I don’t think that I have seen anything like the widespread criminality sweeping England, in my lifetime. It may happen in LA or the Paris bainlieus, but not England. Watching it from the sanity of Scotland enhances the feeling of it happening somewhere I don’t know.
It is necessary to be plain about one thing. This is not, in any sense, a legitimate political protest. Nor is it a revolt of the deprived, homeless and starving. Few of those arrested are coming to the attention of the police for a first time. What is happening is that the burgeoning criminal underclass is realising that it is now large enough to defy society if it can concentrate its forces quickly in specific localities.
This is not a race issue. This is the social mileu from which Jade Goody, Amy Winehouse and Wayne Rooney (all of whom have had close associations with people imprisoned for violence) emerged just as much as it is gangs of Somalis and Nigerians – and it is indeed that too. It is a product of a contemptible urban sub-culture driven by a detestation of education and an avid materialism. That its devotees can argue that the corrupt bankers and politicians are morally no better is a perfectly valid point, but no justification.
They are not destroying the homes and livelihoods of politicians and bankers, but of ordinary decent people.
The policing does raise vital questions. The Met has 30,000 officers. Tonight it will have 16,000 out on the street, including reinforcement from elsewhere. Why on earth did it only have 6,000 out last night across the whole of London, when everyone knew what would happen? And why then did they simply watch looters? Senior officers had decreed that the “containment” tactics used to control political demonstrations should be used here. What arrant nonsense. You don’t just cordon off areas in which looters are allowed to loot.
There are root problems in society which have caused this, but the immediate cause is impunity. The criminally minded witnessed that they could loot what they wanted, while the police would merely stand and watch. As a result, more and more joined in and the situation has gone from bad to worse. One thing which has been under-reported is the amount of personal violence that has been used, with people mugged in the streets, cab and bus drivers attacked and people stoned as they ran from burning flats.
I have no problem at all with calling for the deployment of baton rounds, tear gas and water cannon. If nobody has been burnt to death so far, it is a miracle. If the odd looter gets killed by the police by accident by a baton round, I would view that as very sad but something they brought upon themselves. I would not bring in the army at the moment, but the force of society should be brought to bear by the immediate enlistment of any volunteer with no criminal record as a temporary special constable. They should look to enlist tens of thousands.
The resources of civilisation are not exhausted.
“Oh, and they didn’t touch Waterstones, for some reason.”
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obvious economics, what can turn a ‘profit’ quickly.
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just because they are thieving, doesnt mean they dont have sound business sense.
“So the fact that the press images show an overwhelming majority of the looters, rioters and arsonists as non-white is just a racist slur against the victimized-by-society immigrant community, is it?”
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it just means that the people rioting are from a predominently black population. now is that a wealthy area or a deprived area?
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“These are certainly not legitimate political protests but we surely don’t need the precedent of tear gas and water cannon to be established before the legitimate political protests start in earnest, as they surely will.”
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too late. the pretext for these has already been made.
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“The chaos brought about by the micromanagement of decades of left wing pseudo-science, from all avenues of social bureaucracy, from the government, the public media, and social services. The lesson being that you can’t push string; evolution is a damned sight more effective at moulding the human condition, than a bunch of superannuated sixth-formers in positions of power, under the influence of the Frankfurt School of Marxist-Feminism.”
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we should recall that we have for the last 30 or so years had neo liberal, neo con right wing economics and politics in the uk. that has sought to disenfranchise rather than empower, that has sought enrich a few rather than distribute. that has latterly sought to save the bankers not the nation.
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“Why on earth did it only have 6,000 out last night across the whole of London, when everyone knew what would happen? And why then did they simply watch looters?”
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same old rhetoric from the politcians, what is striking is that they are so relaxed about what has happened. they hardly appear to have any real concern, no michael heseltine moment to be certain. so they will introduce more policing powers. and thats about all.
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the media has carefully constructed a no blame firewall with respect to ideological economic strategy being employed , and the govt has distanced itself from that claim. so its just thugs, and an establishment that has allowed it fester for 3 days.
