Efficiency

So far I've managed to avoid the television since we got home. I've been fairly studious about this. Especially since Katrina. In the wake of 9/11, I decided I was going to avoid television coverage of disasters, both natural and manmade. There are some wounds that you never recover from and I cannot recover from the wounds that are inflicted by television coverage of peoples' hurt. I feel it too deeply and carry it with me forever. There is only so much of that you can take with you.

But I have been hearing some radio reports about what is happening. It's terrible. I have to rant for a minute. Who in their right mind thought it was a good idea to treat people like cattle? We're starting to realized that it's not even a good idea to treat cattle like that anymore, and yet it was a good idea to treat people like that??? Didn't it cross anyone's mind that in the wake of a category FIVE hurricane it was just possible that the electricity might get knocked out?? Even to the Superdome? Or the levees might fail? This was a category FIVE hurricane ... teetering on the edge of SIX, folks ... who thought of this bright idea to put all those people in the Superdome?

I'm just wondering how long we're going to continue this love affair that modern man is having with efficiency. How much longer is it going to continue that we'll think that the most efficient thing is always the best thing? When it comes to people (and even animals) the most efficient is almost always the worst when you think through all of the long term effects. It may take care of things quickly, but there is almost always a really bad unexpected backlash, that should have been anticipated, if efficiency weren't the paramount virtue being sought after.