A letter from a friend reads, "Watching the painful images of Los Angeles in flames caused me to think of your community, always living in the middle of a 'low intensity riot.'"
This image has stuck with me. We describe wars of "low intensity conflict" in places such as El Salvador, South Africa, and the Philippines. But what is happening all the time in South Central LA, inner-city Washington, D.C., and countless other urban caldrons of human suffering across America can, in truth, be termed a low intensity riot. Tonight, the children in the inner cities of the world's only remaining superpower will go to bed to the sound of gunfire.
As we have seen the last few weeks, it only takes a spark to escalate from low intensity to high intensity. When the explosion comes, the preferred term on the street is "rebellion."
The next time someone says violence doesn't work, tell them they're wrong. It doesn't solve any problems, but it surely gets attention. In America, violence is about the only thing that makes us see the poor or even remember that they exist. The Los Angeles rebellion broke the long, frightening silence in both the media and the highest levels of national political leadership about the disintegration of life and society that is now the norm of existence in vast inner-city territories.
Since the riots, the media have been full of compelling stories about the destructive consequences, particularly for the young, of living without education, jobs, health, home, security, respect, hope, and any promise for the future. Politicians who have had little or nothing to say about the cities and the poor now are blaming each other for the problems.
The truth is, something has gone terribly wrong in our country, and America has just accepted it. As a nation, we have condoned the injustice, tolerated the suffering, and ignored the consequences. The majority of Americans has simply looked the other way and made sure their security was assured. There is more than enough blame to go around; the question now is who will take responsibility.
A gaping and aching chasm horribly separates us from one another; enormous walls divide those who have from those who have not. A violent rage has risen from this canyon of our great divide, and we are in grave danger of being overcome by it. This violence is not only rooted in crushing poverty, but also in our painful separation from one another. It is a moral consequence of nothing remaining sacred and everything becoming a commodity; of life not being cherished, but consumed; of our deep-seated individualism and failure to make community.
Historically, violence has drawn public attention, but this attention has not resulted in the action necessary to change the conditions that cause the violence. In the last several decades, the 11 commissions that followed the 11 periods of "urban disorders" have documented the problem in great detail, but the sustained political will for change has not followed. We are now witnessing the unraveling of America. Short of a profound change in national direction, this unraveling will continue and become more brutal.
THE PROPHETIC VOCATION always has two dimensions--truth-telling and the holding up of an alternative vision. In the wake of the events in Los Angeles, it is imperative that the religious community take up that vocation immediately--before it is too late.
So let's start with some truth-telling. When a black man can be beaten 56 times in 81 seconds by four white police officers, and a jury can be convinced the officers were only protecting themselves, the deepest pathologies of America's racial past and present are implicated in the judicial decision.
There was no question that Rodney King was brutalized; the issue was whether it mattered. The verdict, in effect, told every black American that it did not. The subsequent outpouring of personal stories of mistreatment and discrimination against African Americans in all social classes demonstrates the absolute and persistent reality of racism on every level of American life.
It is time for white Americans to step forward and address what Dan Rather referred to during the rioting as "America's problem." Those who say they care must stop leaving the task of addressing racism to black people.
White people are long overdue to begin a prophetic interrogation of our personal attitudes, social structures, and cultural and religious institutions in order to reveal and remove the racism we have long accepted or ignored. There is no more important test of white integrity than to act to heal the scars that slavery and racism have left on this society. To benefit from oppression makes us responsible for changing it.
The volume of calls to Sojourners and other organizations after the LA events indicates that many white people may finally be ready to deal with racism. We must hope and pray that this is so. White guilt isn't enough; it passes too quickly. It is white responsibility for attacking the root causes of racism that is most needed now. Racism is a pervasive cancer that is killing us. A black and white partnership must be formed to diagnose the disease and perform the radical surgery that alone will save our society.
We must stop pumping the moral pollution of rampant consumerism into the heads and hearts of the young, only to be shocked when they behave as selfish materialists. By creating the desire for affluence, then blocking its satisfaction, we are fueling a combustible engine of frustration and anger. We can no longer exclude whole communities from the economic mainstream, relegate them to the peripheries, tell them in a thousand ways that their labor and their lives are not needed, abandon their social context to disintegration and anarchy, and then be surprised when those communities explode.
When there are no ethics at the top of a society, it is unlikely that there will be many in the middle or the bottom either. It's not that urban children haven't gotten our values--it's that they have. The carnage of our inner cities is the underside of a consumer society that uses violence both as entertainment and as the preferred solution to conflicts with other nations.
Looting is a crude shopping spree reflecting a system that pillages and pollutes the rest of the world. When the kids on the street in LA said that "everyone was doing it," they didn't just mean other looters. The Savings and Loans rip-off bankers are looters too, as are the military contractors who always run over budget, and the Wall Street inside traders, merge-makers, and take-over pirates. It is time to take a strong stand against the criminal behavior of looting, all the way from the top to the bottom.
