Well you know how they are …

Take a ride along Bayou Terrebonne, Bayou Petit Caillou or Bayou Lafourche, where the tall booms of double-rigged shrimp boats reach skyward as if in prayer.

They are a key feature of the bayou’s skylines and are among the fixtures that visually identify the unique nature of this wondrous bayou country, where men and women forged lives under conditions meant to accommodate alligators, mosquitoes and birds, under lashes from storms and the slow torture from rising waters and mud.

To the people who man them, the boats are not quite so romantic. But they recognize the importance of the boats to the community at large and their own contribution to local well-being.

There is a 1953 Jimmy Stewart movie called “Thunder Bay,” which tells the tale of an oilman coming to town and the conflicts that develop between him and the fishermen.

The film was shot in Morgan City.

It started with the blasting of dynamite in the Gulf, the tension, with the shrimpers fearing Stewart would kill off the crop.

Stewart’s wildcatter character pleads the case to locals of how finding oil is a necessity and how they all need to get along to help each other, the shrimpers and the oil guys.

I don’t believe in spoilers, even when describing movies older than I, so I won’t say much more about that here. You’ll have to see for yourself. The whole flick can be viewed on YouTube and it’s worth the investment of time.

History always repeats itself. Unfortunately, when it does, we don’t always have the prescience to recognize events as such. We go on blithely re-inventing the wheel because we never checked to see if such a thing existed.

For the first time in recent memory the majesty of the boats has come into conflict with a blasting operation, in an area called Four League Bay, and the way things were handled set back relations between shrimpers and the oil guys almost as far as the time depicted in “Thunder Bay.”

The bottom line to this whole story, which was told in detail on these pages last week, is that oil and petroleum exploration can exist, if everyone respects everyone else.

But for that to happen, certain basics must be in place.

Fishermen might not have reacted so harshly to a blasting operation commencing concurrent the opening of their white shrimp season had there been communication, some sort of warning, an opportunity to express their concerns.

But the notice of a hearing was pathetically deficient and shrimpers were not involved.

Some complained that oilmen were gruff at the sight, telling them how damage to the sounding equipment done by boats or nets would result in claims against fishermen for thousands of dollars.

An official with the exploration company observed that his workers were likely trying to make the point that his equipment is expensive, to deter fishermen from making claims. You know how they are, the official said. They’ll claim damage to make a few bucks.

The shrimpers, meanwhile, have already sized up the oil people and the state government, which has permitted all of this.

You know how they are, any conversation with the shrimpers also begins.

So the bottom line is that nobody dialogues, because, when it comes to the guys on the other side, well, you know how they are.

It is this type of lumping people into categories that results in misunderstandings, ill feelings and, in some places, violence or threats of violence, all because of the profiling and the prejudice. Like in St. Louis with the cops, you know how they are, and their problems with the minority people protesting a killing, and you know how they are.

And so it goes.

Oil companies have public relations people to offset the “YKHTA” relating to them. The shrimpers, not so much.

So let somebody say for the record here that the majority of shrimp fishermen are honest and just want to make a living, and want to be treated with respect.

They have as much right to real and effective notice of events that could have a profound effect on their lives and each time something like this happens their own prejudging of the world in which they live, no matter how incorrect it may be, is bolstered rather than melted away.

Fishermen, who are out on the water to make a living, deserve as much respect as oilmen, who are out there to make a living too, and duck hunters, who are in the marshes for fun but nonetheless have the right to a pleasant, unencumbered experience.

And how do I know all of this? Because I know how they are.