Defund the Elite, Up with Protest

I am in love with the indomitable creativity and resilience of Portland's protest artists. This altar to Black Lives was constructed and decorated by a group of houseless people who are now camping by the altar in order to maintain it. They also protect the altar, built on the site of a former monument to the Elk, from aggressive white supremacists who drive by in large trucks, sometimes bristling with guns, threatening to destroy the altar and its creators. The altar is next to the park where we have our Tuesday walking meditations, near the Justice Center, where nightly protests are still ending with tear gas and impact munitions. Every night.

The extra is the ever-evolving community mural painted and chalked on plywood covering the large plate glass windows of the Apple Store, closed for the pandemic. On the steps of the building someone has scrawled in black marker, "Defund the Elite."