January Critical Mass
The last Friday of every month is the LA Critical Mass ride. It seems that every month the crowd gets larger and there are new incidents for riders to talk/blog about.
As some may remember, the November rider LAPD officers forcefully pulled riders off their bikes. LAPD defended their actions by stating if a rider had gotten injured running a red light the blame would have been put on the department for not protecting the riders. However; this does not explain why the officers where literally pulling people off their bikes causing them to crash and fall on the ground. Nor does it explain why the male officer decided to call one of the riders a “bitch”.
I completely understand the complications a group of riders this large poses. LA Critical Mass has reached over 500 people! However; I also believe LAPD has more important calls to attend to than a group of people protesting the over use of cars in Los Angeles. I seriously believe most of us are law abiding, tax paying citizens out for a bike ride on a Friday night. We are not starting fights, drinking and driving or buying/selling drugs.
All this leads me to what happened last night.
Last night’s group headed north west on Western Ave. We eventually turn right onto La Cienega to make our way up that huge hill. This is where most of the group was separated, due to red lights. A majority of the group went straight towards Sunset while some of us turned on Fountain. Once we realized the rest of the group was not in front of us we stopped at the Ralphs on north La Brea.. Our group was no larger than 50 people and we were there for not more the 5 minutes before the rent a cop came to tell us to leave. I have two serious problems with this;
1- if you are going to be a security guard dont be fat, short and bitchy. I doubt any one can actually take her serious.
2- the people she was telling to leave the parking lot were actually in the process of paying her salary. A salary in which you obviously use to purchase copious amounts of food she does not need.
Obviously our group did not listen because we were not doing anything wrong. However; the want to be cop called the actual cops, LAPD. Two female cops show up and immediately start talking to what I assume is the manager of Ralphs. Without talking to any ridders to find out if we were actually paying customers, which some ridders were, the bitchy officer gets on the loud speaker and says, “You have exactly two seconds to vacate this fucking property.” One of the riders snapped back, “arrest all of us.” Probably a little dumb on his part since he was right next to the cop car, but not surprising. When people are verbally attacked for no apparent reason there will be a back lash. Of corse our group left because we did not want a repeat of the November ride.
I cannot comprehend why two officers would show up to a situation and not try and hear both sides of the story. There is a way to communicate with grown adults without being a complete cunt and have both parties walk away happy. It is apparent the LAPD forgot to instill this information in their officers. I am more out raged at the actions of the female officers. It is women like this who’s action affect all women.
After these two incidents with LAPD officers I am not surprised citizens of Los Angeles hate LAPD. I am not surprised LAPD officers are not paid more. Common sense dictates that respecting people who pay your salary will get you further than taking to us like wild animals. What gives these men and women the right to use profanity on the job? In any other respectable career a person would be reprimanded and probably fired for treating people like this. Not when it comes to the LAPD.
Furthermore, why would Ralphs would treat paying customers like this? I know I will no longer shop at any Ralphs locations. Obviously Ralphs is doing well enough to harass paying customers they no longer need my business.
Ralphs and LAPD should be embarrassed they employee such rude and disrespectful people.