DoingHomework
Recycles dryer sheets
- Joined
- May 28, 2010
- Messages
- 254
Much of the tourism in MS has been decimated not by BP, but by the national media. Our beaches are as clean as they have ever been. Our casinos are still open. Our tourism is not really based on the Gulf. We don't have a lot of good beaches. Yet people think we are closed, because the national media paints the entire coast region as covered in oil. Our beaches are very shallow. You have to walk out several hundred yards before the water is above your knees and the water is dirty, from all of the rivers, including the Mississippi river, dumping their sediment. Our shimpers are still shrimping. Even Obama looked at the beaches and said they were safe and tried our seafood and said it was safe, although I'm still puzzled about those.
That's like shooting someone and saying much of the death came from the bleeding rather than the bullet impact.
I know several people with vacation rentals along the coast, mostly in Florida. Visitors are canceling not because they are directly worried about oil. But they have alternatives (Atlantic coast, Carolinas, etc.) so why risk it? Many of these owners are now going to have trouble paying their mortgages within a few months. As far as I know none of these owners has gotten a dime from BP yet because BP is demanding nonexistent proof - you can't produce 5 years of tax records for a 2 year old condo.
I've obviously been critical of BP, and I don't doubt what you are saying. But if you are a tourist you have choices. It is entirely reasonable to avoid an area that MIGHT have problems just so you don't have to deal with it on vacation. The bottom line is, were it not for BP there would be no media frenzy. That makes losses resulting from the media frenzy part of the effects of the spill.