Three years ago this weekend, Hurricane Katrina hit the Louisiana Gulf Coast. The timing of this tragedy coincided with the Southern Decadence, a festival which at its height drew in excess of 100,000 gays, and takes place during Labor Day weekend. Predictably, right-wing nutballs siezed the moment to connect the notorious debauchery of “Decadence” with the wrath of their displeased God. Three years later, we are again at the cusp of the Labor Day weekend, and yet another Category 3/4 hurricane bears down on the Louisiana coast. There is little doubt that if another storm hits New Orleans as it prepares to sin (as only the Crescent City can), winds that flip homes will also flip the pages of bibles clutched as weapons, and you will hear much prophecy from the fevered egos which seek to pin their insecurities on their favorite shared enemy: you.

Three years ago my parents, grandparents, sister, brother, and some extended family lost their homes in the hurricanes that hit the Louisiana coastline. My brother and grandmother both died last year from medical ailments exacerbated by those storms. Needless to say, I’m concerned about “Gustav,” whose direct path is currently plotted midway between New Orleans and my parents’ home. My only optimism lies in the fact that the most deadly storms to hit Louisiana have all been female (Camille, Audrey, Betsy, Katrina, and Rita). Gustav has been a tropical storm five times, all of which have died in the Atlantic. I’m counting on consistency.

I wrote about going back after the storms in one of my first and favorite posts on TNG, yet I still struggle to share my thoughts from that time when they initially hit. Displaced family, destroyed homes, non-stop fundraising from 1,000 miles away, and a troubled three year relationship unraveled from the stress of the ordeal are still raw memories beneath a three-year scab. These memories are imbued with considerable anger, considering the incompetence and corruption of a federal government that failed its people and continues to prove its inadequacy even now. As of today, my grandparents, who had 12 feet of water in their home, have yet to recieve one dime of assistance from the federal government. Since that time, my grandmother, a proud woman who lost the light in her eyes after the surprise flood surge of Rita, has passed on. Our local representative is still wading through beaurocracy on their behalf.

Of the emotion and anger that still sometimes rises in unguarded moments, the topic that upsets me most is the notion, asserted by fundamentalist Christians, that the hurricanes were sent by God as punishment for the wickedness of New Orleans. When I remember hearing my mother talk about how the water rushed into their home and between her legs and how she panicked becaused she can’t swim, when I remember my sister telling me about the hopelessness in my parents’ faces when they surveyed what remained of their lives knowing they had only a few hundred bucks in their checking account and a room in a church shelter to call their own, and when many of my family members lived cramped in small trailers for almost a year as they tried to rebuild their lives, I’m left with the only opinion that’s reasonable: fundamentalists and their God are fucking assholes.

If a God who destroys regions due to butt sex and legitimizes gay hatred exists beyond a fetid Christian imagination, I’d rather roll with the devil. Drugs, drink, sodomy, or rock N roll, at least Satan has a constructive outlet for his aggressions. Fucking with my asthmatic grandpa doesn’t count.

Yesterday I received mail from two people, one in DC (who I know) and one a TNG reader in NYC (who I don’t know). They both wanted my advice on New Orleans, about where they should go and what they should do so that they get the most out of this year’s Southern Decadence celebration, and so that they don’t limit their experience to that of tourists. I informed them well, but what I didn’t tell them is how charmed I am that they are going in spite of “God’s wrath” being aimed at them. Inspired, I considered a last minute flight to meet them down there, but unfortunately all the couches I would sleep on are owned by wise friends who plan to evacuate if it goes down.

Is going to decadence in this situation a stupid choice? Yeah, probably. But in doing so they approach the city in the manner it demands. Since the date of its founding, living on the edge of the world was never considered sane, but where else would you locate a city where time is still made for a play of the imagination over the facts of life? For everyone giving the hard finger to moderation and the protestant work ethic by attending Decadence this weekend, may you all realize that the location you inhabit is more than just a place to drink and be merry. I hope that in your own unique moment you sense what Tennessee Williams, one of the cities most famous residents, knew to be true:

“New Orleans and the moon have always seemed to me to have an understanding between them, an intimacy of sisters grown old together, no longer needing more than a speechless look to communicate their feelings to each other… this lunar atmosphere of the city draws me back whenever … a time of recession is called for… each time I have felt some rather profound psychic wound, a loss or a failure, I have returned to [New Orleans]. At such periods I would seem to belong there and no place else in the country.”

Or, Historian Lawrence N. Powell knows to be true:

“ It’s always been a special scene where you could… find some space… where you could expatriate without having to go to Paris. And if you’re marginal, if you know an exile from your own culture, this is a place where you can find some room to find … to define who you are.”

Or writer Rick Bragg:

“New Orleans offered homes to creative people and troubled people and people who didn’t fit where they were so they came here to try to find some kind of acceptance and some kind of more than acceptance … happiness, you know. You can find acceptance, but New Orleans gave you acceptance and happiness. It let you dance with people like you.”

In their words, I find the real reason for the fundamentalist God’s wrath. Like Tennessee and so many other gay people have known, New Orleans is that fragile place at the end of the world where those who don’t fear him go to find God, claim the best of him, reject the rest of him, and expose our ass to the worst of him. As, I sit here on my couch watching the weather channel, I hope that both this petty lord and his frightened children reconsider their judgments, and let be the freaks in the city and my family in the swamp.

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