Update: The L.A. riots 30 years later on KBLA
Tomorrow, April 29, marks 30 years since the LA Riots, sometimes referred to as the "LA Uprising" after the acquittal of four Los Angeles Police officers charged with the beating of motorist Rodney King, an incident caught on videotape and broadcast nationally. Tavis Smliey, owner and host of progressive talk station KBLA, will join the Dominique Diprima morning show, broadcasting live from the corner of Florence Boulevard and Normandie Avenue starting at 6 a.m.
Smiley was interviewed Thursday on the KTLA Morning News. He described how KBLA will cover the story of the riots from 30 years ago:
We’ll be at Ground Zero, the corner of Florence and Normandie where this all jumped off three decades ago, it’s hard to believe it’s been 30 years, we’ll be broadcasting live there tomorrow from 6 a.m ‘til 12 noon with a potpourri of guests, from city officials to community organizers, to lay persons to faith leaders to everyday people to try to commemorate and assess where we are 30 years later.
When asked why it was important to observe the 30 year anniversary of the LA Riots, Smiley offered this response:
Dr. Martin Luther King once famously said that ‘riots are the language of the unheard,’ so when people there had it and can’t take it no more, they’re like a teapot, the steam has to come out, the whistle has to blow, as it were. So I think people had had enough of the attitude of the police in this city so at some point, whether one can justify the way they did it back to King, riots are oftentimes the language of the unheard.
As to why we need to look back, as it’s been said many times if you don’t know where you’ve been (then) you don’t know where you’re going, and I think there are still some significant questions that need to be addressed in this city. On the one hand, you can argue progress has been made, again back to King, progress does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, progress just doesn’t happen, but progress has been made. Now the police Chief of this city can no longer serve for life, as Daryl Gates thought he was going to, we see conversations around the country now about doing away with these ‘no-knock warrants,” I mean that’s progress. There’s conversations about what constitutes excessive force, there are civilian review boards I should say (now) across the country, so some progress has been made. But fundamentally, 30 years ago I’m still wrestling with this central question, and I don’t have an answer this morning I admit, I don’t know if the police community writ large, has the capacity to respect the humanity and the dignity of Black life, and that’s a serious question to be asking 30 years later.
Smiley was asked what is now being said in the neighborhoods affected by the riots back in 1992:
You’re going to hear a lot of that tomorrow, that’s why we’re there live from 6 a.m. to noon at the intersection, the flashpoint, Florence and Normandie, we’re going to hear a lot of that tomorrow, I think a lot of people again, I think they would agree with me that some progress has been made, but as I drive around this community that I live and work in every day, I see lots and stores and institutions that were burned down 30 years ago that have still not been replaced. There are some promises that city officials, that city leaders made that have not been kept three decades later so I suspect, while I don’t have a license to speak for all of Black Los Angeles, I suspect here will be those who will agree that progress has been made, that progress has been slow in coming, and that now is a most proficuous time, to have this conversation as we’re headed toward this mayoral election and see what Rick Caruso or Karen Bass are going to do about it.
Smiley was then asked, given what's happened over the last three decades, if history could repeat itself:
That’s the $1000 question. I’m not sure I have the answer. At the end of the day, I go back to Dr. King because he always seems central to me with these types of conversations. King was talking about these kinds of things at his death, the triple threats facing our democracy – racism, poverty, and militarism. And so long as there’s racism, so long as there’s poverty, and so long as our police operate as sort of a paramilitary, those questions are real. Could it happen again? Of course it could happen again, we’ve see so many things, sadly, videotaped beatings and murders of people like George Floyd. And so we’ve been sorta able to contain but at some point, anarchy breaks out if we don’t start to address those issues – poverty, racism, and militarism. So could it happen again? It possibly could happen again, let’s hope that these conversations, these reflections 30 years later, and more importantly recommitting ourselves to the hard work that needs to be done, to keep that from happening.
"The LA Uprisings 30 Years Later" begins at 6 a.m. on KBLA 1580 AM, also available via live stream.
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