Love and Rage
gather up all of your impossible hope and stay the course
ROCK PAPER RADIO is a dispatch for misfits & unlikely optimists by your favorite hapa haole, beet-pickling, public radio nerd. It’s a weekly email newsletter that shares three curiosities every Thursday - something to hold on to, something to read, and something to listen to. Themes include but are not limited to: rebel violinists, feisty Chinese grandmothers, revolution. Thanks for subscribing and spreading the word.
In response to the continued killing of Black citizens by the police, Black Lives Matter protesters took over the East Precinct and six surrounding city blocks on Capitol Hill in Seattle from June 8—July 1, 2020. This flag was hung on the side of the protester-occupied police station. Displaying a U.S. flag upside down is a signal of dire distress. For more photos from the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest this summer, find my @leongstagram albums on IG here. June 14, 2020, Seattle.
SOMETHING TO READ
Our unlikely optimism is being tested.
The cops who killed Breonna Taylor have gotten away with murder. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg has died. Dr. Fauci has been replaced by a guy who thinks we should just let Covid-19 take out all the suckers and losers. The west coast is in ashes. We are 40 days away from Election Day.
So because there’s a lot happening right now, this week I have two essays to offer, both with action steps.
First, Confessions of a Former Bastard Cop, by a writer using a pseudonym who claims to be a former California police officer. When this was first published in June, some red hat tweeters cried FAKE NEWS! because it was published anonymously. My guess is that that the people dismissing this essay didn’t actually read it. The details are horrifying and specific, but perhaps not surprising. The analysis and solutions the author offers are needed right now more than ever.
Second, We Grieve and then We Fight is what I wrote last weekend after RGB passed away. I didn’t know that Breonna Taylor’s killers would be let off the hook this week when I wrote it, but here we are. I open with my wife wielding an educational placemat, and close with three ways to put our rage and fear to work.
SOMETHING TO LISTEN TO
In 2009 Alex Landau was violently beaten by Denver police officers after being pulled over for a routine traffic stop.
In this 3-minute StoryCorps conversation, Landau, who is Black, joins his adoptive mom Patsy Hathaway, who is white, to talk about that terrifying incident and how race has shaped his life experiences.
The racism and violence he describes is vile and familiar. What makes this story different, is that Landau was with a white friend at the time of the attack—a friend who was found to have weed on him, but who was left unscathed.
In just three minutes, this story paints a clear picture of two Americas: one for Black boys, and one for white. The piece also offers listeners a window into Hathaway’s loving but imperfect evolution a white mom in a transracial family. The awakening she describes feels a lot like what many white Americans in 2020 seem to be experiencing as the Black Lives Matter movement shows the world who we are.
SOMETHING TO HOLD ON TO
Shout out to my favorite food fight instigator, Erik Molano, for sharing this short film with me.
This 14-minute documentary from The Atlantic, What It’s Like to Survive Being Shot by the Police, is beautiful and surprising, and it just might be the kind of art that comes from tragedy that will inspire this country to change.
STAY SAFE OUT THERE
That’s a wrap for issue 9. Thanks for reading/listening/holding on. It’s nuts out there right now, so let’s stick together. If you liked this week’s newsletter, please considering sharing it with a curious friend and encouraging them to join our community of unlikely optimists by subscribing. Thanks, misfit crew. Hang in there until next week.
See you next Thursday.
K.