quot;

so sad