For those who can envisage themselves taking part in political protests in the not-too-distant future there may be lessons to be learned from what we have seen so far.
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For instance, it seems that it is far better to have several smaller protests happening simultaneously in different locations than it is to have one mass protest. The latter is much easier to police and makes you a sitting target for heavy handed tactics. Keep things as close to home as possible, there are clear benefits from having local knowledge. If you know the streets you’re protesting in better than the police then you have an immediate advantage.
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Also it’s important to take into account how the news is reported these days. It appears to me that the live rolling news coverage of the Tottenham riot, on Sky and the BBC, contributed to the rapid spread of copycat riots elsewhere the following day (this didn’t happen in 1985 because there were far fewer channels then). The footage of the bus going up in flames – and of policemen cowering behind their lines while rioters ran amock – was potent, dramatic and endlessly replayed. So if you want the media around, set fire to something, preferably at night. If you want the media to ignore you, protest peacefully.
Jody McIntyre is the young disabled man who was yanked out of his wheelchair at the student protests and dragged across the street. He was also interviewed very aggressively by Ben Brown of the BBC afterwards.
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He writes of his experience at the riot here.
http://jodymcintyre.wordpress.com/2011/08/08/from-brixton-to-tottenham-the-inequality-at-the-heart-of-the-riots/
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A video on You Tube that he made previously about police protests has been removed by Google.
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Also Google has admitted complying with requests from US intelligence agencies for data stored in its European data centers, most likely in violation of European Union data protection laws.
{http://news.softpedia.com/news/Google-Admits-Handing-over-European-User-Data-to-US-Intelligence-Agencies-215740.shtml}
Angrysoba
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If even Sky News understands what the underlying problems are, in their business section, then I fail to see what contribution someone thousands of miles away has to make to the underlying social problems in London today.
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You’ve nothing to go on but headline media reports from afar and anecdotal videos.
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The reason it’s in their business section is because it’s important their business readers get facts about what’s likely to happen!! Chomsky said something about that. Go look it up.
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http://news.sky.com/home/business/article/16046645
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Jon
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If you can’t distinguish between calling someone a moron, as he did me, and my suggesting that Angrysoba is complacent, then you really need to ask yourself ought you to be moderating this blog.
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Your last effort smacks of what the BBC like to convince themselves is “balance” but everyone else knows is nothing of the sort.
Angry – we refer to betting shops as bookies. I suppose that is a short form of book keepers.
~~~~~
Cameron has visited Gold Command at Scotland Yard. That is the operation controlled by Cressida Dick at the time who oversaw the assassination of Jean Charles de Menezes.
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Preliminary findings of the IPCC on the death of Mark Duggan.
Independent Police Complaints Commission’s initial ballistics results on the shooting of Mark Duggan, which triggered Saturday’s initial riots in Tottenham.
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The results show:
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• The bullet lodged in the police radio is a “jacketed round”. This is a police issue bullet and, while it is still subject to DNA analysis, it is consistent with having been fired from a Metropolitan police Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine gun.
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• The firearm found at the scene was a converted BBM “Bruni” self-loading pistol. This is not a replica; the scientist considers it to be a firearm for the purposes of the Firearms Act and a prohibited weapon and is therefore illegal.
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• The handgun was found to have a “bulleted cartridge” in the magazine, which is being subject to further tests.
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• At this stage there is no evidence that the handgun found at the scene was fired during the incident. The FSS has told the IPCC that it may not be possible to say for certain; however further tests are being carried out in an attempt to establish this.
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I agree with pretty much every Craig has said on his last 2 posts.
The general demographic of the public-facing police force has changed considerably over the past 10 years . Observe the number of female PCSOs, observe the fresh-faced young constables, observe the abundance of female officers on the front line these past few nights (not having a go at the ladies here, after all, they were on the line) and you’ll see what I mean. They hardly instill fear into criminals or confidence into the public they serve. If you’ve spent any time in the States you’ll know what I mean.
