In the late ‘80s, a member of the George H.W. Bush administration famously referred to Portland as “Little Beirut,” given the city’s propensity to protest any time the president arrived. In a 2016 collection of the most “memorable” protests from that era
I live in Capitol Hill in Seattle, a few blocks from CHAZ/CHOP, and these accounts felt very true to my own experience of reading about the protests vs actually experiencing it. There was so much talk about the very tragic shooting that happened there which finally caused the city to shut it down, but all I could think about was the violence that happens every year in Capitol Hill and the Central District, Seattle’s historically black neighborhood (which borders Capitol Hill directly) and how the shootings and stabbings that happen every year in the Cal Anderson and in the CD are virtually ignored by everyone who doesn’t live here.
In July, a teenager was shot and murdered a few blocks from my apartment, same as happens almost every year. But it wasn’t at the protests, so who cares? None of my rural relatives emailed me in concern - no one even knew it happened. Last year, in May, another young black man was shot to death outside the neighborhood bodega down the street from my apartment, less than a ten minute walk from CHOP. Again, no one talks about that terrible incidence of gun violence, and it barely even made local news, but I still see the memorial flowers left in his honor there by his devastated family and friends every time I go for a walk. Yet a shooting happens at a protest, and it’s national news. I understand why that is, but it doesn’t make it right.
Personally, I never felt unsafe in downtown Capitol Hill, except when I saw the cops in riot gear patrolling the streets.
Thank you for compiling this record of local folks' thoughts that plays against the simplistic national narrative. I live in PDX, and I love this city. One of your interviewees makes a good point about the "old" PDX, when it was more blue collar, left-leaning libertarian. And while, as your final interviewee pointed out, in some districts it's been washed out and NIMBYized with superficially "progressive" gentrification, there's still plenty of the old Portland where the majority of Portlanders live, which is outside of downtown and the strips on the inner east side. She's right about Laurelhurst, but most people I know live around Foster, or in Cully, or St Johns, or east of 82nd. All of which are still pretty old school.
But the past few months have brought an exhausting barrage of messages from family around the country. The messages are often framed as "concern", but usually link to some new outrage article about how liberal politics have turned Portland into a war zone, and the underlying theme is "you moved to antifa town, what a mistake. How do you like the chaos now?" Well, I support the protests, and it's not chaos. I mean, I grew up in Los Angeles in the 80s. I saw a guy stabbed to death outside my apartment window. I've lived in NYC, Mexico, Bangkok, Buenos Aires. Portland feels like one of the safest cities on earth. I can understand why someone from Newberg who never leaves Yamhill County might think it's super dirty and dangerous here in the "big city", but imagine what they'd think walking down Hollywood Blvd. Let alone Patpong Road. It's just insane that the Yamhill view of Portland has become this national obsession.
And you know, rural conservative white evangelicals also think that Chicago, New York, and LA are "hell holes", but I've come to think that the reason they put so much extra focus on Portland is that it's mostly white, and there are white liberals doing a lot of the protesting. I think that bothers them and scares them more. Perhaps on some level they view us as race traitors. I think it's easier for them to dismiss anti-racism in a minority-majority, mixed race big city like Chicago or LA, than it is to dismiss homegrown anti-fascism in a small, mostly white town. This is a thing I haven't heard anyone talk about.
Anyway, it just makes me prouder of this city. This is a place you could always sit down at a bar and end up talking to a trans activist on one side, a redneck on the other side, and an antifascist further down. It's a freewheeling, open conversation unlike so many other places in America where the only ideas people get are a one-way stream from their TV. I wouldn't trade living here for anywhere else.
Thanks for putting this together. I appreciate the multiple viewpoints; helps me make sense out of what is going on, as an older white female on the side of BLM in a tiny midwestern town.
