The Backlash of Los Angeles’ Social Choices
By: Lorik Gagica
Tags: BlackLivesMatter, Racism, Los Angeles, Social Justice, Violence

This is not the first time that the Angeleno police have used their force to shoot down African-Americans. The judgment of these four officers took place in a jury composed mainly of White people including a Latino and an Asian which is surprising, but ultimately not. Bringing together Whites, an Asian, and a Latino as a jury in a trial to deliver a verdict on a person from the community they commonly despise makes perfect sense. And, it was on April 29, 1992, that all four of these police officers were acquitted of all charges.

This is the last straw that broke the camel’s back, very violent riots broke out in Los Angeles in response to this injustice. These acquittals were the trigger for these riots. As with the Watts riots, they were triggered by a road arrest. In fact, injustice to African Americans, residential segregation, discrimination, and others have accumulated over several years and this spring of 1992 has helped to explode the discontent of these poor people.

The hardest-hit places were Koreatown and South Central. The riots were fraught with heavy consequences, with more than a billion dollars in property damage and more than 50 deaths. Besides, 2,383 people were injured, 8,000 arrests, and more than 700 companies emplacements were burned.

The great demographic change that occurred in Los Angeles in the decade leading up to the 1992 riot led to Black emigration and immigration of Latinos and Asians. This has led to a classic process of “ethnic” succession, or what might be called the “desegregation” of the black areas of South Central. In short, desegregation can lead to “ethnic” violence, but the “ethnic group” whose neighborhood is being desegregated must be properly identified and in 1992 these were the black areas of South Central. Thus, Los Angeles became notorious in the 1990s as a national leader in urban, social, and political problems. The civil disorder of 1992 and the successful passage of the anti-immigrant proposal, called Proposition 187, in 1994 seemed to mean the disintegration of the social contract.

Proposition 187 was a Californian referendum that sought to vote for or against prohibiting illegal immigrants from California from enjoying public benefits such as public education, health care, and other California State services. The results of the election being positive, the reactions were immediate to oppose this Proposition 187 considered xenophobic and discriminatory towards ethnic minorities and especially those coming from Latin America.

Extreme pressures on this Californian metropolis have raised many questions about whether Los Angeles could continue to offer opportunities and an attractive way of life to its millions of citizens.

With the riots in Watts, those in South Central, and the violence that reigns in Black and Latino neighborhoods, the image of African Americans and the people of Latin America have worsened through the media and people are becoming increasingly suspicious of them. The reluctance of Whites toward African-Americans and Latinos by excluding them from social life has led to a phenomenon of delinquency and deviance characterized by gang formation throughout history.

Since racism and discrimination have been banned in the 1960s, and punishable by law, other strategies and tactics had to be found to maintain and nurture residential segregation.