Our Beautiful Disaster Porn

[bzarcher]

"We've (Americans) never had a major city totally wiped out before" - Phil.

Now, this isn't entirely true. The British certain did a number on D.C. in 1814, and earthquakes have reduced San Francisco to flinders at least twice since it was settled. Now, that we've not had a major city wiped out in this era of modern communications? Yes, I'll agree to that.

And as a culture, we're certainly milking it for all it's worth as hurricane Katrina inexorably makes her way towards New Orleans.

I came downstairs to take a break from MUSHing, PC, etx.

I turn on the TV - not surprisingly turned to CNN.

Katrina.

Headline news? Katrina.

ESPN? Katrina. (Apparently the Saints just rented SJSU's fields to practice on, while the superdome is now the world's largest hurricane shelter.)

Travel Channel? Katrina.

Fox news? Katrina.

TBS? Blade II, but with a Katrina bar occasionally going off.

WGN? Katrina.

Food network? Ice Cream. Thank god.

ABC? Katrina.

MSN/Money? Katrina.

Animal Planet? Katrina - they're putting the New Orleans Aquarium dolphins into pools at a Holiday Inn because they're deeper than the NOA tanks and farther inland.

We're fascinated by it. I'm personally quite concerned, because I'd really like to vacation in New Orleans someday, and touring some of the historical sites and architecture was one of the things I wanted to do. This is rather difficult if they're reduced to flinders.

And yet, it's something I want to watch. We've studded the city with cameras, 24x7 progress reports are in the offing, and I can get real time stormtracks and projections just by flipping channels. We're all waiting to see this incredible thing. Could, against all logic, the city somehow survive this intact? Will we finally see a disaster At Home to equal some of the destruction we've seen in Asia over the past few years? Will this be our Tsunami? Our Kobe? Or will it be horribly destructive, but not quite the the meteorlogical orgasm that we've been anticipiating?

We will see, soon. The entire country seems to be watching. Such a beautiful disaster we've found in the making.

Comments

[chaoticgoodnik.livejournal.com]

*nods* Funny you should mention it - I was reading about the 1906 quake very late last night/early this morning when I couldn't sleep. The San Fran Museum has a number of interesting primary sources online, a lot of which reveal a less than flattering concern about an "Asiatic coolie influx" and general suspicion and bad treatment of the Chinese population. Also read about the quake that took down the Cypress freeway, and the term "disaster porn" definitely crossed my mind. I wish I could remember when and where I first heard that phrase.

[ardaniel]

Probably from me around the time z_gryphon started disasterporn for fans of shows like Seconds from Disaster.

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

I think so, but I may have also caught it from Warren Ellis, too. It's a great term, though.

[chaoticgoodnik.livejournal.com]

Possibly. I know James Patrick Kelly's Wildlife used the term "corpse porn." He might have used "disaster porn," or I might have generalized from there or heard it in the mass media or something. (A quick Google search a few minutes ago indicated that it's been used a lot.)

[mephron]

The first time I heard it was in a book by Pat Cadigan, 'Synners'. Wherein the term 'porn' was a generic term for stuff that appealled to baser instincts, not just the sexual.

[chaoticgoodnik.livejournal.com]

Hmm. The only Cadigan novel I've read was Tea From an Empty Cup. I couldn't really get into her writing style.