The “Second Civil War” is a social warfare between the interests of the middle class against the welfare of the urban poor. Malls and complexes of many buildings have replaced public space; police inside these complexes places people under surveillance. These malls and office centers have access to electronics, whereas in the ghetto it electronics are not as accessible. This unequal distribution is the start of Los Angeles heading into one direction favoring the elite. Public services are diminishing and public spaces are becoming more privatized. This clashes with the view of Frederick Law Olmsted, the mastermind behind Central Park. He saw parks and other public spaces as a way to bring the different social classes together through similar leisurely activities. Olmsted wrote, “No one who has closely observed the conduct of the people who visit [Central] Park can doubt that it exercises a distinctly harmonizing and refining influence upon the most unfortunate and most lawless classes of the city-an influence favorable to courtesy, self-control, and temperance.” Why has the distinction between classes been reinforced by public spaces?

In Fortress Los Angeles: The Militarization of Urban Space, the author discusses how in Los Angeles it has become clear that the gap between rich and poor has been reinforced through security. The author states, “ The defense of luxury has given birth to an arsenal of security systems and an obsession with the policing of social boundaries.” No longer are the wealthy distinguished from the poor based on their riches. The poor neighborhoods are secluded from urban society through police enforced barricades. The disparity between rich and poor is now physically in place through military enforcement as well as construction of luxury buildings that clearly exclude those below a certain stature. The new use of public space as areas to divide the classes opposes the Olmstedian vision, which saw public spaces like parks as areas for the mixing of the rich and poor.

Question: How can public officials fulfill the Olmstedian vision through public policies?

This article truly makes Los Angeles look like a horrible place, determined to protect their wealth and status at all costs, even if that means destroying the last truly public spaces in exchange for security-heavy destinations, banking on the draw of exclusivity. While I don’t doubt that LA (and probably other large American cities) are seeing a turn towards the polarization of any person or thing not deemed socially “elite” (I.e. minorities, the poor), I can’t help but question the extremity of the article, which depicts the city as a sort of militaristic city of a dystopian future. Regardless, the privatization of public space is a concerning issue, especially as income gaps continue to widen nationwide. This issue particularly effects the homeless, who are no longer allowed in more and more areas of the city. Rather than focusing on finding housing for the homeless of the city, they are focusing on ways to keep them out of “luxury” areas, only further deepening class divides.

I was appalled by this week’s readings. Never have been to LA and only being exposed to the glamorous side of the city on television, I had no idea that LA functioned in such a harsh way. As described in the reading, the city is divided into stark like life versus broadway chaos. This means that part of the city is rich and flourishing while the other part is dysfunctional. The reading stressed how the military and rich people strive to keep those two worlds separate. I was shocked at how they have attempted to isolate the poor and how cruel the city is to them. What stood out most was when the author described how the city replaced the seats at terminals with barrel like chairs and how the sprinklers were programmed to go off to scare away the homeless sleeping on park benches. Furthermore, restaurants made sure they were unable to go through the trash cans and the government eliminated most public bathrooms. Such isolation and cruelty broke my heart when reading this. In addition, this information is hidden since the area looks appealing on brochures.

How much regulation should be forced upon the homeless?

I had never really wanted to visit Los Angeles before, but now I definitely don’t want to. If what Davis is describing is close to reality, it sounds like an awful, racist, classist, city of the rich. I’d like to stay far away from Los Angeles. I definitely subscribe more to Olmsted’s philosophy of public space: it should be common ground for people of all classes, races, religions, and so forth. What’s going on in Los Angeles, its shameless and deliberate militarization, is just plain wrong. Los Angeles is not only wrongfully pandering to the wealthy, but it does so at the purposeful expense of the poor. It is immoral, irresponsible, and frankly, criminal. Los Angeles is not ignoring the needs of the majority of its citizens – it is consciously denying them. This is no way to promote a healthy, happy, and productive city. I believe by being so short-sighted, Los Angeles developers and legislators are poisoning the future of the City of Angels.

I fear that most of my reading responses are very reactionary forms of “oh my god how could this be happening?” I do not think I’m cut out for sociology. But seriously, how far are we from the kind of ghettoization of arab communities during the Algerian war being applied to social classes? What struck me most in this article, for whatever reason, was the focus on Gehry’s neoconservative architecture. I’d never thought about architecture as a basis for division—it just never occurred to me. I’ve always seen architecture as more or less innocuous—utility over form and whatnot—but the amount of thought put into making these buildings as uninviting as possible for those of the lower-classes is sickening and mind-boggling. It’s classism being literally built into the foundation of a city—how much further from egalitarianism can we get? Even if these class divides were solved, these buildings would remain like grim reminders. But this has me thinking: what does egalitarian architecture look like? I can see why vertical facades and fortress-like premises are the domain of classist architecture, but does architecture exist for the cohabitation of classes? What does that look like? How does it function? My mind immediately brings up the image of large, very horizontal designs that might take up more room than anyone would benefit from, but surely this is a thing that’s been talked about, right? Please tell me there is architecture designed for class integration. Please.