The other day in my Asian Americans and Mass Media course, we were discussing the LA Riots which took place in 1993. The media made it out to look like a racial conflict between Korean storeowners and Blacks. One independent film named Sa i Gu (literally April 29th) involved really touching interviews with many residents of the area, both black and Korean and most of them pointed out that the cause of the riot was not racial tension but poverty and anger at the police and judicial system after 4 police officers were released after beating the shit out of Rodney King. Were the black folks angry? Hell yeah, but not at the Koreans. They just happen to be easy targets since they can't go and attack the LAPD directly. Both sides noted that white run media love to pit subordinate groups against each other to deflect negative attention from the real issue - the fact that both groups blame white dominated institutions including the LAPD, judicial system, government welfare etc. It was really enlightening to see that point of view. Anyways, during this discussion the prof asked what we remembered of the very biased media coverage of the incident (angry black people, hysterical inarticulate Korean women, Korean men pointing guns at looters from rooftops). The response? "I don't really remember, I was nine at the time." Damn that was a reality check. I'm freaking almost a decade older than many of my classmates, at least in my undergrad classes. I cannot wait to get these undergrad prereqs and electives over with.