Gulf Oil Spill Threatens Vanishing Cultures: 'They Have Abandoned Us'

AFP:

MONTEGUT, Louisiana (AFP) -- The encroaching Gulf of Mexico oil spill may have sounded the death knell for the vanishing cultures of the last French-speaking Cajun communities and Louisiana native Americans.

Read the whole story: AFP

Comments

[Tea Party]

03:40 PM on 05/30/2010

And you wnoder why I want the fed out of my life?
Where is the BIA?

[larry278]

04:21 PM on 05/21/2010

The Cajuns r right. We Yankees ain't no count anywhere, anytime. "Great job, Brownie.", you expletive deleted & your mother too.

[rougebaisers]

12:42 PM on 05/21/2010

CRUCIFY THEM.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TNV89PxS-I

[larry278]

08:03 PM on 05/21/2010

No, Jesus died that way to save us. Even we atheists know that. Honor your lord, master, savior & friend. We atheists choose to do so. You Christians have no choice. Every child of Father Abraham honors Jesus, Hebrew, Muslim & Christian. It's a time honored custom & practice. Don't waste 1 of god's trees by cutting it down & making a rood. Hang the BP people from 1 of Lousianas fine tall trees. Woodman spare that tree. Hang the BP crud from strong, high limbs. Don't destroy the Pelican State. BP already did that & the Gulf of Mexico. BP will foul the Gulf Stream, the USA's Atlantic Coast & the UK, sooner or later.

[sheoples]

06:15 PM on 05/20/2010

WATCH THE DOCUMENTARY "CRUDE"

cheap oil at the cost of humans, environment, lives!!!

[Eyeful]

04:49 PM on 05/20/2010

How much abandonment can take place when the government has never been around to help the Choctaw Indians in the first place (Katrina)? It's the same modus operandi, except this time the area is FUBAR so the expectation now is to abandon all hope.

[carlgt1]

04:01 PM on 05/20/2010

well what did they expect, caring for cultures is a "liberal" thing - and this country is firmly entrenched in the reich wing.

[Dncr4lfe]

02:49 PM on 05/20/2010

President Obama needs to get back down to the gulf area..pronto!!

[BamaMama]

02:48 PM on 05/20/2010

As a buyer of nonfiction books for children, I am constantly amazed by the beauty and diversity of our biosphere. It's a gift that is meant to be enjoyed and shared by all, but the naked avarice and wanton disregard for plant and animal life that the oil industry proffers as its face to the world leave me speechless and grieving.
Yes, BP is responsible, but why have other oil companies not jumped in IMMEDIATELY--without being asked or invited--to help mitigate what has already become an unimitigated disaster?? The planet is being ruined. My heart breaks for every family that loses its livelihood and way of life, and for the millions of marine animals and plants, and protected habitats that are suffocating by the minute. May those responsible for this tragedy, as well as those who are in a position to help but have yet to lift a finger because it's NOT THEIR FAULT OR THIER PROBLEM--all rot in hell!!

[kevman08]

02:27 PM on 05/20/2010

They abandon anything that isn't profitable.

[masanford]

02:25 PM on 05/20/2010

US Govt today apologized for it's treatment of Native American peoples ... in Oklahoma .. This smacks of earlier relocations ...

[JoeBlough]

01:49 PM on 05/20/2010

BP has created the "forbidden zone", as featured in the movie "Planet of the Apes". Who knew we were so close?

[tjconkster]

02:42 PM on 05/20/2010

Well the tea bagger's spokesman did say that some of us worship a "Monkey God"

[charon]

01:41 PM on 05/20/2010

I lived in New Orleans for about half a year in the 1970s. My landlords were a Cajun couple of means, he had an oil industry consulting business (I'm not sure what his area of expertise was). They used to invite me over to have dinner with them at least once a week, and were very hospitable people, serving up red beans and rice, barbeque with crawdads, etc.

They used to speak of Creoles, Cajun, and what they pronounced as "Coo-nass" (Cunhas?). The Creoles referred to the Black residents whose families lived there before the "Louisiana Purchase," I believe; Cajun, of course, were themselves, the descendants of the French settlers of what is now called Nova Scotia, after the Protestant Scots and English moved in and kicked the Catholic Acadian French out and they migrated to New Orleans; and the Coonass were, so they told me, the Native Americans.

