“Fortress Los Angeles: The Militarization of Urban Space”  by Mike Davis struck me as being unlike any of the previous course readings. Whereas our other readings addressed social crises, particularly those affecting NYC, Davis’s work addresses a crisis of physical space in LA. Initially, I found the central idea of the piece to be quite abstract but images like that of “fortified garbage” are very powerful and ground Davis’s argument in reality. Adding maps and images of the referenced buildings could have further strengthened Davis’s argument.

Of all the examples provided in the article about security and militarization of public space, I found the use of LAPD helicopters under the Astro program to be the most extreme. Not only is it environmentally detrimental for helicopters to spend circa nineteen hours in the air, this extreme type of surveillance is also wildly inappropriate and unnecessary. Lastly, as I had mentioned in previous blog posts, the phenomena of the militarization of the police force in America has been well documented and studied…and yet, the problem remains largely unaddressed.