Katrina Anniversary SPAM

When you get an email from the President and CEO of a respected publication like The Atlantic—you answer it. Or so I thought...

But after flying from Chicago at the crack of dawn to attend The Atlantic’s “Katrina: 10 Years Later” conference at the Sheraton in New Orleans, I find myself wishing I had labelled the message as spam.

I should have recognized the signs: a generic email with only slight attempt at personal touch (“you would add so much to the conversation”), the REGISTER HERE link at the bottom of her digital signature, and the fact that I had no clue where they acquired my information. And yet, I admit, I was a bit struck with the idea that maybe—just maybe—this was a personal email that just had the detached touch of a successful magazine CEO. I thought maybe my work as an artist and a vocal New Orleanian had made me, in some sense, worthy to be invited.

But what I found out was that I was just there to fill seats.

Which was disappointing considering that also filling those seats alongside me were numerous accomplished, impressive, and passionate New Orleanians, some of whom had worked throughout their lives and careers to improve the city. And fortunately, a small number of them were, in fact, granted a spot on the various panels throughout the day, and an even smaller number of those spoke the truth about the state of the city.

But it wasn’t all bad—I admittedly did learn a thing or two.

From the session on being young & black in New Orleans, I learned the shameful fact that Black children are two to three times more likely to be poor as white children in New Orleans, and black children are seven times more likely to live more than half their childhood in poverty. In a session about housing, I was introduced to an opinion, shared by Mark Walters, a community organizer for an organization called The Micah Project, that affordable housing isn’t the only goal. Ideally, in his opinion, mixed income housing is what gets impoverished people to see that there are possibilities beyond their poor community—affordable housing often just concentrates poor people, to their detriment. I learned from a bright Brandeis University Junior, who is a product of one seemingly successful charter school, that charters (of which New Orleans now has many) aren’t inherently bad—but too often they are chiefly funded by corporations, whose intentions aren’t mainly about providing a good education. From environmental journalist Mark Schlefstein of the Times-Picayune Newspaper (and a member of my synagogue in New Orleans) I was informed that while the new levee system is one of the best in the world, the levees still will have to be continually raised in the next few decades as sea levels rise due to climate change. And all this before lunch—didn’t seem like a bad start…

So the 500 or so people all grabbed their free boxed lunches—generously sponsored by The Atlantic—and got a chance to eat and connect. But after getting this all-to-brief chance to interact personally with a diverse array of people who care about New Orleans, it was becoming clear to me that it was going to be very difficult to transition again to being just an audience member taking notes.

And yet transition we did, but it was by no means a smooth one. Things began to go downhill right around this point—and fast.

The chief motivator of this steep slide was President of the Rockefeller Foundation, Judith Rodin. She was given, for the first time since the opening speaker, a podium on her own, and she used it to talk about just how much her and her foundation has done for New Orleans since Katrina. At this point, I was reminded that the foundation underwrote the conference (and probably paid for my lunch), and so I was prepared to let this shameless publicity go on. After all, the Rockefeller foundation also underwrites a lot of PBS shows I like (like Downton Abbey!), so I figured, let her have her day. That was until she posited the outrageous claim that “the main thing we learned from Katrina is that we can never let a disaster go to waste”. I heard gasps from various people around my table. “Did she really just say that?” one woman at my table questioned, “I cannot believe she said that!”

Immediately, my mind jumped to Chicago Tribune writer Kristen McQueary’s insensitive editorial “wishing for a Hurricane Katrina to hit Chicago,” in order to reset Chicago’s finances (whatever that means). I thought to myself: here again is another outsider telling us how much of a special opportunity Katrina was, without truly understanding and considering the destruction, displacement and suffering of millions, and the deaths of thousands. Rodin’s speech, though, was in many ways worse than McQueary’s (albeit more subtly), as she was speaking these words live before a group composed of many hundreds of survivors.

It was from this point that I started to become aware of the outside and corporate forces at play in this conference—as well as the self-serving nature of the event itself.

I could point to the fact that Rodin, along with the CEO of Greater New Orleans Inc., Michael Hecht (who provides chiefly low-paying hospitality jobs within this city), were among the members of the final panel. I could point to the fact that they devoted a whole session to out-of-town filmmakers who have a movie about the growing industry of taking advantage of disasters. I could point to the fact that when I met Margaret Lowe Smith, the head of The Atlantic, and tried to express how grateful I was to be invited and be able to attend the conference, she was completely dismissive and didn’t even verbally respond to my thanks (she nodded, gave a half grin, and walked away). I could point to the fact that the HOT 8 Brass Band, one of the greatest musical outfits in the world, played an amazing set at the reception that was almost completely ignored by the attendees who stayed for the reception—many of whom, I realized, weren’t even from New Orleans (A band member also divulged to me that what they were being paid was pretty shameful, even with such reputable national organizations sponsoring the event)!

But above all, what bothered me most was that The Atlantic personally invited and gathered hundreds of diverse people who care about this city into one room to talk about the past and future of New Orleans, but then never asked for their input (beyond the one or two questions allowed after each panel). I was promised, in that initial email invitation, that I would be part of a “conversation”; but instead hundreds of locals and I were spoken at­—not spoken with.  It seemed to me we were only there to show viewers of the live stream that local people were actually interested in this conference. They wanted The Atlantic to seem like a relevant voice in the ten-year anniversary conversation.

But in retrospect, I think I should have thought to wonder what The Atlantic has to do with New Orleans or Hurricane Katrina at all. What stake do they have in this community? What stake do they have in the efforts of the Rockefeller foundation and the various corporations (as well as the head of the charter schools and the police chief) they allowed in their forums?

These are questions I wish I would have asked myself before I allowed myself to be dazzled by the invitation of a respected, national publication. Because if I would have asked myself what stake they have in New Orleans—other than to exploit the interest around this ten-year anniversary of Katrina—the answer would have been “none”.

Sometimes an opportunity, upon closer examination, is really just another piece of spam. Next time, I’ll label it as such.

David Kaplinsky is an actor, filmmaker, and writer born and raised in New Orleans until Hurricane Katrina ravaged his home. He has since been living mostly in Chicago. 
Contact him at dkaplinsky2@gmail.com