Shootings, murders and carjackings are surging in New Orleans.
New Orleans Police Chief Superintendent Shaun Ferguson talked about the ‘mental stressors’ of everyday life during a pandemic being a factor.
Times are tough, and people can break.
But why is New Orleans cultural fabric fraying at the edge and tearing down the middle?
There are a lot of answers.
But some are ones many have never even considered.
“I think that our mental health is not doing very well, because so much of how we’ve supported each other over the years has been taken away,” says Rachel Breunlin, an anthropologist at University of New Orleans. “For quite a while, many of the things that the City did to take care of itself mentally have not been able to happen.”
Breunlin says New Orleans is a city that relies on its expressive culture as a way of connecting with one another. Since many of the cultural events, like Mardi Gras and music festivals have been curtailed, pent up feelings of detachment have built up and people have no place to turn.
“In a cultural economy that happens around the parades, we just haven’t been able to participate in those kinds of things. In the same way that Carnival is a major way people connect throughout the year. We weren’t able to do that this year either.”
Without means of cultural expressions of togetherness that everyone is so used to, some are feeling lost and could be less equipped to deal with the stresses of life during the pandemic.
“Many people have lost close relatives and we know that just the psychology of risk can cause incredible amounts of stress for all of us.”
But Breunlin goes deeper in her analysis of the situation faced by New Orleanians:
“With COVID, there’s another kind of devastation,” Breunlin explains. “Our natural inclination is to hug, or reach out to one another, or be close, is not able to happen.”