It wasn't blacks against koreans. I hoped indymedia would dig a little deeper than the racist corporate press. It was loot, loot, loot, then burn it to the ground. It was people against capitalism-- white, asian, chicano and black. Get some free shit while you can. That's not a negative image to be out in the streets and standing up for yourself. It the fucking white liberals who should get the bad image. they talk about this and that, while people are out in the streets fighting. And people wonder why the anti-capitalist movement is so white. Talk, talk, talk, and when something happens liberals rush home and watch it on TV.
there was blacks against koreans. people looting. and also, people upset about the verdict who were at parker center after the verdict.
i'm sure there are other reasons why people rioted.
to try and take that big event and give it a single meaning is pretty "modernist" or "authoritarian".
if you ask a looter, they might say it was about getting free stuff, and that everyone was looting.
if you ask a korean shop owner, they might say that it's about blacks being hateful.
if you as a black person who is faced with shopping at the korean shops, you might hear that it's about local community control, and not being exploited by outsiders.
if you ask a left/liberal, they might say that it's about racial profiling or the verdict.
if you ask a marxist, it's a class uprising.
if you ask some anarchists, they might say it's a temporary moment of freedom.
and, if you ask some postmodernist, they might say that people were reconstructing their identities, or having them altered.
Sorry if you can't handle multiple meanings. Sorry, because, if you can't, you're going to be pretty fucked in LA.