On Thursday night I was up late and was just about to go to bed when CNN started to show live images from an earthquake in Japan and I could not believe my eyes. Watching the destruction live on my TV was heart wrenching and I had a feeling of helplessness as I watched that tsunami crush and mangle peoples lives before my eyes. All I could think about were the families torn apart and was there anything I could do to help?
On Friday we were told via various news reports that this horrific crisis in Japan has a confirmed 1000 deaths and no, all seems to be alright out at the nuclear plant...Just a bit of a leak, but they are handling it. I thought to myself, a 1000 dead and no nuclear fall out, can that really be true? There is no way I thought. I mean did you see the destruction? How could there not be thousands more dead?
Then I felt really bad for thinking that because, although I am not hoping for high casualty numbers or some sort of nuclear fall out, I just don't think the news coming out of Japan is accurate and I immediately wondered if they are keeping the truth from us to mitigate the financial fall out. Probably.
Clearly, the TSX and Nikkei think the worst given their plunge this morning and this concerns me greatly. I know it will take months for Japanese authorities to confirm number of deaths, sheesh, it will probably take that long just to gain access to some of those washed out communities but given the level of destruction is there any one out there who thinks it will be less than 30,000 casualties claimed? Now with rolling black outs and supply channels cut off, how will the Japanese cope? It is hard to sit here and watch as this unfolds knowing there is nothing I can do to help (except give to the red cross and hope my donation actually makes it to someone in need). It's also hard to understand news reports that say there is no nuclear fall out when we've witnessed explosions at reactors, do they think we are morons? And already the insurance companies are calculating "losses" . This also pisses me off because calling these 'record" losses for the insurer seems redundant to me. They are INSURANCE companies!
I read The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein and now I can see, even in these first brutal days after this tragedy, the vultures are descending. One of the first reports I heard after the news was a report about Canadian lumber and how timber companies shares spiked after the Japan quake. I acknowledge that this is reality. Finance and economy come first, got it, but that still doesn't make it any easier to stomach.
I hope the people of Japan are not taken advantage of while they are struggling to comprehend this tragedy but what do I do with the knowledge that there will be plenty of advantage taken?
I supposed it bothers me that in our world the people who look at this situation, who rub their hands together gleefully and think ooohhh...how can we make a buck, will not be held accountable or even be criticized. Post-Earthquake Reconstruction will be big business and that seems to already be the focus.
Song Du Jour: When I Look at The World by U2
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