Successive governments have reduced our public services to a bare minimum and the chickens are coming home to roost. I’m not having a go at the officers but at the politicians who set the budgets.
The police have been all about easy targets and statistics for ages now. As Craig states, you often see them getting stuck into crusty students etc. but faced with a real foe they’re nowhere to be seen.
The buck has to stop with the government! I wish the officers on the streets tonight the very best of luck.
[Mod/Jon, deleted as disruptive]
Jody McIntyre loses his blog at The Independent, for corrupting the young and not believing in the city’s gods.
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http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2011/08/08/jody-mcintyre/
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Laurie Penny is the last activist blogger left.
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May God help us all.
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Some silly woman at the BBC insults Darcus Howe.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biJgILxGK0o
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Memories of Jody and Ben Brogan of the BBC.
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For Jon
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Both instances are what the BBC call balance. By way of a clue, they’re not!!
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They’re designed to instill in the viewer a negative view of the interviewee. An altogether loathsome tactic I’m sure you’ll agree.
Looting fail: http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lpnocx3dtO1r1pwklo1_500.png
Angrysoba
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Now reduced to posting boastful tweets to support his case.
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Delighted though we are that you take such an interest in London affairs, I think it’s fairly safe to asume you don’t know anything about what’s going on here.
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Again, if you’re really interested, here are some facts:
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http://news.sky.com/home/business/article/16046645
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If you want to comment on the facts, then well and good, but readers are certainly entitled to draw their own conclusions should you continue to ignore them as you have been doing.
Angy said “Here we go again.”
But apparently not. All those seemingly non-indigenously British people, looting and burning is something the lib-left cannot bear to even think about. How sad that the dominant political movement in Europe is so ossified in its thinking that it is no longer capable of dealing with reality.
Herbie – it was Ben Brown of the BBC.
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The trouble extended into Kent yesterday I see. There are already reports of trouble in Manchester this afternoon.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-14465585
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The Cameron effect is apparent at the stock exchange which was up today. Lots of lolly for his pals in the City for doing all that selling off and buying back, I think they are called ‘trades’.
Riot Fail (LOL!):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p39ULW_xzUE
This is not revolution, social or class struggle, economic deprivation. What this is called is FUN. These kids are having fun at the expense of others. There is a movement of criminality or some form of distraction behind it, but most of the kids think this is FUN and they don’t think or care about anything or anyone else.
How do I know?
I have lived in Belfast, Northern Ireland for nearly 50 years and have seen it all before and much worse.
“RECREATIONAL RIOTING”, is what it’s called here.
I know what happened in Northern Ireland was awful and about the lives lost but the young people who went out onto the streets to riot, especially in the later stages, went for the fun and excitement.
You can try and analyse all you like but that is how many of my friends seen it at the time.
I never got involved myself, as I was horrified by what I had seen as a child during the early days of the troubles.
What we see happening in britain is nothing new, it has happened before and it will happen again. I just hope it stops before anyone else get hurt or killed.
Herbiw The woman talking over Darcus Howe is Lady Gregor Charles MacGregor in real life when she is not operating for the state broadcaster. She should have stuck to fishing and clan history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiona_Armstrong
These riots aren’t a sudden outburst of latent “criminality”. They are generated and sustained by a feeling – feeling that the youth have not been able to express in any other way. It is (roughly) this:
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++ Disaffection with state control and media manipulation ++
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It has many facets, many nuances and some exceptions. But that’s the core current driving this phenomenon.
A certain irony that the rioters are using the technological tools of capitalism, the Blackberry and social media Twit-ter and Fascist-book, to co-ordinate their activties. And as strong encryption has been incorporated into the former, makes it hard to trace.
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Many are savvy enough to use generic fashion clothing and cover their faces from the prying eyes of CCTV and media cameras. Surely unless summary justice will be used, making a case at court with strong evidence is not going to be easy. There is likely to be a lawyer fest when the legal aid comes in following this.
