WHAT A RIOT!

This reading was something that resonated home with me. I'm really interested in anything involving civil rights, especially the Rodney King story and Rosa Parks. a quote in the reading that stood out to me was "No body's a monster here. That's the thing that makes it tragic, that these characters are human beings." And it really is scary that people like the policemen who beat Rodney King are living and breathing human beings like us. It makes me wonder how people get that screwed up and can actually do things like that. What drives a person to harm another human being in such a violent act? The reading brought up another good question with the quote "are the police there to protect me or to suspect me?" I feel like as a black female I've had a lot of trouble trusting police. I frankly don't like them and think the majority of them are corrupt. I feel like they walk around on a high horse and break the laws as criminals do. Yet nobody stops them because of a simple badge, aka the Rodney King case. I just hate that they're here to protect us, yet they can be the very ones we have to be afraid of. I don't trust policemen whatsoever and that can be a scary thing.

Lastly in the reading Mady Schutzman spoke on how all the kids played differently roles throughout the play and how they used the Joker to help people digest the severity of the circumstances in this play, especially the children. The kids were able to play different parts and speak on racism through the characters such as Claudette Colvin and The Bus Driver. "The Joker System embraces the mutability of identity, reminds us that our identities, as well as others', are constructed and thus available for reconstruction." This relates a lot to my major here at Calarts, as I am studying acting. I'm sure for the children who didn't quite understand everything they were talking about- switching roles every five minutes between such different characters with completely opposite beliefs wasn't that hard. But for me since I know a lot about this kind of stuff, and feel strongly about it, it would be extremely hard to put myself in the shoes of a policemen beating a black man based on his skin color. The reading stated may questions the actors would ask themselves or statements they'd say to themselves to be able to take the role of that character but I personally could never find a reason to do that. Now if I were to imagine beating the policemen who beat Rodney King, I think I could find that anger. But beating a man for no real reason, it's something I'll never understand.