Blog Post #6

Blog Post #6

Layla Suleiman

In Adam Burke’s “Sucked into the Tunnels beneath Las Vegas,” Matthew O’Brian shows us through visual and olfactory imagery what is really beneath the city of Las Vegas. While some people view this as the place to go and gamble, or the city of luxury, people don’t seem to see what is beneath this city, literally. In this podcast, there is something that truly stood out to me. Within a city like Las Vegas, known as the city that “trades on excess,” O’Brian brings us to an interesting place. ("Sucked Into The Tunnel Beneath Las Vegas.")

When we look around the world to places that are deficient in many of the recourses needed for survival, such as third world countries, it is not a surprise to hear that a person is homeless, and lives day by day, unsure where they’ll sleep next. The thing that is so disturbing in this podcast, in the city of Las Vegas, people are living in underground tunnels.

I believe this says a lot about the state of Americans and the blindness of poverty in America. When people live in a city like Las Vegas, where millionaires live, and people literally play with their money, their should be no reason any human being should be dehumanized and have to live where their own waste does.

While this does reflect on American’s underestimation of poverty in its country, it does not mean that people don’t know about it at all. O’Brian himself brought up a point about Visitors not coming to Las Vegas to see the under going tunnels, but what if they did see it? What if someone took a step and showed people the state in which human beings are.

People use the excuses of how people that do live in these certain conditions would only use the money for drugs, but does that mean it is necessary to provide money? What if it was a simple as providing things necessary for life? Steve, who is addicted to drugs in the podcast, is an example of why people say this. However, when people are in these types of living conditions they want to change, as he states in the podcast he is trying not to do it anymore.

This podcast really sparks a flame for things that should be looked at deeper in this country. If people cared more, and honestly thought that there is a problem when people live in these conditions, I believe that one day there could be programs in which avoid ever having people live anywhere that is as dehumanizing as an underground tunnel. All it takes is effort, with effort, anything can happen.

Work Cited:

Burke, Adam. "Sucked Into The Tunnels Beneath Las Vegas." Third Coast International Audio Festival. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2013.