Americans are decent, generous, Christian people who understandably want to help others. But our desire to help must be tempered by our responsibility to our countrymen to maintain an orderly, safe, and prosperous country. It also must be tempered by some recognition that Haiti’s bad circumstances are not caused by the earthquake, but rather are exacerbated by the earthquake; the conditions that made the earthquake so bad stem from the characteristics of the Haitian people and the unique characteristics of Hatian society. Even David Brooks recognizes this obvious fact. So I was a little chagrined to learn that Florida may be taking in several hundred thousand “evaucees” from Haiti, most of whom I imagine will never leave.
A very similar, though less dramatic, experiment took place in Houston, Texas in 2005, where Bill White, our mayor and basic centrist liberal, extended the red carpet to New Orleans’ many Katrina refugees. It was a noble gesture, and Houston responded quite well logistically, but longer-term it’s a gesture for which the poor and working class Houstonians had to bear the brunt of the cost. Homicide went up 28%. Crime in general increased. Many refugees remained stuck in a cycle of dependency that they had begun as welfare cases in New Orleans. Most Houstonians had ambivalent or negative feelings about the Katrina refugees in the end.
There is no reason to think the outcome will be different in the case of the many Haitian refugees we may soon be taking in. Indeed, because of language barriers and an even more corruption-ridden antecedent in Haiti, it will probably be worse. The refugees won’t live in the fanciest neighborhoods, but rather in poor and working class apartment complexes on government subsidies. Haitian gangs, Haitian attitudes about crime and corruption, and Haitian disrespect for law and order will almost certainly follow in their wake, as they have followed those Haitian immigrants already here in Florida.
This is not a tough call. There is good reason to be helping Haitians in Haiti. They’re in our hemisphere. We have the resources to help. It’s part and parcel of a Western Hemisphere oriented foreign policy. But there is no reason to take in massive numbers of Haitians into our country in order to extend that help. Such a refugee policy will hurt vulnerable and poor Americans–white and black–in order for the leadership classes to feel good for a day or a week until they move on to some other pet cause. Charity does not require that we endanger ourselves and hurt third parties to whom we have responsibilities and ties of citizenship.
We no more have to take these forlorn Haitians into our homeland to show our compassion than we have to take real life, often self-destructive, homeless people into our real life homes. But that’s what Obama and company want Florida to do for Haiti: a gesture stemming from a perfect storm of liberal compassion, the opportunity to show a “lack of racism,” indifference to America’s working class, and the cultivation of a political constituency through specialized immigration policy. This is going to be bad and especially bad for Florida.
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I followed your link and saw that the woman featured in the article about evacuees was a doctor. Even though she has a 10 month old baby, it seems strange that a doctor would be evacuated out of the country right now. You can’t blame her for wanting to protect her child, but still, it seems strange.
I’m not so sure relations with Haiti should be determined by a “Western Hemisphere oriented foreign policy”. I don’t think Haiti’s geographic location should make any difference to any decision to send aid. See the classic essay by Walker Connor, “Myths of Hemispheric, Continental, Regional, and State Unity”. It’s in his Ethnonationalism, one of the best political books I’ve read.
One mark of corrupt societies is looking out for your immediate group first and having little social solidarity. I missed that detail, but it’s consistent with my observation.
I realize we’re very different from Francophone and Latin America as compared to Canada, but we should still do our best to keep order and good will on our side of the pond. Thanks for the essay recommendation, however.
“We no more have to take these forlorn Haitians into our homeland to show our compassion than we have to take real life, often self-destructive, homeless people into our real life homes. ”
summed up nicely.
You are correct. This is tragic, and our response has been predictably PC and stupid. Woe is us.
It is nice to know that while I drive a beat up little Ford Focus, because that’s all I can afford given that I take care of my wife and two kids even though I make a decent $120,000 a year for working 80 hours a week solving minorities’ self-created problems (here in Miami), most welfare Haitians here illegally in Miami drive a BMW or a Benz. Then they drive like the third world animals they are, thus putting my two angels’ lives in danger as we ride in our death trap Ford Focus. Then some of the thousands of dollars I paid in taxes goes to prop up bad mortgages, banks, Haitians, Arabs, and Africans.
You and Brooks have it right, but even you (especially Brooks, as he must be given his position) are too polite. The problem is that Haitians, on average, are about 1.5 standard deviations below the average IQ of a white European/American. This puts them at a level where they pretty much need to be in a zoo. Given today’s high tech society, they simply cannot handle the basic necessities of life. That is why many in the US resort to crime so they can go to prison to get fed three meals a day. That is why a country like Haiti, which is filled with them, cannot build a safe building. Ever see one of those 400 pound wide nose females of the species working at McDonald’s? The ones who look like a silverback gorilla? Lotta resemblance, no? Notice how it cannot even make change for a dollar? This animal simply cannot survive in a modern society. You and I were doing algebra and calculus problems when we were 15 years old that the smartest Haitian living in Haiti could never do at any point in his life.
