How One of Katrina’s Feel-Good Stories Turned Bad

[n2doc]

When Kathy Phipps was relocated to a suburban Utah neighborhood after the storm, she was hailed by the media as an example of how the tragedy could turn into opportunity. But 10 years later, Kathy is back in Louisiana, scarred by what happened after the cameras went away.
by Peter Moskowitz

Ten years ago, Kathy Phipps seemed happy. After Hurricane Katrina forced her family from New Orleans and into the federal government’s hands, and eventually to a white, suburban, Mormon community in Utah, where her story was told again and again on national television and in local papers, Kathy seemed not only resilient, but joyful.

“This storm was the best thing that could have ever happened to my family,” she told one CBS reporter.

Kathy may not have wanted her house to be destroyed by floodwaters, or to board a FEMA-funded plane to Utah and be separated from her family, but once there she seemed to make the best of it. Amid the vastness of its snowy mountains and tranquil suburbs, she said felt like she had peace of mind. Her kids had a chance to escape the poverty and terrible schools of New Orleans. Her husband found a job.

The positivity of Kathy’s story fit in well with the narrative the mainstream media latched onto post-Katrina. At some point, television screens and newspapers stopped being filled with stories of disaster and instead offered stories of hope, redemption, and lives made better through tragedy. Former first lady Barbara Bush perhaps best exemplified the dissonance when just a few days after the storm she visited Houston’s Astrodome, where many of the storm’s evacuees were staying. “What I’m hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas,” she said. “And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them.” Conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote about how New Orleans could be made a better city after the storm. Oprah Winfrey, after donating $10 million to construct a community for Katrina survivors in Houston, dedicated several episodes of her show to detailing the ways in which their lives had improved. And there were countless stories about people like Kathy Phipps — people who seemed to have made it despite the long odds.

Then the cameras left.

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http://www.buzzfeed.com/petermoskowitz/how-one-of-katrinas-feel-good-stories-turned-bad#.lizjb7kXo

[murielm99]

1. Some of the comments at the end

of the article are hateful. This woman and her family experienced terrible trauma. Anyone would have mental health problems. I am surprised she is still going.

[Syzygy321]

2. The real story is how news and storytelling intersect

and influence each other.

Everyone loves a story: for example tragic ones (lives crushed by a hurricane), heroic ones (Zeitoun rescuing neighbors with his canoe), or hopeful and uplifting ones (Kathy Phipps losing everything but landing indomitably on her feet in Utah.)

We like our stories simple, straightforward, with concrete endings.

Take Zeitoun*. Lots of us loved reading his story (It made us feel uplifted, and then properly outraged - enjoyable emotions!). Meanwhile: he surely loved talking big about his heroism and travails; the media loved getting a watchable scoop; Dave Eggers loved selling books and selling himself; and Zeitoun's abused wife and children had complex reasons for keeping their mouths shut and going along with the charade.

Zeitoun was a Katrina hero and a victim of anti-Muslim prejudice. True enough.

He was also a sick bastard of the stereotypical type: a religious Muslim who coerced, controlled, and violently beat his wife and daughter. Last I heard, he was arrested for trying to kill his now ex-wife, along with her family. This is after having gotten off with a slap on the wrist for chasing her down the street and trying to beat her to death with a tire iron.

The point: any life can be spun, because people are complex.

Kathy Phipps is a whole person with a life stretching decades into the past and future. But what we get is one media piece that calls her a gutsy survivor living happily ever after... and here, another media piece that calls her a psychiatric patient who stares at reality TV shows all day.

Neither piece scratches her surface. They are quick, salable clichés that fit a script and a word-count.


(*He is a distant relative of mine, actually. I am not surprised by his violent religion and misogyny. It's oh so familiar.)