the people versus... ?
friday, june 15, 2001
after a few wrong turns we made it to my cousin's place. the entire drive we've been listening to news from gothenburg -- it turned into riots and mean, mean fights between police and hooligan rioters ruining it for the real activists..
it has gotten sooo ugly. hooligans are pulling up street signs to dislodge large rock chunks from the cobbled streets to hurl at the police and the police horses, while the police seems to wield their batons at will. i listened to a straight-from-the-streets radio journalist give a commentary on the chaos around her and suddenly a thumb and sigh was heard and a second later the reporter said, very matter of factly: "well, i just got hit in the back by a baton.."
i absolutely understand the police reacting the way they do, with fear, because the combatants act out of their fear and so a cobble stone flying through the air to fight a rain of baton blows make some sort of horrid sense but it's just.. scary. an entire city suddenly demolished. everywhere i hear people say "this isn't sweden, this isn't what sweden is." shock.
you know. i'm all for activists and demonstrating against things, i really am, i think discontent with things should be vocalized and protested. after all, i'm pro-choice vegetarian animals right whatever whatever etc etc girl, but these hurled cobble stones and crushed store fronts and bleeding people and the fear... it's just so useless.
and most of all i hate that what these masked hooligans are doing becomes all that outsiders see and remember - people are happy to see images of ANY non-police person being whacked in the name of fighting the hooligans and they can't accept that in the midst of the hundred of awful dissidents, there are a few thousand who actually wanted to say something, quietly and respectfully.
i saw footage of three masked assholes hurdling rock chunks at one lone police officer three feet away who had to fend for his life with a tiny shield and i saw a lone activist cover his bleeding head before he disappeared underneath three large black police raising and lowering their batons with great force and don't know what to feel but just.. sadness.
and staying at this beautiful house makes the riots just 45 mins away seem like another world entirely. the contrast is almost too great to fathom.
my cousin + husband and kids live in the most gorgeous house on earth. i mean it is really awesome - very rustique and lots of wooden stuff (he's a carpenter) and gorgeous furnitures and decorated stuff - she's so swedens martha stewart, in the bathroom mirror handle she's stuck a glass test tube and put a fresh flower + a tad water in. i mean, how adorable and clever is that? down right annoying. too perfect. i'm in awe. and lacking, lacking. hee.
her kids are total brats, though. i mean, they are cute, but they are BRATS.
i am amazed because i am used to my friend's extremely well mannered little boy, i mean he acts up sometimes but compared to these two boys.. amazing.. they
scream and yell and can get away with climbing into the chair behind a parent and then kick and slap them on the back and arms when they get angry and just screeeeam.. i'm shocked, but try not to show it. not a parent, and all that.
the smallest one gets total rage out bursts - it's somewhat understandable that they are spoiled b/c the youngest is really ill since birth, but i dunno if feeling guilty that he's ill is a reason to make a little tyrant monster out of him.. you know?
alright, highlander on the telly.. must go. swords and neat music and cute lambert and there can be only one and all that. cin cin.
