The Bus Bench

Imagine. . .

Imagine all the Metro executives' bullshit being used to fuel natural gas buses instead of empty rhetoric and ill-conceived lies.
   

-BusTard

Roger's Rogering May Get The Shaft After Having "screwed [that] thing up."

After years of buggering the bus riders and strap hangers of L.A., Roger Snoble's end may be in sight. More on that anticipated comeuppance here and here.

-BusTard

Imagine. . .

Imagine a metro map without a glaring error. (In this case it is the omission of the "E" transfer point.) 

-BusTard

Imagine. . .

Imagine properly planned repairs being done when the metro rails are not running, rather than during rush hours leading up to weekends.

"Hollywood/Highland Station Elevator
Out of Service
Thursday & Friday, April 10-11 Only

Due to required maintenance, the elevators servicing the Metro Red Line Hollywood/Highland Station will be out of service Thursday and Friday, April 10-11 between the hours of 6:00am and midnight on both days.

Hollywood/Highland Passengers requiring elevator access to the platform or street levels should take Metro Bus Lines 163, 212, 217 or 780 to Hollywood/ Vine Station to complete their trip.

Red Line passengers requiring elevator access traveling to Hollywood/Highland Station should travel to Hollywood/Vine Station, disembark and take Metro Bus Lines 163, 212, 217 or 780 to Hollywood/Highland Station to complete their trip. Metro apologizes for any inconvenience."

 

-BusTard

Deconstructing the black/brown beef in South LA

African American Homeboys who asked for a Latino-Black heritage Mural

Lately I have been hearing more black/brown fighting stories on the news, which bothers the heck out of me. I dont know if the fact that racial tension existing between communities that I love, or the fact that the media and many law enforcement officials are exploiting it as a bigger problem than it is at a street level is what bothers me the most, it may be even.

This is why I say this:

For every skirmish or gang beef between Latinos and Blacks we hear about in the media, there are hundreds if not thousands of examples of barrio/hood folks getting along just fine and amalgamating into communities of understanding rather than hate that we never hear about.  When I go through South LA, Compton or Duarte I find a lot more black and brown kids playing with each other and families extending their traditions and cultures to each other than gangs throwing racial epitaphs at "the other side". Nothing is more beautiful than a black city worker ordering from a taco truck in Spanish with a heavy melodious African American south LA accent on Nadeau St., or a 4 foot tall paisano (Mexican immigrant) getting in on a game of basketball with his black neighbors at Wilson Park in Compton.  I love the culmination of black brown unity creating that distinct South Central blacktino accent that is synonymous with hoop earings, Dickies and Nike cortez, swap meets and low riders.  I was about 2/3rds into the book Monster (the book about the crip that had everyone shook) before I stopped visualizing him as a Mexican cholo, I was amazed at seeing blacks driving lowriders (just like we do in East LA) firsthand when I got my drivers license and went down to M&M's on crenshaw to see if their macaroni was as good as I'd heard.

Despite growing up in projects that had a serious history of police abuse and antagonism in racial animosity (which I'd later find out), I never thought about their part in the whole black brown racial problem until I heard others talking about it several times. Mind you, the people I heard note the police and media blowing this problem up were not conspiracy theorists but rather experienced policy makers, social workers and community leaders noting that fact in a very moderate hushed tone. I would say the one thing that would scare America more than black and brown kids picking each other off is them getting together and uniting, and that speaks volumes.  So the media ignores the unity and gets on the bullhorn at any hostility, and the police act as if it's always an epidemic so that more funding rolls into their coffers rather than into proactive gang prevention or youth programs.

Thats not to say there aren't racist idiots who do attack folks for their race, the examples of Avenues in Highland park and 204th street killing kids is exactly that. Just the past weekend I went down to Compton and painted over 4 foot tall graffiti proclaiming "f*ck n*gg$rs" in the creek written by Latino gang members, and I had the black gangsters keep an eye on me in case the Latino bangers caught me in my act of social unity. Nowadays blacks have become the victims of Latino gangs, I remember in the late 80s/early 90s when the opposite was happening and black gangs began harassing Latinos because their numbers were dwindling and they felt threatened, the situation is horrible either way and I cannot tolerate any of it.

