LA has capitalized off of Kobe Bryant’s death

I drove 20 minutes out of my way to drive by the circus that is the Staples Center to see what the people of Los Angeles were doing to memorialize their cherished basketball player. 

I didn’t know what to expect, maybe flowers, candles, people memorializing the basketball star, but I didn’t expect the way it was becoming a marketplace. People capitalizing over the death of people who meant a lot to the city of Los Angeles. 

Vendors were capitalizing off of the people’s sadness who came to mourn his death, with T-shirts fresh off the press with Bryant’s face and the year of his death. They mock the sincerity of the people coming together to mourn the deaths by creating the ‘death merch’. 

In an article by the Los Angeles Times titled, “Outside Staples Center, a grim hustle for unlicensed vendors of Kobe R.I.P. shirts”, by Daniel Hernandez, he covers the vigil and how people are making money off of a tragedy. A vendor argues with him saying that “When deaths of local heroes of great magnitude occur, the people of L.A. hold public memorials and all-day vigils. Angelenos also mourn with personal displays: tattoos, window decals on vehicles and most of all, T-shirts. They are a wearable memorial.”. 

Although ‘Angeleons’ might morn in this way, it doesn’t mean you have to have a ‘merch’ table right outside the place people are mourning him. If people want a T-shirt with Bryant’s face on it saying R.I.P they can go to a store, you don’t have to disrespect him by crowding the beautiful memorial that the city came together to build. 

Another vendor said that “L.A. is all about getting that hustle.” But when does too far go too far? Should these “event vendors” really be capitalizing off of a tragedy, off of the people’s emotions, or do they even care that they have turned a memorial into a marketplace.

T-shirts and jerseys are such a strong representation of what you believe in, they are a strong statement that imply a cause or a belief. In a sport like basketball people have the team the root for and express their alliance through their shirt. But in this case it’s not expressing what team you root for, it’s acknowledging that you’ve bought into the game these street vendors are playing on the city, and you don’t even know it. 

As I was driving away from the staples center there was a spot on the street covered in candles all lit in the middle of the day, with fresh flowers and a beautiful mural. That was more of what I expected to see at the staples center, a vigil from LA to her passing stare Bryant. It was a scene of respect, and not a place where people are bargaining over the price of T-shirts.