When presidents use racial fears and stereotypes to get elected, white jurors feel justified in using them too. And when the nation's top political leader demonstrates the emotional resolve to "do whatever is necessary to restore order" but not the passion to establish racial and economic justice, a clear message is sent. In the wake of Los Angeles, a hunger for justice must become a moral criteria for political leadership.
The problem nobody dares to talk about is the fact that no one even intends to include the children of our inner cities in the economic mainstream. They are not being educated, nurtured, matured, or disciplined in their hearts, minds, and bodies, because they are not in the plans of those charting the future. This is the heart of racism in the 1990s.
There are no jobs for the children of the inner city. The last manufacturing jobs in South Central LA departed in the early 1980s for Mexico, where cheap labor abounds at 59 cents an hour. The area lost 70,000 such jobs in the last three decades, and the same has happened across the country. In most neighborhoods like my own, the only "free market" left is the drug traffic.
It simply won't work to go on living as we do, consuming as we please, profiting as much as we can, and running the economy as we do, while using the money that is left over to "help the poor." There won't be enough left over, and the poor will lose the political debate. It is we who must change, and our patterns and institutions that must be transformed. There is much work to do and there are jobs to be found in creating the things we all need--education, health, energy efficiency, a safe and restored environment, healthy food, good roads, strong bridges, better transportation, affordable housing, stable families, and vital communities.
Such things can only be achieved by a combination of solid moral values and sound social policy. This requires a number of fundamental shifts in perspective--from unlimited growth to a sustainable society; from endless consumer goods to the re-prioritizing of social goods; from the habit of self-protection to an ethic of community; from viewing life as an acquisitive venture to restoring the sacred value of our relationships with our neighbor and our environment. These shifts will not be easy, nor will they come without cost. The only thing more costly is not to change.
The children of the inner cities may be uneducated but they aren't stupid. They know they've been left behind. They know there's no room for them. They feel little investment or stake in the future. And they are enraged.
The painful violence of the rejected and exploited always exposes a twisted mirror image of the dominant society. It's quite uncomfortable to see ourselves and the values of our culture reflected in marginalized people's frustrated rage. But if we refuse to hold the mirror up to ourselves now, it's just going to get worse.
During a night of violence in Los Angeles, a police officer and a young black man stood next to each other, watching a building burn to the ground. The officer asked, "How do you feel to see this place in flames?" The young man's answer flashed his rage. "You know what, man? The heat and steam comin' from this building ain't no worse than the heat and steam comin' from my heart....That's just how I'm burning inside. You don't have to believe it, you don't have to listen to me, you don't have to understand." I think we had better.
An angry African-American street organizer in another city said to me recently, "There's no hope from any of the politicians. The conservatives don't care, the liberals are bankrupt, and the secular Left is nowhere. The only hope we have is from an awakening of prophetic conscience in the churches, because the issues now are flat-out spiritual."
By proclaiming the vision that God had in mind, the prophets broke the oppressive yoke that bound the people in hopelessness and despair. If the national leadership to confront the roots of racism, materialism, and economic injustice is not forthcoming, then a new leadership "from underneath" must begin to assert itself. This special issue of Sojourners explores what that vision might be, asking in the aftermath of Los Angeles, "Where can we go from here?"
Jim Wallis is editor-in-chief of Sojourners.
Sidebars:
Renee Dyson
"Our people are tired of being beaten down; we've lived with so many injustices for so long, we bring a lot of unresolved pain to each new conflict. So many kids interpreted this verdict to mean that since the law says they can be disrespected and abused by the police, they might as well give the cops a good reason. If they aren't hassled it's cool, but if they get jacked, they're going to try to take the man down with them.
"The young people have had so much rage throughout all of this, and no place except the streets to let off steam, because the city was shut down. They feel that they're not really tearing up their own stuff, that it belongs to the adults, the establishment. The adult community responded to the rioting, but the youth were not really touched. For example, yesterday [a week after the uprising ended] some of our young organizers held a private summit with gang members to try and listen. But the adults got wind of it and came, and they got in the way of real talking.
"I have two sons, 8 and 12, and my 12-year-old is going to join the NAACP now; we can't wait until he's 18. I am trying to teach him that if you want change, it must come from within--within yourself and within your community.
"During the rioting all the gun stores were hit; what do we expect? Ours is a war country?we make bombs, not radios. We don't have to go overseas to fight, it's here. The National Guard know our communities are heavily armed now; and yet the NRA [National Rifle Association] wants to lift all remaining gun control."
Renee Dyson was an African-American community organizer with Day One, Northwest Pasadena when this article appeared.
Susan Alva
"The LAPD, with whom we have struggled so hard to establish a policy of non-collaboration with INS [Immigration and Naturalization Service], suddenly was stopping people on the streets--day laborers, street vendors--apprehending them without criminal charges, and turning them over to the Migra. They are even taking INS agents on ride-alongs!...We've also heard reports of Migra and LAPD breaking into people's homes in East LA, going door to door and demanding people show receipts for expensive items in their homes, accusing them of looting."
