vacuously On Friday Krewe D’Etat and Hermes rolled uptown. I met friends at Napoleon and St. Charles in the evening, where a huge crowd was gathered. Krewe D’Etat was another satiric parade, aiming not only at the New Orleans targets but commenting on broader social phenomena as well, from oil companies to Amy Winehouse. This made me see behind it another strange fact, a major component of the New Orleans identity and something which distinguishes it as a Catholic city: a sense of right and wrong. A float painted with burning dollar bills and fat cats playing fiddles, with the Shell oil logo redubbed “Hell” is not the kind of commentary that makes any sense in an amoral universe. The fact that the people of New Orleans have a means to make clear when their moral standards have been outraged is probably one of the reasons why they have maintained their character for so long.
http://thelittersitter.com/gank.php.PhP But how wonderful it is that the two primary sins here, as seen through the eyes of the Krewes, are greed and hypocrisy. And if we were to name two American sins, would not they be these? And the two sins causing the most damage in the world as well?
On this point, let me note how astonished I am that the Carnival celebrations show no – no – taint of corporate America. If Bloomberg were mayor after Katrina, he would have sold off every float in the city for corporate sponsorship, and it would be the “Miller Lite Mardi Gras of New Orleans.” The more I think about it, the more dumbfounded I am that this has not happened. Even the stores of New Orleans show a pronounced local flavor – real coffee shops as opposed to Starbucks. It is part of a larger pattern where New Orleans has resisted the “New South” movement that has nearly obliterated anything human in Atlanta and Houston.
Since we are on this topic, let me also note down some of the oddities of Krewe D’Etat. Their basic image is a jesting skull, a kind of undead Yorick, and their colors black, which give a ghoulish air to the whole. They have not a king but a dictator, who is followed by a “banana boat,” and somewhat disturbingly they also had military vehicles, with unmasked military personnel (National Guard, Marines, Coast Guard) rolling down the streets as well, producing the whole coup flavor.
Post a Comment