The main street you are directed to is Bourbon Street. For those of you familiar with Magaluf, you'll remember the main drag where the floor is soaked in vomit, there are people lying about comatose, and the bars play a non-stop mix of cheese and techno. If you're familiar with this then cross New Orleans off your list.
From the above you may be able to gather that New Orleans was a big disappointment to me, and you'd be right.
So, back to the subject of this weeks blog and here's a tenuous link for you. It's been a while since we've had one, but I shall explain what the home of Mardi Gras, Tattoos, and Inequality have in common, just bear with me.
Roughly a year ago I was lucky enough to get a ticket for "V Festival" down in Chelmsford in the county of Essex. The weekend was very good, the bands were awesome, the women were orange, and the men were cutting around in what looked like their girlfriends vests to show off their tattoos.
I couldn't help but notice how many tattoos there were, it was as if Asda were offering a buy one get several free offer, in addition to this some off them were, and there is no polite way of saying this, shit!
But it did leave me wondering why so many people have tattoos now?
And I think I may have finally stumbled upon the answer.
Back to my New Orleans visit, and one of the things I wanted to see was the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina. I took a small tour bus which promised a visit to some of the areas still deserted since the hurricane struck way back in 2005.
The tour bus skirted around some of the areas that were flooded when Katrina struck but we didn't get to the real epicentre of the disaster, because in the words of our tour guide, it was just too dangerous. These areas which lie on the outskirts of the city are predominantly black neighbourhoods, and regarded as no go areas even for the police.
Several US cities I've visited have this same problem, the centres are always very well developed, safe, clean, and inviting, but travel a few miles out of the city and it's a whole different story. Away from the polished concrete and shining glass structures, the out lying towns are drug fuelled, gang violence dominated, enter at your own risk areas.
It's this model that illustrates the difference in income inequality, the gulf between the haves and the have nots, societies neglected and forgotten.
But why is this the case in a country as strong, developed, and powerful as the United States of America?
This is the part of the story where I bring tattoos back into the mix.
A book I read recently spoke of a study of tattoos, and their growth in popularity over the past few decades. In a social context a tattoo can convey to the world that you're a person that lives for the moment. The tattoo itself may well symbolise something quite different, but the very fact that you had it done in the first place was to illustrate your care free, live for the moment attitude.
So what's wrong with that?
Well nothing in the short term, but with a view to the future, maybe quite a lot.
Todays society is one of mass communication, mass consumption, and a collective amnesia. We express a preference for current consumption over future consumption. We are obsessed with short term gratification, we want what we want, and we want it yesterday. We have shortened attention spans, which lessens our tolerance for what moves slower.
All of the above attributes prevent us from seeing the bigger picture, they hinder our ability to plan for tomorrow, and probably worst of all they are unsustainable.
If we are all of a sudden obsessed with the here and now, how did we get this way, and is it our fault?
Our obsession with the quick fix gravitates from government, the media, and the loathsome one they call Ke$ha.
Take the recent bank bailouts, we were told that these were very necessary whatever the long term cost, because in the short term the risk of collapse was too catastrophic to consider. The message this conveys is that connections and guile, over hard work and talent, lead to success and wealth creation.
The quoted G.D.P figures and quarterly profit forecasts that we constantly hear of on the news, which few of us actually understand, are considered worthless by leading Austrian economics schools as a measurement of economic progress.
Ke$ha our beloved future nobel laureate nominee, tells us in the lyrics of her songs that, "we're going to die young" and that, "we don't give a f*** cause that's just who we are".
Programmes like X Factor and Made in Chelsea, show us that hard work is boring and completely unnecessary. Instead, celebrity and fame are what's important, the shiny happy people on TV are what you should aspire to. Just look they don't have a care in the world.
If the government, the media, and Ke$ha keep telling us to shorten our horizons, then slowly but surely this must filter through to everyday individuals.
Now to put it all together.
The inequality I witnessed in New Orleans, and tattoos exemplifying the live for the moment mentality.
As a society we have no patience to tackle the real route of the problem. Inequality can't be stamped out by half hearted short sighted measures. The governments answer is to cut benefits without an alternative, as a public we think this is an excellent cost cutting solution, but how can you take away without providing an alternative?
It takes time to educate people, it takes time to re-train, it takes time to create opportunities, and I'm afraid we have no tolerance for the slow. The attitudes that we have inherited from the very people we chose to lead us are killing our society, and only exacerbating the wealth inequality we see today.
I leave you now, once more safe in the hands of our fabled lyricist, Ke$ha.
"I'm fresher than that Gucci. Them boys, they want my coochie. I say no, I'm no hoochie".
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