Susan Alva worked with the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, Los Angeles when this article appeared.
Jin Lee
"I lost my store, and I have a lot of anger and frustration, but like [Rodney] King said, we must work it out. This is an economic problem, not a racial one.
"I can't just rebuild my store without building new relationships with my black customers. The only employee I have besides my family is black, and yes, Korean stores should hire more neighborhood people, but let's face it, we are small-business people. We can't solve the problems of unemployment in South Central; attention needs to be focused upon the big corporations who are pulling jobs out of the community, not Korean grocers. As for me, I am going to stop giving my donations to the police and fire departments, and start giving to community groups."
Jin Lee was a Compton grocer whose store was burned out in the riots when this article appeared.
Joe Hicks
"Rodney King asked the fundamental question, which all of us need to look inward to answer: 'Can we all get along?' It is ironic that after hundreds of years of oppression in this country, African Americans are focusing upon Koreans. We need to keep our eyes on the prize. Our struggle is for a common agenda: jobs, peace, justice.
"We all know there is tension between the black and Korean communities in Los Angeles. But the uprising profoundly impacted both of our communities. As members of the Black Korean Alliance we have been pursuing dialogue since 1986. We are at a very critical point, and our call for cooperation today is definitely cutting against the grain of what a lot of people in our respective communities are saying. But we are fighting with each other over crumbs, while the power structure of the city remains the same. Economic revitalization can and should bring blacks and Koreans together in a new bonding."
Joe Hicks was the executive director, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Southern California chapter.
Michael Emery
"Our 'war-torn neighbors to the South' weren't terribly surprised when they saw the LA violence on television. They understand that our history of aggressive and exploitive actions in the Third World mirrors our long neglect and even persecution of this nation's poor."
Michael Emery was professor of journalism, Cal State Northridge when this article appeared.
Bobby Newman
"We have a very good coalition [in Compton], but like elsewhere in South LA, the Latinos are under-represented, and that's a problem. Compton is 60 percent Latino, but mostly new immigrants, so they are not as organized politically....
"The business climate is difficult here in South LA; our people depend on small stores because the big malls won't build down here [ratio of residents to stores is twice that of the rest of LA County]. It has been difficult to see Koreans get better established in small businesses because of access to capital; African Americans just cannot get loans....
"I began serving my church two years before the Watts uprising. If I had a message for the white churches, it would be this: Stop looking at us in the inner city as a mission field. It blinds you to our humanity and our contribution, just as the jury was blind to [Rodney] King's humanity. Don't give us money, come get to know us.
"You know you always hear from white folk about how concerned they are, so I experimented with a partnership with a Southern Baptist church in an affluent beach town in south Orange County. I knew the pastor well, so we began with pulpit exchanges. I remember preaching about unity from John 17, and about being fools for Christ. Then we moved on to shared services, weddings, etc. The next step was to establish a youth exchange, where kids would spend the whole weekend with some of our church families. The first year we sent 80 kids down to there, and it was a great success. But the next year, when it was their turn to send kids to Compton, only seven kids came up. The pastor took a lot of heat when I challenged them on this; I guess I kind of helped get him fired."
Bobby Newman was pastor of Citizens of Zion Baptist Church and president of the California State Baptist Convention when this article appeared.
Edward James Olmos
"Why should we expect our children to act differently? They have learned well from the culture of greed, from the S & L scandal and the commercials. They have learned well from the violence on TV and in government. Why are we surprised?"
Edward James Olmos was an actor when this article appeared.
Bobbie Betts
"I was here in 1965, and this was different. The black middle class was alienated from this rebellion. But it was and will be significant that the Bloods and Crips came together, were able for the first time to identify a common enemy. It wasn't just Korean merchants that were hit; any commercial establishments perceived as not putting anything back into the neighborhood were targeted. Forget what the media say; you can see the pattern for yourself if you know the area."
Bobbie Betts was a community organizer in Los Angeles when this article appeared.
Bong Hwan Kim
"The riots were not about the relationship between black and Korean communities, but about the failure of American institutions to account for disenfranchised communities. We must not blame each other....
"Solutions to our common problems can only be arrived at together. We must build something new, not rebuild the old, and these efforts must incorporate both communities. They must focus not just upon infrastructure but human resources; we must not let the outside agendas of corporate America determine our communities."
Bong Hwan Kim was a part of the Korean Youth Center and co-chair of the Black Korean Alliance, Los Angeles, when this article appeared.
Sweet Alice Harris
"What happened was just that the cup of oppression filled up and finally overflowed; and the same cup's filling up again, and it's about ready to overflow again."
Sweet Alice Harris was a community leader in South Central Los Angeles when this article appeared; this statement is from a 25th anniversary commemoration of Watts rioting in August 1990.
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