just had a memory from almost 30 years ago. im in high school, at a pep rally. i dunno if they're still like this, but back then they let us out from last period maybe 20 minutes early, but had administrators and truancy types funneling everyone to either the basketball gym bleachers or the football bleachers. then like the cheerleaders would do some choreographed something while something like 69 boyz - Tootsee Roll blared over the PA, then the athletes playing at the nights game would run out and we were all expected to give a shit. some people had school spirit, but most people just stood there, because after 7 hours sitting silently behind a desk, who the fuck gives a shit about anything.

anyway, for this specific memory is was a football thing, so we all go out to the football bleachers and the adults had organized a little parade of the usual suspects, only this time. the "School Resource Officer" (aka the full time armed pig the district hires with its limited resources to threaten children and initiate minorities into the school-to-prison pipeline) is driving like a lowered, "tricked out" 1990 Ford Mustang with this custom flamed metallic paint job, spinning rims, and some outrageous competition grade sound-system blaring something a Dr. Crankenstein mix CD making every part of the vehicle rattle as it crawls by. everybody, even the rah-rah-go-team losers were cringing at it. the rear window has the giant D.A.R.E. anti-drug logo on it. i imagine, in the minds of program administrators, seeing such an enviably sweet ride would make us all realize that doing drugs with our friends is lame, actually, and it is the cops who are into cool stuff.

broke kids couldn't have a free lunch, we couldn't have books from a relevant decade, and there were 35+ kids to a classroom, but fuckin' Officer Piglet had his don't do drugs mobile. that he would cruise around in and try to hook up with 15 year olds.

did that guy take off his shoes to climb the ladder?

Siri define liberalism

I think this is actually a hate crime?

Incredibly cursed image

ok ok, but hear me out; Merry Pranksters driving an MRAP instead of a school bus.

seattle

Seattle Art Fair features reclaimed apartheid-era police vehicle

SPOEK-1, a reclaimed apartheid-era police vehicle adorned by 70 million colorful beads by South African artist Ralph Ziman, is unveiled Tuesday morning at Lumen Field prior to the Seattle Art Fair in Seattle

The CASSPIR Project

The centerpiece of the exhibit is a hulking Casspir military vehicle. Ziman has reclaimed the eleven-ton, twenty-two-foot-long and nine-foot-high four-wheeled monster into a striking, sparkling "Africanized" work of art, entitled SPOEK 1. Enveloping its every surface with millions of brightly-colored panels of glass beads, Ziman and his team transmuted the Casspir from armored vehicle to adorned sculpture, effectively indigenizing the reviled symbol of tyranny. The dazzlingly intricate beadwork and traditional patterns, courtesy of local artisans from Zimbabwe and the Mpumalanga province in South Africa, are full of energy and enthusiasm--the spirited reds, yellows and greens representative of a vibrant optimism which had come into view after a dark past of systemic discrimination and segregation. Developed in South Africa in the 1970s, the Casspir was originally conceived as a military vehicle. A weapon of terror during the apartheid-era, the armored Casspir was extensively used against civilian populations. Widely despised and feared, it soon became synonymous with violence, police intimidation and institutional oppression. “I wanted to take what was the ultimate symbol of apartheid,” artist Ralph Ziman says, “and turn it into something that is African and beautiful.”

Maybe they're just fans of old timey naval dazzle camouflage.

did they get that out of a lootbox?

I appreciate the dazzle camouflage. I cannot tell what the front of this vehicle is or even what it if. Bring back dazzle camouflage.