As they say, 2025 has been a rough decade. Los Angeles, my home of 25 years now, has in just a few months seen wildfires raging, friends displaced, homes destroyed, rents gouged, its own people blamed for their oppression, and now I C E raids descending on school graduations, ripping families apart, racially profiling and abducting people without cause or due process. From November 5, we knew shit was going to get much, much worse. Even in my horror, I didn’t anticipate the cruelty and idiocy would go this far this fast. Between the racism, the attack on LGBTQ+ rights and dignity, the misdirects away from their own corruption, the mismanagement of funds, the invasions of privacy, the pandering to billionaires, the censoring of any DEI language on government science sites, the CDC epidemiology departments gutted, I don’t even know what fucking direction to rage. So I guess, we calmly deliberately rage toward it all. Please use your voice. Please peacefully protest if you can. Please counter misinformation. Look for mutual aid groups to support. Take breaks and care for your mental health. We put up a seaweed episode last night — all hands on deck — while keeping one ear and eye on our neighbors afraid to leave their homes, our peaceful, mellow downtown full of singing, dancing demonstrators invaded by military forces who have been shooting at journalists, trampling protestors on horseback, firing rubber bullets point blank at unarmed Angelenos. Protestors are coming in peace with voices raised, as they should against an authoritarian administration which is violating their constitutional rights. They’re being met with excessive force to cause panic. Don’t believe reports of LA being on fire and chaotic: it’s simply fucking not. Downtown has a few blocks of mostly mellow protests. Five empty Waymos were vandalized. Some bad-faith burglars break into stores, which happens across America on any given night. Those make good headlines, those pictures get clicks, they make America stay scared. They’re not the reality. The reality is that we should not fear each other, but we should fear and protect against a regime that turns us on each other for their economic benefit