Sunday, April 1, 2012

1992 L.A. Riots

There's a series of posts over at BonnieGadsden that I encourage you to read.
For those of us who were out here in "LA-LA Land" during the riots, it's a chilling reminder of just how fast society can break down.
I was living in Redondo Beach at the time, right on the beach (Catalina Ave.) with two of my buddies. We were far enough off the freeways that we felt fairly safe, but the sight of all the smoke rising in the distance, and the constant reporting on the TV still gave us pause to wonder just how bad it would really get.
It took Governor Wilson three days to request assistance from the National Guard, and it wasn't until the fourth day that the Humvees started rolling into the city, and a semblance of order was restored.
I have a lot of Korean friends that I've made since then, and they still talk about it. Since the police (at least the LAPD was) were holed up in their stations, you were on your own, and the Korean shop keepers took defense of their property and families into their own hands.

5 comments:

  1. We were there for the Greater Los Angeles County Inter-ethnic May Festival of 1992, and yes indeed it was totally surreal to see columns of smoke arising in every direction and knowing that they were the result of societal collapse. Some upper level talking head from LAPD went on the boob tube to assure the Drooling Masses that they didn't need guns for protection because the Ordnungspolizei could protect them. I thought "Then all of this riot, arson, and affray are occurring because it's OK with you?"
    _Revjen45

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  2. And even after all that, there are people who claim all we need for self defense are the police. "Protect and Defend" my a$$.

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  3. I lived in Alameda, adjacent to Oakland, when they had a small riot there because their sports team WON! It's a small example, but again the police were impotent.

    Look at how London burned and the bobbies retired from the field.
    It was baseball bats versus the Molotov cocktail and arson wins!

    Now imagine a real crisis, like an all out war in the Middle East with no oil being shipped out, widespread terrorism in response, and the grocery store shelves are soon empty. Not implausible.

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  4. Thanks for the link to BonnieGadsden! When the #OWS crowd was busy practicing their riot-technique and direct-action in Oakland I was wondering how they'd fare down here and who among the fellow-travelers they'd use to create a scenario locally. Reading Scott Reitz's book, "The Art of Modern Gunfighting" there are some extended sections on the LA riots where he participated as a Cop...

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  5. I was *finally* able to find the entire list of posts from Texas Arcane, who it turns out is quite a character.

    Here's a link to his blog:
    http://vault-co.blogspot.com/

    Earlier today I found a link to his bomb shelter construction project Down Under, and it was quite impressive.

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