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As for the furniture store that went up last night, I thought modern furniture had to be fairly fire resistant going back to regulations of the 1980’s. Of course this was before globalisation took hold and maybe the foreign imports do not meet the requirements as they should. Odd though that it was left to go up when Sky news helicopter relayed the whole event. Surely they must have had fire alarms?
A Sad Jester
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You’re quite right about that. Fun indeed.
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The issue however is that it was the culture of alienation produced by the bigoted statelet of NI that enabled such fun.
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So alienated were people that they had nothing but total and utter contempt and disrespect for the state that their fun enabled its downfall in that form.
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It’s that kind of alienation that we’re witnessing here. These people just don’t care anymore because the state just doesn’t care about them. They may aswell have some fun with it.
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That’s the price you pay for neoliberal policies.
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I suspect the banksters will be thinking they can rely on the army and tanks and so on to protect them when the shtf, but as we saw in NI that’s not quite what happens.
Oopsie doopsie doo
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Police to blame, again!
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“Mark Duggan did not shoot at police, says IPCC”
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/09/mark-duggan-police-ipcc
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How long will it be I wonder before the Police are brought under some sort of democratic control. They’re responsible for more breaches of the peace than all the criminals in the country added together.
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How many have they killed in police custody since 1998?
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That would be about 330.
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Any police convicted?
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Of course not!
I usually agree with Craig, but I find the suggestion of volunteer police officers and rubber bullets pretty chilling, and probably the easiest way to inflame the situation further. Do you think the volunteer police wouldn’t be brought out to bash a few heads next time there was a general strike?
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There are no quick fixes to this, it’s the end result of thirty years of ignoring inner city communities, ignoring the polarisation of wealth, and letting myriad social problems compound over generations, while at the same time bombarding people with advertising designed to encourage selfish greed. I’m not condoning violence, or excusing the individuals of responsibility, but we have to accept it happened in our society and its a societal problem. The immediate reaction may need more (genuine) police on the streets. But the real problem needs thirty years of dedicated resources to turn if around.
Bloody hell, I didn’t realise it was Amy Winehouse’s fault.
“Meanwhile, as former England cricket captain Alec Stewart began assembling a posse of vigilante test heroes, seismologists reported a sudden lurch to the right as people who own tagines found themselves calling for the immediate deployment of the Parachute Regiment and a couple of RAF Tornadoes.”
I do love the Daily Mash on these occasions.
The police could have come clean about what happened right from the start. Officers who were there when Mark Duggan was shot would have known he never fired a shot. It cannot have taken 5 days to debrief them. Or even 1 day. This fills me with disgust. What the Police did instead was lead the public to believe he shot at police at the scene and that a bullet lodged in a policeman’s radio. It’s Jean Charles de Menezes all over again. A police cover up.
Seems like Corporal Jones got put in charge whilst I was away on holiday. I know it’s the silly season but water cannon and baton rounds? I think you’ll find the senior command structure of the Police Service will be rolling their eyes at that one.
Why?
Practical reasons for a start. Water cannon is a device for dispersing large groups of people gathered in one place. It’s certainly not a useful or tool or practical option in situations where shopping malls and high streets are being rolled over by mobile groups moving rapidly from place to place. Moreover, using them to target small groups of people looting shops and setting fire to things before they move on will end up causing more damage to shops and the stock that’s left.
What was that I heard in the background there? Don’t panic! don’t panic!
Similarly with baton rounds which the professionals will only use as a last resort in situations where there is risk of injury or death to members of the public or the police. In situations where there are non-participants in the immediate vicinity of what is taking place or poor light you risk injuring or killing innocent people if you start using them indiscriminantly.
Just as an aside Craig, you haven’t moved to Tunbridge Wells have you?
I blame the mainstream media for a lot of the hot air that’s been blown about here. I’m also with the author Terry Pratchett’s observation that a lie can be twice round the world before the truth has got its boots on. The level of lazy journalism taking place is staggering. Instead of going out and doing some basic leg work much of the media spends its time in the imeediate aftermath of situations like this pinning politicians up against a wall for an instant soundbite or using a small coterie of “instant experts” rather than actually finding out what going on in different places.
