> At 13:12 2005-09-07 -0400, Robert A. Book wrote: > > >> After the tsunami disaster in Asia there was no plundering and looting on > >> this scale, although the destruction was maybe 100 times that of Katarinas > >> in terms of lives lost. Why is that, do you think? > >> > >> Regards, > >> Mats > > >Perhaps there was nothing left to steal! > > Countries like Thailand are not as poor as some Westerners seem to think. > In Thailand the disaster struck in areas with a lot of luxiorious hotels, > yet there was no widespread stealing and looting.
Thailand is not all that poor generally, but specifically in the tsunami areas right after the tsunami, what as left that was easily stealable, worth the trouble, *AND* *UNATTENDED*? Since the tsunami was not forseen, there was no evacuation, so there was much less unattended property. The key thing about New Orleans was that 80% of the population was gone, so much of the property was unattended. I think this is the main factor. Nevertheless, there were reports of looting in Sri Lanka -- where some displaced victims were brought to shelters away from their property. > >Seriously though, there were reports of widespread rape in Sri Lanka, > >of orphaned children being kidnapped and sold to sex traffickers, and > >of plundering and looting as well. > > Sadly, sex trafficking with children is going on all the time, Tsunami or > not. Yes, and sadly shoplifting and robbery is going on all the time, hurricane or not. But the hurricane provided expanded opportunities for it. Likewise, the tsunami provide expanded opportunities for kidnapping children, and some people took advantage of it. In addition, the stores were all closed (much longer than anyone expected), which meant buying food was not even an option, so even honest people who were perfectly willing to pay for food had to take it without paying, since ther was no one there to take their money. A scrupulously honest person would try to keep track and pay the store later, but "later" hasn't happened yet, so what they did still technically counts as looting. --Robert Book [EMAIL PROTECTED]