I have sent this piece to Midwestern friends as a kind of explainer (written after a Patriot Prayer protest in 2018): "To groups on the fringe, attention is oxygen, and Portland is a great place to get it." https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/04/us/portland-protest-patriot-prayer-rally.html
I appreciate these personal accounts. I've lived in the NW (not Portland, although I've visited several times) and a lot of this rings true.
I live in Capitol Hill in Seattle, a few blocks from CHAZ/CHOP, and these accounts felt very true to my own experience of reading about the protests vs actually experiencing it. There was so much talk about the very tragic shooting that happened there which finally caused the city to shut it down, but all I could think about was the violence that happens every year in Capitol Hill and the Central District, Seattle’s historically black neighborhood (which borders Capitol Hill directly) and how the shootings and stabbings that happen every year in the Cal Anderson and in the CD are virtually ignored by everyone who doesn’t live here.
In July, a teenager was shot and murdered a few blocks from my apartment, same as happens almost every year. But it wasn’t at the protests, so who cares? None of my rural relatives emailed me in concern - no one even knew it happened. Last year, in May, another young black man was shot to death outside the neighborhood bodega down the street from my apartment, less than a ten minute walk from CHOP. Again, no one talks about that terrible incidence of gun violence, and it barely even made local news, but I still see the memorial flowers left in his honor there by his devastated family and friends every time I go for a walk. Yet a shooting happens at a protest, and it’s national news. I understand why that is, but it doesn’t make it right.
Personally, I never felt unsafe in downtown Capitol Hill, except when I saw the cops in riot gear patrolling the streets.
Thank you for compiling this record of local folks' thoughts that plays against the simplistic national narrative. I live in PDX, and I love this city. One of your interviewees makes a good point about the "old" PDX, when it was more blue collar, left-leaning libertarian. And while, as your final interviewee pointed out, in some districts it's been washed out and NIMBYized with superficially "progressive" gentrification, there's still plenty of the old Portland where the majority of Portlanders live, which is outside of downtown and the strips on the inner east side. She's right about Laurelhurst, but most people I know live around Foster, or in Cully, or St Johns, or east of 82nd. All of which are still pretty old school.
But the past few months have brought an exhausting barrage of messages from family around the country. The messages are often framed as "concern", but usually link to some new outrage article about how liberal politics have turned Portland into a war zone, and the underlying theme is "you moved to antifa town, what a mistake. How do you like the chaos now?" Well, I support the protests, and it's not chaos. I mean, I grew up in Los Angeles in the 80s. I saw a guy stabbed to death outside my apartment window. I've lived in NYC, Mexico, Bangkok, Buenos Aires. Portland feels like one of the safest cities on earth. I can understand why someone from Newberg who never leaves Yamhill County might think it's super dirty and dangerous here in the "big city", but imagine what they'd think walking down Hollywood Blvd. Let alone Patpong Road. It's just insane that the Yamhill view of Portland has become this national obsession.
And you know, rural conservative white evangelicals also think that Chicago, New York, and LA are "hell holes", but I've come to think that the reason they put so much extra focus on Portland is that it's mostly white, and there are white liberals doing a lot of the protesting. I think that bothers them and scares them more. Perhaps on some level they view us as race traitors. I think it's easier for them to dismiss anti-racism in a minority-majority, mixed race big city like Chicago or LA, than it is to dismiss homegrown anti-fascism in a small, mostly white town. This is a thing I haven't heard anyone talk about.
Anyway, it just makes me prouder of this city. This is a place you could always sit down at a bar and end up talking to a trans activist on one side, a redneck on the other side, and an antifascist further down. It's a freewheeling, open conversation unlike so many other places in America where the only ideas people get are a one-way stream from their TV. I wouldn't trade living here for anywhere else.
Thanks for putting this together. I appreciate the multiple viewpoints; helps me make sense out of what is going on, as an older white female on the side of BLM in a tiny midwestern town.
This is excellent, I appreciate all of the personal accounts, particularly Laura from Laurelhurst's account.