Conspiracy Theories
Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan among other public figures claimed the levees were dynamited to divert waters away from wealthy white areas. The conspiracy theory reached a United States House of Representatives committee investigating Katrina when a New Orleans community activist made the claim. According to the New Orleans Times Picayune this is an "urban myth". Reasons for belief in these theories have been ascribed to the decision by city officials during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 to set off 30 tons of dynamite on the levee at Caernarvon, Louisiana which eased pressure on levees at New Orleans but flooded St. Bernard Parish, the Ninth Ward taking the brunt of the city's flooding during Hurricane Betsy, the general disenfranchisement of blacks and lower-class people, and the similarity of sound of the levees collapsing to that of a bombing.
Read more about this topic: 2005 Levee Failures In Greater New Orleans
Famous quotes containing the words conspiracy and/or theories:
“People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.”
—Adam Smith (1723–1790)
“A work of art that contains theories is like an object on which the price tag has been left.”
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