Photo by Tony Pierce. Used with Permission.
By Tabitha Violencia
As I sleep, I can hear people yelling in violent protest mere blocks from where I am.
Stones and bottles hit the building. The locals know there are children here so near the violence. The violence is somewhere here, but who knows where, who’s fighting whom at this point.
I’m definitely aware of my vulnerability.
We are located about four blocks from the “action,” so we get all the riff-raff glomming on. There is definitely an outside element glomming on to a just and righteous anger. Drug deals are going down. The local dragsters taking advantage of the last days of empty streets to rev it up, crash, and antagonise the police.
I will say, the police arrived in strong force, some 20-50 thick- BEFORE THE PROTESTS EVEN BEGAN LAST NIGHT. At least according to what I could hear. It’s all to bizzarre. And then there’s COVID (which many will attribute to the outrage we’re witnessing nation wide).
I swear to God, I fully think this is only the beginning, but what do I know? Me–some homeless chick holed up in a cement shelter in downtown LA. I can say, without doubt, protestors/ drunks/angry clingers-on/ the righteous few, and maybe some with intentions of sabotage–something impossible to see from inside, but from just a few blocks away, seems like a lovely way to “clean up the streets” of sick and dying people, eh? Forgive my vitriol. I’m watching this from the wrong place.
Every “protestor” walking by tries the shelter’s glass doors out front. Their anger is so twisted by misinformation, disinformation, propaganda and simple tools for the weak minded. I don’t doubt the police have stronger weapons. I know they don’t care that we protest: we only burn our own asses.
