How We React

I think there are two levels of reaction to disaster. Both of which could be seen in Katrina and 9/11, but only one surprisingly back in 1906. Perhaps this is due to the lapse in time, but back then there was an overwhelming coming together of the nation. After the earthquake there wasn't a covering of tails to blame what limited resources were sent and how much time had passed. All did what they could as quickly as they could to aid those who had been affected. After Katrina, there was a bickering and drawn out relief. Even private citizens and corporations who wanted to aid those in distress had no means of getting money and people down in the areas where it was needed the most. At that time a country within our country developed and they were heavily left on their own. This also happened during the Earthquake to some extent, but in this case authority took power into its own hands through similar means to martial law. All the way up until reconstruction, troops regulated and controlled the growth of the city. After 9/11 the country came together to provide relief and sent caravans similar to the earthquake, but in this case they were of firefighters flooding into NYC to stem the fires and provide aid. There was also a banding together on multiple levels of both government authority and citizens. The disasters had their differences, but in the past there was seemingly less blame and more of an active and quick response to the problems at hand without allowing any of the politics to get in the way. One thing that aren't quite the same, but at the same time similar is the isolation of different races between 9/11 and 1906. After the earthquake the Chinese were excluded in camps due to racial segregation, but after the attack muslims(particularly people from the Middle East in general) began to face discrimination. Disasters bring out the best and the worst.