Thomas

McKenzie Thomas
Jennifer Rodrick
English 115
15 October 2016
Rough Draft Project Text
Los Angeles is a city of many traits. In Beverly Hills, the wealthy reside in large,
beautiful, and expensive house and mansions. These people are mostly doctors, lawyers, actors,
singers, and other career positions that provide more than enough money to predominantly white
individuals. In South Central, minorities often live in poverty. It is well-known to the Los
Angeles residents that one does not go to South Central at night time, and that it is still not a safe
place during the day. In the Hollywood Hills area and the West Hollywood area, residents live in
over the top mansions and beautiful houses. I once overheard someone say to their friend on a
street in West Hollywood that their friend bought a house for 1.3 million dollars. Meanwhile, Los
Angeles is home to a countless number of homeless people. Almost everywhere in Los Angeles
homeless people can be found. The homeless individuals are also often African American. Los
Angeles clearly has many sides to it, and can shape an individual in multiple different ways
based on who they are, where they came from, their race, how much money they make, and
many more factors. In the short story Los Angeles by Richard Rayner, found in the book
Another City, the main character experiences Los Angeles in the time period of the Rodney King
riots in 1992. He is a white man from England and lives in a rougher neighborhood. At the time
of the riots, he decides to have his African American friend help him go and see the riots. By
doing so, he faces great fear and has experiences like never before. Los Angeles and all of its
sometimes unusual events and characteristics shaped the authors identity by forcing him to

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acclimate to the crime and mischief in his neighborhood, by making him more fearless, and by
changing his view of how other races fit in to society. [insert photo here]
One way that the authors identity has been shaped by Los Angeles is by forcing him to
acclimate to the common and regular crime and mischief in his neighborhood. For example,
Rayner recalls a morning where he and his girlfriend go to the parking garage below their
apartment building to find human excrement on the windscreen of [their] car . . . and took over
an hour to wash and scrape off (173). While Rayners girlfriend is horrified by what had
happened, Rayner himself brushes the occurrence off. This event is one example of how the
author has become more immune to the unpleasant reminder[s] of the nature of [his]
neighborhood (173). Even though this incident was extremely unfortunate, Rayner accepts the
fact that the homeless people in his area often do things of the sort. Another example of how he
has gotten used to the crime in his neighborhood is by the fact that the author refuses to move out
of his neighborhood to a safer one. For example, in response to listening to one of his friends
question his motivations for living in the dangerous neighborhood that he lives in, he replies that
his apartment was a particularly beautiful piece of history, designed and built in the 1920s by
the movie director Cecil B. DeMille (174). This statement proves that Rayner is used to the
crime in his area and that he is more comfortable just dealing with it rather than moving away to
somewhere where blacks wouldnt exist at all (175). The author makes a statement by staying
in his apartment building in his rough neighborhood. When Rayner moved to Los Angeles, he
immersed himself in a new culture. Even though this culture includes crime and tension between
the different races, he proves his ability to deal with the drastic differences between his lifestyle
and the lifestyle of others who participate in crime. Although Rayner was at one time surprised
by the way the people of [his] neighborhood accepted [the behavior of the police department]

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with such indifference, he still refused to leave his home (174). This shows that the author has
now become used to the side of Los Angeles that includes crime. His identity now includes an
attribute that is better equipped to deal with being immersed into a city with a high crime rate.
Another way that Los Angeles has shaped Richard Rayners identity is by making him
much more fearless. When the Rodney King riots broke out in South Central and a few
surrounding areas, the author could not contain his curiosity. [insert source here] For example,
Rayner stated that if the riots were going to start again, [he] wanted to see them for [himself]
(180). This proves that the author is willing to immerse himself in an extremely dangerous
situation despite the possibility of injury or even death, as the riots had already caused there to be
thirteen dead by the end of the night on the first day of the riots (180). Rayner decided to call
on his African American friend Jake to help him to witness and experience the riots firsthand. He
and Jake drive through the city and look at all of the African American people running through
the streets, stealing merchandise from looted stores, and setting things on fire. As they drove,
they were passed by LAPD cars, not moving singly, or even in pairs, but in groups of four and
five (180-181). By driving around and watching the riots, Rayner shows extreme bravery. Even
the police are afraid, but this still does not motivate the author to go home. Though Rayner
admits to Jake that [hes] the sort of person . . . who lies awake in bed thinking someones about
to break in and slit [his] throat, he continues to stay with Jake and check out the riots, instead of
being too afraid and just going home. Another frightening aspect of this drive was when an
African American teenager stopped in the middle of the street with a bottle of Budweiser which
he was getting ready to throw at a car, ours (184). Afterwards, however, the teenager realized
Rayner was with a black man and went on his way. Though this frightened the author, along with
all of the other scary aspects of the drive, he was still determined to accomplish his goal of being

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a firsthand witness to the riots. Los Angeles can be a frightening and dangerous place at times,
but the author has become far more fearless due to having resided in the place that he has.
One more way that Los Angeles has shaped Rayners identity is by changing his view of
how other races, namely African Americans, fit into society. The author describes the
demographic of the suspects he witnesses being stopped to be always black, usually young,
often well-dressed (173). [insert source here] As a professional young man himself, I suspect
that Rayner is often disturbed by the fact that average-looking African American people are
stopped so commonly. He also mentions how violent the police officers are to black suspects
under the command of police chief Daryl Gates (174). He witnesses various officers outside of
his apartment window spewing out threatening statements to African American suspects such as
be careful now, Im in the mood to hit me a homer (174). While the authors neighbors all
seem to be okay with this behavior, Rayner is disturbed by the fact that the LAPD . . . was seen
less as a police force than an army at war (174). To Rayner, the fact that African Americans
were seen as something other than normal was an unusual concept. When the author lived in
New York, he had a very different way of looking at African American individuals. Los Angeles,
however, has brought out a new form of viewing black people. Rayner now finds himself
categorizing blacks into groups of smart professional blacks, middle-class blacks, and the
bums on Hollywood Boulevard (175). Instead of seeing an African American as just another
person, he now automatically puts them into categories, whether he likes it or not. In fact, during
the riots, after a group of black people killed an innocent white man, Rayner, if he had been
given the chance, actually saw [himself] with a gun in [his] hand killing the particular African
Americans who killed the innocent man (179). All of these factors lead Rayner to feel differently
about black people. He now feels more of a division between himself and them because of the

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crimes they may commit and because of the way the police treat them. It would be unavoidable
for the author to feel as though he is on equal footing as African Americans now, due to all that
he has seen. This affects his identity by making him more aware of his race and culture and of
the race and culture of black people.
In conclusion, Los Angeles depicts the story of a man who has been forever changed by
the racial divisions of Los Angeles. Throughout the story, Rayner describes through his actions
what it is like to live in a place where all races are not on equal footing. Whites are seen as
superior, whereas blacks are seen as less-than. This story seems to be true for the entire United
States nowadays. With a resurgence of police brutality against African Americans, riots have
erupted in many southern states, and the Black Lives Matter movement has been formed. The
story by Richard Rayner sounds almost like a prequel to the events happening today. The United
States has proven that it has still not been able to rid itself of racism. Here in Los Angeles, there
is still an undertone of racism against black people among a certain segment of the population.
Over time, one can only hope that race will not have to be a very large defining factor of our
identities any longer, as it was in Los Angeles and still is today.

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Work Cited
Rayner, Richard. Los Angeles. Another City. Ed. David L. Ulin. 1st ed. San Francisco: City
Lights Publishers, 2001. 173-184.