Ever notice how even educated blacks go into fields such as studying race issues, politics, complaining, taking surveys? Never hard science. You and I did physics and chemistry problems as teenagers (and we were middle of the road in science in our little public school in mudlick hickville), that none of them can do. Their PhDs are given to them in weak fields.
This is a disaster. Now even more gorillas posing as humans will be permitted to invade my Florida.
Typical–check this out. This injury was caused by a Haitian firing a gun, not an earthquake:
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2010/01/18/anderson-in-the-midst-of-looting-chaos/?hpt=T2
I don’t know if you have seen this yet, but Senegal is offering to take in Haitian refugees and even give them parcels of land.
Senegal is acknowledging that most Haitians came from that part of Africa and is desirous for them to return to their homeland.
Personally, I think this is the best solution I’ve seen.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100116/ap_on_re_af/af_senegal_haiti
I think it is wrong that discussion of possible racial differences in pyschology is suppressed so relentlessly, and that sensibly wanting to keep mass numbers of Haitians from immigrating into the U.S. is denounced as racism. But I find comments about blacks being “silverback gorillas” and belonging in zoos substantially worse.
If we do determine that there is an average genetic difference in intelligence between blacks and whites, our first priority will be to keep in mind that the value of human life springs from individual God-given souls rather than scores on an IQ test. Our Leftist culture is already moving us towards the IQ = personal worth model. Its disregard for the possibility of a soul, its wholesale infanticide of the mentally retarded, and its desperate insistance that there cannot possibly be the slightest difference in average intelligence between racial groups are all markers of this development.
If our Leftist intellectual class eventual gives up its belief in absolute racial equality, it is easy to see how they will quickly fall back into the social darwinism and racial eugenics they only recently held so dear. That is why it is important for the Right to strongly oppose any attempts to label racial groups as “gorillas posing as humans”. It is on the Right that the sanctity of human life has its best chance of preservation.
Roach, I think it is great that you tackle a lot of the racial issues that are now forbidden in polite discourse, but if this blog becomes a forum for people like Miami, it will be doing a disservice to your cause. I wouldn’t suggest banning him, but I do think a stern rebuke is in order.
I agree pretty much with everything you say, David, and actually do tend to censor comments like that when I catch them in time, but these seemed OK until that popped up. I also have something of a hands-off policy when it comes to comments, but obviously I think such views said in such hateful ways are un-Christian and will tend to repel decent people who are not racist but like me and perhaps you to a lesser extent are annoyed at the hypocriscy of our current world order that denies black on white crime, the scope of affirmative action, etc.
I think this commenter is a one time thing, though, as he/it is new.
Not only did crime go up in Houston, ruining some good neighborhoods, like Westchase, but anyone pointing to this obvious fact was denounced as a ra-a-a-a-a-cist.
At any rate, moving several hundred thousand Haitians into Florida isn’t about benefiting the Floridians. It’s about turning a purple state solidly blue. I imagine it’ll meet some political opposition, though. Cubans and others aren’t quite as hampered by white guilt, and they know they’ll be the big losers this time around.
I’m a neighbor of yours (about 30 miles due south of OIA) and I’m equally unhappy about this.
But I can’t ‘blame obama’ for this. I could see ”President McAmnesty” doing the exact same thing with Perky Sarah gushing about how wonderful our ‘Christian Compassion ™’ is.
But NO ONE is thinking long term here; we don’t have enough jobs (unemployment is 12% in metro Orlando) FOR THE PEOPLE THAT ALREADY LIVE HERE!!!
Where do WE flee to?!?!?!
Mr Roach,
Youre linked to Steve Sailer, which is how Ive found your blog. You are entirely and succinctly correct on this matter. Hatians living here wont know the language, are about 50% illiterate in their own language, and many will be innumerate and computer-illiterate. What on earth will they do for a living in Florida? It will be a disaster.
America is going to have to ask itself a serious question someday: Do we want a black and white working class of people who can read, write, multiply, divide, and speak coherently and have been trained to obey the laws and respect higher class citizens at least to a civil degree, or do we want third-worlders doing those things more cheaply, but costing us a bundle in welfare/penal/and extra security costs? Having our own working class is much cheaper. The 2-3 hundred thousand Haitians would probably never leave the Miami area and add to that areas already signigigant upstairs/downstairs problems. It will be a hot mess.
Apparently, U.S. policy is to prevent an exodus, at least for now:
http://wcbstv.com/local/haiti.exodus.flatbush.2.1435152.html
I was born and raised in houston and i love it so much, i left for college in 1998 and 2003 went to england for grad and medical school, i came back to houston in 2007 in sadness , everyone is a gangster or a badass its childish and stupid. I feel the houston residence needs to pull together and get the people out .They have brought their animalistic ways to a civil and calm way of life. You see ass soon as they moved here ike hit, its Gods way of saying we should have let them die in new orleans