things kevin hates

Since my post on suburb bashing drew lots of attention, I figured I’d return to a topic I’d said I would cover: bashing New Orleans residents who aren’t natives. This strikes me as downright inhospitable.

Now, this is a broad topic with many different underlying causes. On the one hand, you have the overt racism against Latino workers who came here after the storm. Recall, if you will, the taco trucks that were all over the place after Katrina. (This Los Angeles Times article sums things up nicely.) Many a politician bitched about the taco trucks. Among them was Jefferson Parish councilman Louis Congemi, whose official bio notes that he’s the son of Italian immigrants. Perhaps Congemi had somehow forgotten the discrimination Italians were subject to when they came to the US in droves at the dawn of the 20th century. (My own mother—half Italian, half French—once complained that when she and my father—who’s a mixture of a number of Germanic races—were dating, his grandmother complained about her own offspring dating an Italian. Seems crazy to me, but that’s the way it was, apparently.) In any case, it’s hard for me to imagine New Orleans food without red gravy. But I can imagine some stuffy old upper-crust Creoles bitching about the dagos and their grocery stores—ones like Central Grocery (founded in 1906) or perhaps Mandina’s (founded in 1898 as a grocery store, becoming a pool hall before gaining fame as a restaurant). So just as the Italians brought food and culture which are vital parts of the gumbo that is New Orleans, I hope we say the same things about the Latinos fifty years from now. I’m already hooked on the carnitas tacos at Felipe’s, so I’d say they’re off to a good start.

Secondly, there’s a ton of bashing of those “carpetbaggers” who came here after the storm. In many cases, such criticism is warranted. A great many people came in post-Katrina motivated either by desire for personal gain or an attempt to stamp their own platonic ideal of the American city. (Nevermind that we’re the happiest state, so we must be doing something right.) Sure a great many of the carpetbaggers deserve all the scorn that is heaped upon them. But for every bad apple, there’s probably ten people who come here, work, love the city, and become just like us.

Perhaps the best example of disdain toward outsiders came a few years ago when I was at Le Chat Noir seeing the late-night comedy mishmash they ran for a while, the Red Light District Variety Show. One of the segments featured Jim Fitzmorris’s rants.* It’s been a while, so my recollection may be fuzzy, but I distinctly remember venom toward people who didn’t go to high school here or transplants who live in the Quarter and never venture outside of it. Now, I don’t remember exactly what was said, so I don’t want to go too far out on a limb, but I remember a fair amount of hostility toward transplants. And that’s not what the city should be about.

I’ve always thought that being American is much less about ethnic origin or place of birth than about citizenship and residence. We are a nation of immigrants, after all, and there’s no “American” race (though lots of people in the South put that on their census forms):

(Bigger version of map available here.)

Just as being American isn’t really about where you were born, neither is being a New Orleanian. It’s true that the way we use the English language, you wouldn’t say you’re from somewhere unless you were born there or spent a significant part of your childhood there. But the history of this city is littered with notable New Orleans residents who aren’t from here. Two of the city’s most famous writers, Tennessee Williams (born in Columbus, Mississippi, grew up in St. Louis, Missouri) and Walker Percy (born in Alabama, raised in Georgia and Mississippi, lived in Covington for most of his adult life), weren’t natives. Likewise, many current journalists and writers are transplants. Most famous of them is Chris Rose (a native of the Washington D.C. area), who, in the wake of Katrina, was probably the city’s most notable, beloved, honest, and impassioned voice. Plenty of others have explained our plight to a wider audience. Consider New Yorker columnist Dan Baum, who wrote a shitload about New Orleans. Go to The New Yorker’s website to read his stuff, but be forewarned that you will probably spend all afternoon reading it.

And the single best thing I have EVER read about New Orleans—and believe me, I read damn near any essay about New Orleans I can get my hands on—comes from this transplanted blogger. Someone linked to it on facebook a year ago and I was simply blown away by it. Seriously, go read it right now. It won’t consume your entire day like those New Yorker blog entries will, but you will love it.

[edit]—Also, while I’m on the topic of non-native writers, go see The NOLA Project’s production of Taste at Le Petit. It’s by Illinois native Gabrielle Reisman and it’s simply brilliant. I’d be hard-pressed to think of a better original play about New Orleans (maybe Andrew Larimer’s Get This Lake Off Our House, which was also produced by The NOLA Project). And they cook food onstage! And you get to eat it! It doesn’t get more New Orleans than that! I saw it when they did at the Marigny Theatre a while back and I’m hoping I can fit in the time between rehearsals and Saints games to make it over to Le Petit to see it again.

To me, New Orleans is something like a religion, and once you convert, you’re one of us. To extend the analogy, I used to take a very dim view of apostate New Orleanians (read: people who moved away), but then I realized what a pain in the ass finding a job here can be. And I realized that most people don’t have parents they can leech off while being underemployed in the greatest place on Earth. So I’m a little less critical of those people now. But how can a native who moves away be more of a New Orleanian than a transplant who lives here? Impossible. So the next time you ask someone where he went to high school and he admits he’s not actually from here, tell him it’s okay, and thank him for sticking around. If you love New Orleans, you’re one of us, regardless of your birthplace.

* Jim Fitzmorris, one of New Orleans’s best known playwrights and directors, is well known for scathing condemnations on a variety of local topics.