Reply #98: The movements and riots in the 60's were not blue-grey affairs either

[haele]

I was born in the late '50s, spent most of the '60s and 70's as part of a university going family (mom and dad were both students at UCLA, later UC Berkley and then University of Washington)and even though I was very young, I remember things that were happening just down the street, or at Campus, or halfway across the city...

I remember Watts, the black smoke in the distance, constant noise on the street, the edginess - even living in the San Fernando Valley at the time. When we were living in Student Housing at Berkley and UW, I remember the student gatherings with the shouting and the rocks. I remember waking twice to bomb blasts, my bedroom window cracking, and finally breaking at the second blast because it faced the Administration Building and one of the Science Buildings, a little over half a mile away, were target over a particularly contentious summer. I remember from when I was 8/9 years old the faint, burning, itchy feeling of tear gas, even if my parents kept me and my brother a sufficient distance away from the various riots.

I remember growing up hearing about and watching the Civil Rights wars and the very whitewashed "War on Poverty" throughout the country - even in California, at the big ranches and major farms; "soft warfare" in our own country - riots, strikes and protests that turned violent, "Company Camp" beatings of sharecroppers and migrant workers, intimidation tactics, bombings, murders...

In uniform, I've been to Panama (one week stop during a canal passage) during the '80's "Narco Wars" period - when Noriega was "our friend" - and got shot at several times while on temporary Shore Patrol duty there. We all got shot at, pot shots from the trees, mostly. The entire area around the Balboa navy base, base housing, and Balboa downtown/business/tourist sections just reeked of the desperation,poverty, and callous indifference.

In the 90's, co-workers that were California National Guard were called up for the Rodney King riots, that had as much to do with economic disparity, chronic poverty and a perceived lack of social respect as they did with race.

I'm feeling the same edge, the anticipation, the uncertainty that I felt during those times. And I've got the urge to clean up any outstanding issues, stock up, and hunker down. I'm even more short with the kidlet, who's still pretty much living in her own social bubble and has no clue what it means to be under fire and survive.
Whether or not those are real storm clouds on the social horizon, I'm definitely aware of some pretty damn' familiar feeling social patterns, and frankly, it puts me on edge.

As Twain says, "History may not repeat, but it does rhyme." In this country, even recently, we as a population, no matter how sophisticated and comfortable we appear to be, are perfectly capable of resentful, localized, destructive madnesses.
All that needs to happen is for that madness to spread quicker or last longer than geography or local policing can contain it, and these "isolated instances" can become the norm for several years - as happened during the student and Civil Rights movements just fifty years ago. And the riots and other destructive activities my parents remember from the Union and other Depression era social and economic movements during their childhood.

Lack of opportunities, financial security and at least a perceived lack of respect for at least half a population are the major issues that accellerate into most revolutions throughout history. All it takes is a couple small sparks, and the country blows up.

Haele