So you end up with empty platitudes, fear, and panic and an absence of clear heads as everyone starts following the agenda set by the media, the politicians, the studio experts and the rest of the insular Westminster village.
Seriously, how many people actually know what is going on? Is the situation and events in Ealing the same as that in Campden or Hackney, or Croydon? What about the different parts of the country? Is Liverpool the same as Kent. Nottingham the same as Bristol? and we have not even started on motivation. Are they all the same? Are the groups involved the same? Are they ALL white? black? Working class? Middle Class? Underclass? or is there differentiation taking place?
The only answers people have are driven by the prism of what they hear and see in the media – which is a key problem here. Not only do you have peoples views and opinions affected by instant observation and comment but also interpretation. And to be frank the record is not good.
It was less than two weeks ago that we saw the same phenomenon at work with the tragic events in Norway. Where within hours we saw a plethora of “experts” stoking up the image of “Islamic Terrorism” with instant interprtation to be fed to the masses when the full facts were not known. In the course of a weekend, and without missing a beat, the “Islamist Threat” line was dropped and the edl was suddenly part of the framework of explanation. And no one, apart from Charlie Booker in the Guardian, batted an eyelid. it was like a scene from Orwells’ 1984 the way the majority of people seemed to take it in their stride as though no contradictions had occurred.
You could go through the Barroom Darts scene from the film Roxanne (Starring Steve Martin)as many times as you like with as many darts and still struggle to run out of examples of cases where the initial and official line of interpretation being fed out turns out to be load of baloney. From the Gulf of Tonkin incident; used as pretext for an escalation of US involvement in SE Asia; through to the events of Orgreave; the fatal shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes; the death of Ian Tomlinson and so on.
So you end up with a stoking up of the fear factor – which not only sells newspapers it also acts as a powerful means of controlling the agenda. At work today I thought I’d died and been banished to Daily Heil Land listening to some of the comments which seemed to be indistinguishable from whet you get in an op-ed peice in that kind of publication.
Someone in the MSM has commented about the use of social media and suddenly I’m hearing words like “they (meaning the authorities) need to to control it; but you’ll get the civil libertarians opposing that” and so on and so on.
And it then becomes difficult not to think about the contents of these observations:
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/511928.html
and starting to make comparisons.
No one has a clue what is really going on because the only source is so contaminated that any sensible person needs to keep their heads and not get paniced into knee jerk reactions based on incomplete nfacts and instant interpretations.
It’s not that long ago that a major trial – which cost shed loads of public money, not to mention the police costs involved – collapsed due to the fact that those arrested had been infiltrated by an Agent Provocetuer working for the state security services and that it is public knowledge that he was not alone. Anyone who has been around long enough also learns that the majority of “left” groups and protest groups are infiltrated and many even compromised and led by such people. How does anyone know for sure whether or not some of these events are being stoked up in similar fashion?
The answer is we dont know one way or the other. All we have is instant interpretation affecting our view which most sensible people should treat with a hefty dose of scepticism because experience has demonstrated it to be suspect at best. We need to keep a clear head, a sense of perspective (150 youths smashing windows in Manchester City Centre reported tonight. That might have made the papers back in the 60’s and 70’s as a relatively small event on a Saturday during the days of footbal hooliganism), and a mindset which seeks to improve the situation.
This latter objective can only be achieved by analysing things properly using evidence based approaches. At the momeent this is not possible because the dominant discourse is shouting very loudly in a knee jerk way like a Borg on Steroids that “context is futile” and not an option.
If the Colonal Blinks, and you know who you are becuase you wear it like a badge of pride like the dumb dog in the fables, want to be taken seriously as part of the solution rather than remaining part of the problem, I’m afraid you are going to have to start living in the real world and drop such a nonsensical position. Consideration and study of the context is not a method of excusing something it’s a method of analysis and synthesis vital for tackling the issues raised here.
More police violence to end something that began with police violence, I say!