The problem started in our state prison, and as a result of the incarceration of generations of young black and brown men is now an aspect of hood street life. The odd thing is that interracial unity and cross cultural influence even permeates racist gang member's lives, something I love pointing out to all of them. Pachucos were inspired by Black jazz musicians, Black gangsters were inspired by Latino cholos, Latino cholos were inspired by Black gangster rap, black gangster rap was inspired by cholos, both wear the same shit from the swap meet. Anyways, in the 50s the California prison system was beginning to be inundated with Latinos. Although outnumbered by blacks, the white inmates realized their time was running with this new minority also having plenty of racial animosity towards white culture, so rather than fighting them they allied with them against the blacks. Unfortunately, the Latinos took the bait, as blacks had a precedence of abusing latino inmates during times when they were numerically smaller, and thus the racial beef was born.

Prison guards who allied with the whites helped instigate much of this racial beef in order to maintain control and keep the inmates from uniting against them, and the black and brown inmates and prison gangs sadly fell in line. During the late 70s, the prison beef got so bad that the division became permanent and spilled out onto the streets, at the same time Latino prison gangs divided between the North and the South (LA). In Northern California blacks and latinos intermingle in gangs much more and gangs are not codified by race in most cases, that does occur in LA but not as frequently. Because of the need to control inmates through division, and the social framework and tension involved with power and drugs, this prison racial beef will not be going anywhere soon. This spills out on the street and the media/police took it and ran, never looking back.

The thing is that the racial unity between blacks and latinos will not just go away. When the whole black/brown beef went down numerous interracial gangs had to divide up into race based gangs. Most notably was Grape Street in Watts which divided into Grape street 13 and Grape Street Crips, both gangs still uniting across racial barriers to fight other gangs of the same race. So both black grape st. will aid brown grape st. in fighting other latino gangs, and vice versa (such as bounty hunters). In the Pueblo Del Rio projects, the Pueblo Bishops ally with Florencia to fight other black gangs such as East Coast Crips, and Florencia does the same in their immortal war with 38th street(a latino gang). On top of all this is the fact that "black on black" and "brown on brown" crime is still much higher than any black vs. brown violence, meaning both ethnicities pick off their own at a much higher rate than anyone else. The Florencia neighborhood is the community between Florence and Slauson Blue Line stations, the Pueblo Bishops are located south of the Vernon Station. Both Grape Street gangs are located about a half mile east of the 103rd street Blue Line station.

Imperial Courts (near Jordan Downs)

These facts and a list of personal experiences with both gangs and police have validated this belief in me.  I never hear about being "careful of black gangs" by anyone other than police, oftentimes the black gangmembers coming and hanging out with me while I'm painting murals after the police warning me about them.  This has happened numerous times, in Southeast LA, in Jefferson park, in Compton and Lynwood; never once has a community worker or member ever told me about this danger, just the police over and over again oftentimes in a manner that makes me feel as if they are mad at me for even being there trying to paint a mural. In fact, I usually have a lot more trouble from latino gang members than black gangsters (of whom Ive never had trouble with), because the blacks look at me with curiosity whereas the latinos look at me as competition, which I may make another post about.

So yeah, blacks and latinos get along just find and the racial beef (although real) is totally over hyped.

Why the Bus Bench sometimes talks about things other than the bus

In the environmental movement, I’ve noticed a lack of knowledge.

People seem to have a lack of knowledge beyond the environment. I have actually noticed this in all movements. Everyone is a specialist.

Imagine. . .

Imagine busses that are put back together before they are put back in service.

     

     

-BusTard

Imagine. . .

Imagine buses being as well-maintained as police cars. (When was the last time you saw an LAPD cruiser being towed?)

         

-BusTard

New writer at The Bus Bench

I’d like to introduce a new writer to The Bus Bench.

His name is Art. He’s pretty badass. I discovered him busting heads and taking names in a very eloquent and figurative way over in the comment section of  Blogging LA. I liked how he stated things without being nice about it.

Fuck being nice.

A girl like me goes weak in the knees for the kind of guy that has great grammar, but isn’t afraid to use the f-bomb.

Check out his recent entry: Art's recent entry.

So Art aka Art Bench will now be a regular writer at The Bus Bench.

I should probably get bios up of the people who write and take pictures over here.

Grosses bises,

Browne Molyneux