On Los Angeles...

It’s easy for me to pretend like nothing is happening in Los Angeles. I’ve not been downtown or around where the pop-up protests materialized late last week when ICE Agents started rounding up random immigrant-looking people in Home Depot parking lots and arresting them without cause. These peaceful protests have continued well into this week, countered by President Donald Trump escalating the tension by federalizing thousands of National Guard troops to “protect” the streets. The President has since deployed marines as well, hoping to quell violence that doesn’t exist and occupy a city with a population of 3.8m people. With like 4,000 National Guard troops and some number of Marines. Not like such pithy numbers matter in the face of the aforementioned number of people living in this city.

First of all, fuck this guy. Trump sucks. He’s a senile, reckless, small individual who ran to stay out of jail and prove he wasn’t a loser. The American populace decided to take a second gamble on the guy because inflation sucks and our country keeps getting richer while the vast majority of the citizenry see minimal tangible gains.

I’m not here to indict the American people for their decision. I hope everyone who voted for the man got exactly what they wanted. I hope they’re happy with the direction this country has gone in the last six months and they look forward to the next 42. I hope it’s made all their dreams come true— or, at least, that they happily see us on the path to whatever idyllic utopia they thought they’d get from a convicted felon with a history of criminal activity and who is openly for sale to the highest bidder.

What I am here to say is that this goes beyond the politics of who voted who whom or what. This is about my city. I was born in Los Angeles. My family might have moved to San Diego when I was 10, but for as long as I can remember, it was always the place I wanted to return to. When I graduated college, I took the opportunity to come back here and it’s been home for me ever since.

It’s difficult to understand a place until you live there. Part of the reason things are so completely fucked in this country right now is a general lack of empathy and understanding on both sides. It’s easy for me to think about Middle America and look down on those who live there for the slower lives they’ve chosen to live, just like it’s easy for those in smaller or rural communities to look at my big urban life and not understand a thing about what it’s like, thinking it’s some moral abomination that proves some great Evil is upon us all.

In the world of this current discourse, I’m very aware of the caricature of the life I’ve chosen to live and the culture of my home. Turn on most [right wing] news channels and you’ll see grown ass men scared of driving down the city streets of a populace who just want to live their lives in peace. The President has made the determination that cities like mine have been “invaded”. He wants to “liberate” us and stop the systematic burning of all the houses that are perpetually on fire from Escape From New York on steroids levels of violence and carnage. It’s like I live in the city from The Purge, as opposed to the one where I ran three miles today. I ran through shady neighborhood streets while having headphones in my ears. The outdoor mall I run through (The Americana, for those asking) had a line outside the Cheesecake Factory five minutes before the place opened for lunch, and the fountain in the center of the plaza was not spewing any of the blood you’d imagine from the bodies dumped in there overnight. Sure, the sun might not have risen in Los Angeles County in several years, but I’ve gotten used to the perpetual night.

These portraits come from a wing of the populace who like things the way they are, who think that any progress we make (if any at all) should come slow and methodically. I empathize. In smaller towns, the ones far from urban metropolitan centers, it’s easy to see changes of the world as too fast and against [insert whatever value system you like here]. Not being here, it’s easy to watch a film like Pulp Fiction (which I put on a few hours ago and have been watching as I write this) and think mine is a city where gangsters drive around having nothing conversations amidst indiscriminate acts of violence, murder, and mayhem.

Stories, though, are not real life. Film, television, books, art… all narratives are flights of fancy that pull real life and weave it into something compelling and digestible. Having a President who’s an utter lunatic (like John Logan of 24) is all fun and games until there’s an actual pea-brained psychopath sitting in the Oval Office. Trump did deploy American troops to an American city to suppress real Americans. Never mind that there are laws existing that explicitly prohibit such an act1. The military is not a police force. It’s to protect us from enemies abroad, not to oppress its citizenry like they’re some enemy within.

I didn’t start this substack to get political. You can go elsewhere for political analysis and updates on the day-to-day of how whoever should be making the world a better place. The reason I’m here is to talk about stories and narratives and to respond to whatever I’m ingesting. The strongest power in all narratives is in building bridges of empathy and understanding. It’s why we need diverse people telling varied stories. Lifting up disparate voices opens us to new ideas and ways of thinking and conceptions of reality.

This empathy is powerful. Such connection is the only way to get through times such as these. I totally understand everyone who moves away from this city for literally any reason. Like other cities, Los Angeles is hardly for everyone. But the people who live here are incredible people with an endless reserve of stories and ideas and compassion. Like everywhere else, there is so much life here. Joy. Hardship, sure. And yeah, we have a serious homeless problem. But there are things like the street meat carts that hang around outside of sporting events and self-driving Waymo cars that freak like everyone out. There’s traffic jams and poor neighborhoods and rich neighborhoods. There’s some good Dodger fans and a lot of shitty asshole Dodger fans. There’s a thriving burger scene and also the survivors of a hot chicken war that started like a decade ago and also traffic jams2. We’ve got a terrible smog problem and horrible water drainage because it never rains here but god dammit is it beautiful after it rains. It’s a city you can live in for years and barely scratch the surface. There are entire major thoroughfares and freeways you’ll not cross for years, invisible and imaginary borders you’ll never breach and never notice because there’s so much to do anywhere you are.

It’s a city whose anthem (by Randy Newman) is a super shitty, tone deaf song that fully embraces the sort of reckless love that everyone else thinks we’re assholes for3. For all that I hate that song, I get it every time I hear it.

Los Angeles is one of the great cities of the world. It’s easy to pick on (I could have done that last paragraph for another thousand words and still not touched all the things that would come to mind), but it’s also a remarkable city that deserves so much more than its role as the punching bag the right wants it to be. It’s diverse and varied and communal and that’s why the President wants to make an example of us. But this patriotism that I feel, the city pride I have for living here is the sort of thing that others have echoed all over my social feeds for the last week. It’s been impossibly unifying.

Anything this big and this grand is not something that’s going to go quietly. This country has invested its citizenry with a profound sense of freedom and protest and dissent. I assume that’s true everywhere but I know it’s true here. All of this will pass and (if the people of L.A. have anything to say about it) it will pass bloodlessly. This reality where a group of would-be authoritarian jabronies run roughshod over everything we’re supposed to be isn’t one most of America wants4. If there’s a hope here, it’s that Los Angeles is going to help show the country that all of this made up farce is the bullshit act of a tiny, delusional carlatan who is dangerous because of how much of a joke he is. A joke to whom we’ve given far, far too much power.

I love L.A. You might not, but know that we’re not the enemy here. This is America. The majority of us are on the same side and there’s far more we have in common than what divides us. Let’s listen to each other more and then go about living our small, miraculous lives.

And also: fuck Donald Trump.