(Image Credit: http://www.morguefile.com/creative/jdurham)
On August 23rd, 2011 a very rare 5.8 magnitude earthquake struck the eastern United States. Strong vibrations were felt all the way to Toronto, Canada. An earthquake of this magnitude had not been recorded in the eastern U.S. for nearly 70 years.
Shortly afterward, on August 27, hurricane Irene made landfall at North Carolina's Outer Banks. Although downgraded to a Category 1 storm at landfall, computer modelling predicted that Irene would move aggressively through New York, New Jersey, Vermont and other northern states unaccustomed to hurricanes.
So what was the reaction of other Americans as these populations struggled to cope with unfamiliar natural disasters?
Scorn and derision. Sneers. Insults.
Here are a few comments from online sources. It took me only a few minutes to find plenty like these:
Ah, a 5.9 or, as we like to call it in San Francisco, a Tuesday.
Exactly - the tallest building in DC? Let it fall over.
Earthquake preparedness, earthquake safety, and seismically built structures are necessary everywhere. *returns to giggling*
LMAO...and it was a little 5.9...
With regard to Hurricane Irene:
We do not panic. We do not hope the federal government will come in and give us debit cards with welfare.
There's a sizable chunk of landmass where people are quite amused at all the histrionics of city dwellers who find survival impossible without their delis and double lattes. Keep it up - we've stockpiled plenty of popcorn to eat while we're busy watching how helpless you all are.
As for New York City, well, everyone there is also more shallow and limited than had been feared.
america=retard
This is shameful. Our nation is battling a host of grave problems- Great Depression 2.0 among them- and if this is how we are going to treat each other, we hardly deserve success. We need to work together and instead we have divided ourselves into self-righteous, exclusionary cliques. Each little group is so proud of its own superiority-so busy gazing into the mirror and preening- that the problems of other human beings go unnoticed or are ridiculed.
This is the kind of behavior one expects from spoiled teenagers, not the citizens of a great nation. In fact, at this point I'm ready to put the 'citizens' and 'great nation' parts of that phrase aside.
I'd be happy if we all just started acting like adults.
What if the jerks who write nasty comments such as these were one day subjected to their own version of 'compassion?'
I'm reminded of a speech from Shakespeare's Henry V:
The mercy that was quick in us but late
By your own counsel is suppressed and killed:
You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy;
For your own reasons turn into your bosoms,
As dogs upon their masters, worrying you.
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