Sam,
At the start of the NI troubles the local self-appointed volunteer police force became one of the top paramilitary organisations causing more damage to the community it was supposed to protect than its so called enemies. So this idea of Craig’s to empower the community does not always work for the good.
Plastic baton rounds are deadly weapons and should not be used however; water cannon with a dye so that rioters can be identified later would be good.
Herbie,
The young man who was sadly killed, had a gun, WHY?
Most police officers do not go out every day to kill they are there to protect. The PSNI (RUC) is constantly blamed for acts that are carried out by groups or individuals. The Omagh bomb is only one example.
The police do not plant bombs or murder people in cold blood, in some cases shadowy groups connected to government may or may not , a misguided individual or an infiltrator or by mistake but not the Bobby on the beat. The organisation as a whole (apart from the top brass taking a bung from News Corp) is doing a pretty good job. The police needs are support and this includes keeping them in check and within the law.
It is time the blame was put back where it belongs not on the police, the government or the greedy rich but people. Those who loot and destroy the property of others are breaking the law, are law they are not revolutionary freedom fighters seeking social justice or heroic outlaws just bored, selfish brats behaving like spoilt children.
Craig’s piece is very naive and superficial. Expecting teenagers to target the homes of bankers and the super-rich for arson, is asking a lot of them isn’t it?
As I believe bourgeois democracy is dead and we’re heading for a kind of ‘fuedal’ dictatorship, the return of the famous London ‘Mob’ was only to be expected, after all, Cameron and Osbourne seem like figures from the eighteenth century, fabulously wealthy aristocrats lecturing the peasantry about the Big Society.
Cameron’s latest drivel, that a massive social explosion, is really and simply criminal activity, shows that he knows about as much about sociology as he does about economics, which is close to nothing.
Revolutions… have to start somewhere, don’t they? They are rarely pretty and don’t follow a neat plan. Is this the start of a revolution? Unfortunately, probably not, but it is another step along the road to revolution.
Somehow, we have to remove the ruling elite from power, typified by Cameron and Osbourne. What kind of society allows shits like them to accumulate a £100,000,000 between them? Basically, with people like them re-emerging to claim their natural birthright to rule over the common people… we are doomed.
Craig is also totally wrong about ‘education’ and the anti-education stance of young people. They are right to reject the bullshit fed to them in crap schools, for what it is, pure propaganda, designed to make them conform and serve the state, the corporate state.
In fact the youngsters are reacting ‘rationally’ and ‘normally’ in a society that’s sick, depraved, degenerate, undemocratic, corrupt and doomed.
It’s not the kids who are a threat to ‘civilisation’, but Cameron and the ruling elite, people who are destroying civilsation with extraordinary speed.
These kids are our children, we created the world they grew up in, we created the ideas and values they see all around them, and then we are shocked when they react to a world gone mad?
And what do the vicious, imperialist attacks on Afghanistan, Iraq, and now Libya teach our young people? That we take, with ultra-violence, what we want, by any means necessary.
These are the lessons our young people learn, and they’ve learned them well. This is how we ‘educate’ them. They are not blind and they are not stupid.
Even in ancient Rome there were periodic uprisings by the slave-class. These were usually, nasty, brutish and short. But do we blame the slaves for their slavery and their spontaneous and violent reaction to their inhuman treatment?
And if young people are ignorant and uneducated, why is that? Did it just happen by magic? No, it’s a direct result of government policy, educate them a little, but not too much. Enough to work and serve, but not enough to question and think, not enough to become a threat to the established social order.
And this crap about ‘materialism’ is annoying too. We are subjected to what can only really be described as brainwashing by society, specifically movies, the media, and commercials and advertizing; a veritable ministry of capitalist, consumerism and ideology… and then we wonder in dumb surpise that our youth are ‘materialists.’
Are children are corrupted by materialist propaganda from birth, isn’t their reaction to their ‘education’ perfectly normal? Are they supposed to calmly sit back and not want all they’ve been promised just because we’ve entered the Age of Austerity? Are they supposed to accept growing inequality and their pauperisation just because the cunt Cameron tells them to?