Yesterday morning I woke up to news about riots and window smashings and found out that, though I usually have a finger to the pulse of what’s going on around the world, I absolutely missed the May Day Protests until they were happening. After evening plans fell through I got a wild hair to drag my gear downtown, brave the mobs and document the heck out of the heyday.

The only problem is… I’m a bit of a wimp when it comes to putting myself in danger (says the guy whose been photographed hanging off bridges, standing knee deep in rapid waters, etc) so it wasn’t until I got a text from a particularly intimidating friend of mine to “get my back” that I reigned in the wimpyness and trekked to 4th and Pine.

And I’m glad I did.

There aren’t a lot of words for what I saw. I will say I missed the insanity that started the day, and thankfully (for public safety, not for the drama of the photographs) it didn’t fire back up later in the day. Blame it on the rain, maybe. What  I did experience was a fascinating collision of passion and hypocrisy, cause and chaos.

Here’s a bit of what I saw.

{ disclaimer: as with most protests, there was a substantial amount of obscenity in language, signs and gestures, all of which I documented and included in the pictures below. So if middle fingers and four-letter words offend you, consider this your warning. }

//josh