Anyway, I just bring this up because this article mentions "Creoles" who sound more like Cajun to me, and calls the Native Americans Choctaws and not Coonass. I was wonder if anyone knows why the discrepancy? Maybe I misunderstood them?

[spinns17]

01:59 PM on 05/20/2010

creoles are african american , spanish american ,and french mix.cajun are french americans only.coo-nass people are french americans , and native american mix.chocatows are the native american tribe that lived there ,so i was told anyway. i realy dont know if im right either .lol

[charon]

02:02 PM on 05/20/2010

That makes sense and explains it. Thanks much.

[americanfabius]

01:36 PM on 05/20/2010

With their traditional home being in a high risk area, and the fact the federal government has offered to relocate them to a safer area, I don't see where the "abandonment" argument holds weight here.

[doctorj2u]

01:44 PM on 05/20/2010

Your attitude disgusts me. We are losing our culture feeding America's unending love of oil. Abandonment is what America does. It does it very well. You did it 5 years ago and you are doing it now. I am sick of being America's colony, to be used and thrown away.

[HerodotusWept]

06:09 PM on 05/20/2010

Damn right, Doc. How would you feel fabius, if your family for generations lived in the same area, which was central to your entire cultural identity, was constantly denigrated and destroyed for naked profit... Then when things get so bad that the land is damn near uninhabitable, you are to to "just suck it up and move!" Spoken by someone with no cultural identity at all... typical American...

[PartyPartyParty]

01:49 PM on 05/20/2010

"[Clifton Hendon's] small, flat-bottomed boat lay idle, moored on the canal alongside the mobile home where he has lived since Hurricane Katrina destroyed his house in 2005. US officials have promised him a new home. But so far nothing."

You didn't even bother to read the article before you decided these people haven't been abandoned, did you?

[americanfabius]

01:55 PM on 05/20/2010

The bigger tragedy is the fact that Clifton doesn't understand the complexity and largess of a bureaucratic federal government and the fact that it consistently and repeatedly makes outrageous promises it can't keep.

[Moshe]

01:00 PM on 05/20/2010

The American People have been abandoned in a world of international corporate greed and careerist polititians that have become nothing but well paid corporate enablers.

We are on our own folks.

You pay for your government but they don't work for you any more.

[Scott23]

03:21 PM on 05/20/2010

Well my partner just returned after 3 weeks in the mess down there. No one has dealt with this level of .... in the services before, she is injured but will be ok. The spill is beyond what is known. She and the peers are making it up as they go along. If you have a great idea submit it to the DOI, or better yet go fix it please. Just tell me what you would do.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oil_spills

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_15095000?IADID=Search-www.sltrib.com-www.sltrib.com

Anyway there are lots of very smart folks that care more than you can know.

just saying,

scott

[Moshe]

04:20 PM on 05/20/2010

Thanks Scott. I hope she is better.

There are lots of people who care.

And there are some that don't.

The latter ones are the problem, and that is why we need a common government to keep those people honest.

And you can't unring the bell. This mess can't be fixed in a way that will just make it go away. The only way to have done that would have been to prevent it from happening. Sufficient safety precautions WERE NOT taken, and mounting evidence proves that.

So now people and animals are going to get sick and die unnecessarily, as wasted oil spills into the Gulf.

Disasters need to be prevented through responsible efforts before the disaster. Because no after the fact efforts are sufficient.

[SOLERSO68]

11:11 PM on 05/20/2010

my first suggestion is to ban deepwater drilling outright, and let the the people of each region decide if the want drilling. decide one time then leave them alone. i dont have a suggestion about our goventment and contry being taken away from us by greedy global corporate slugs. i would have suggested working "from within" to change the system but the system is rigged. back at ya.

[thegirlnextdoor]

12:44 PM on 05/20/2010

I can not believe that they refused to put up barriers to this island. Because nothing of worth is there.
I know the most about the Cajuns, those long ago refugees from the British invasion of their Acadian homeland here in the North. And I love the music! Viva Balfa!
Creole, Chocktaw, Cajuns! Good luck to you all. Hopefully some day not too far off "les bontemps" will "rollez" again!

[planetjeffy]

04:30 PM on 05/20/2010

They have no barriers to put up. Besides heavy oil floats beneath the surface and cannot be stopped. BP was completely unprepared for any spill. We need to seize BP now, take over the spill effort and reveal all their data.