#DeColonizeLACityHall, a direct political action as occupation by Black Lives Matter-LA (BLMLA), is in it’s 38th consecutive day. Tents went up on July 12th in response to the LA Police Commission announcement that the 2015 police killing of Redel Jones was deemed in policy. Since then it’s been the biggest, most undereported historic local event since Occupy LA took the City Hall grounds for 3 months in 2011.

Janelle Monáe’s anthemic, Hell You Talmbout tests the limits of a small Bluetooth speaker; ricochets off the hard surfaces of downtown as sidewalk sleepers emerge from a cluster of fifteen tents on the plaza at City Hall East in Los Angeles at 6:00 am. A few feet away a big red bus hacks up a dark plume that settles on a large yellow banner propped up near the curb spelling “Say Her Name” in big red letters. Another sign, “Fire Chief Beck” leans against a traffic signal, staring blankly at the Mayor’s office just across the street. The Black Lives Matter (BLMLA) encampment is exactly what you’d expect to find at the bleeding edge of the Black Liberation Movement; a tightly organized, clean, open but guarded, kid friendly, abundant, creative, gay-trans-ally friendly, loving, matriarchal space.   BLMLA Camp, LA City Hall_8/16   Melina Abdullah packs a few essentials into a bag near the food table as she begins her day. A founding, core member of BLMLA, the mother of three, tenured professor and Pan-African Studies department chair at Cal State, Los Angeles is a guiding presence here. A practiced communicator, she breaks from the scrip to consider what they’ve created at City Hall; “I don’t think we’d really articulated it before, but it’s a really beautiful loving space. We’re building the community we want to live in,” she says and excuses herself to help unload a car that has pulled up to drop off supplies. The spontaneous action dubbed “Decolonize LA City Hall” began on Tuesday, July 12, just after the Los Angeles Police Commission announced that the 2015 police killing of a black woman named Redel Jones was deemed in policy. Shortly after tents went up at City Hall a block away from...

Tonight’s Radicalized screening at El Hormiguero is the first San Fernando Valley viewing. A homecoming of sorts, the last act of the feature documentary was shot in Van Nuys at #FortHernandez  (aka Fuerza Hernandez) beginning in the fall of 2012. #FortHernandez, a Political Action in the form of a Foreclosure Resistance / Home Defense, was initiated by Occupy San Fernando Valley and supported by OLA, OFF, Brown Berets, AIM and many other groups and individuals. Despite intense intimidation tactics from law enforcement the Action lasted more than 100 days a year after the beginning of  Occupy Los Angeles and became an international news story featured on broadcast TV in Russia, Switzerland, Japan, and Australia. Tonight’s screening will feature a Q&A with  members of the Hernandez Family moderated by Radicalized Producer Luis Vargas. VIDEO Screening info: Thursday, January 14 at 6:30 PM – PST El Hormiguero 12545 Terra Bella St, Pacoima, California 91331 More Info Visit: www.radicalizedmovie.com/events El Hormiguero: http://bit.ly/Hormiguero   Samslovick.com HuffingtonPost Facebook...

“Radicalized is a cinematic endeavor not seen since Wexler’s Medium Cool”…. “Not since Wadleigh’s Woodstock have we had a documentary film that is a comprehensive socio-polotical historical document of this magnititude.”