Tottenham Riots

[laklak]

[ Those others have iPods and flat screen televisions, they don't.

All God's chilluns got iPods and flat screens now.

[Coito ergo sum]

I'm not sure that the rioters don't have ipods and flat screen t.v.'s. I know a lot of "the poor" in the U.S. have ipods and flat screen t.v.'s.

I see a lot of poor areas in a lot of different countries not rioting. I'm just not sure what the motivation is. I don't think it's the poverty itself, or the relative disparity. As we never stop hearing from Brits on other threads, the US has - they say - far more income disparity than in Britain, and of course, in the US, we let people die in the streets because people in the US are unable to get health care. So, we see Britain, which of course is far better and more compassionate and far more of an equal society than the US, having poverty riots. Why? They are certainly closer to equal than we are in the US, right? So why don't the poor, underclass in the US riot today since things are so much worse?

I mean - I know there have been riots in the US - but, that just illustrates my point that the riots must be caused by something other this idea that of underclass angst. Right?

[Tyrannical]

[ Those others have iPods and flat screen televisions, they don't.

All God's chilluns got iPods and flat screens now.

They had them before the riots. The UK newspapers even had to censor photos of large screen TVs and Xboxs when visiting poor unemployed council residents.

[laklak]

Well, the U.S. is a police state, under the control of Pentecostal Tea Baggers armed with sawed off shotguns and nooses, riding around in gas guzzling pickup trucks looking for minorities to lynch and denying global warming. And then there's the HAARP initiative, don't get me started on that. 9/11 and the Japanese tsunami proved beyond any doubt that the moon landings were faked and that George Bush is actually a hologram created by extraterrestrial nematodes that live on Nibiru. U.S. hospitals are cleverly camouflaged death camps where poor people are injected with AIDS and then ground up and sprayed from commercial airliners that are actually CIA listening posts.

[Coito ergo sum]

That tears it. I'm off to start a riot now.

[Ironclad]

I view the idea that the riots are caused by the poverty of the rioters with some skepticism.
I can't help feeling that something else must be moving the mob. I don't know what it is, though.

Perhaps this is the physical form of the term Broken Britain?
The Guardian has an interesting page about this phenomenon, or social-collapse, if you will.

Perhaps we could topic this properly and try to dissect the thing? It is odd to many that while UK families are hardly Somalian refugees their own feelings are of being deprived and lost and very separate to 'the norm'. Personally, and I know these estates too well, I see a hideous sub-class of lower working-class families and it will not break easily. They are fearless, jealous, aggressive, immoral and self-justified in all of these descriptions. The (often young) parents cry, "there ain't nuffink for them (kids) to do around here", but there is; but the kids will not play ball - the yoof club is a place to deal drugs and fight. What can we do, sociologists?

[laklak]

What can we do, sociologists?

Get back to old-fashioned English justice.

[Tyrannical]

Some type of public whipping without too damaging of a whip would be really effective and cheap. Quick too, so they can "move on with their lives" like they always want.

[Warren Dew]

Perhaps we could topic this properly and try to dissect the thing? It is odd to many that while UK families are hardly Somalian refugees their own feelings are of being deprived and lost and very separate to 'the norm'. Personally, and I know these estates too well, I see a hideous sub-class of lower working-class families and it will not break easily. They are fearless, jealous, aggressive, immoral and self-justified in all of these descriptions. The (often young) parents cry, "there ain't nuffink for them (kids) to do around here", but there is; but the kids will not play ball - the yoof club is a place to deal drugs and fight. What can we do, sociologists?

This is the same subculture Rum describes, right? It's self perpetuating at this point because it's in its second or third generation? So why do these people, who presumably don't have a lot of money to spare, having children?

[Robert_S]

I blame an increasingly consumerist and status obsessed culture that has implanted the notion that if you do not have X, Y and Z then you are somehow not worthy.

Add that to a bit of class-ism and or racism in economic situation where it is increasingly difficult to get such things, and you've got a bunch of pissed off kids with fucked values.

[Ironclad]

@ WD Bigger welfare payouts, bigger housing, family protection??

[Horwood Beer-Master]

...Its not about right or left right now. Its about public order. You want your house looted?

Any looting here could only improve on the clutter and chaos.

Fine then. I’ll be round later with a brick, a swag-bag, and some petrol and matches. OK?

...Without cash the mob will just loot...

Without cash where the fuck did they get their BlackBerry from?

Raising class consciousness by raising the neighbourhood?..

These shit-eating vermin can’t even spell consciousness.

...We are engaged in countless dodgy military conflicts abroad and imagine this kind of rank behaviour on the international stage won't come home and haunt us?

That post almost seemed half sensible up ‘till that point. Linking this violence to “dodgy military conflicts”? Seriously? W.T.F?

...I am sure young people are hugely marginalised and have been ignored this last decade or more...

They’ve been excused this last decade or more – that’s a major part of the problem.

...These kids are the result of the system and the creation, in this country anyway of (until now) an almost invisible underclass, who however hateful many of its individual members may be, are fundamentally victims of the system we have created over the past 50 years...

They’re not nearly as much victims as the people they are victimising. Also a large part of the blame has to be placed on the culture they’ve created, for themselves, over the past however-many years. I know how this probably sounds but I don’t think it should be so easily and lazily dismissed that, for example) “gangsta’ rap” (among other things) has played a role here.

Bad policy and bad economics may create the social niche for this abhorrent culture we see on display here to thrive, but they didn’t create that culture in the first place.

A rotten system is one thing, and we all played a part in that. But the scenes we’ve witnessed as the result of rotten memes – and those memes aren’t our memes.

Just as with religious memes, I am not prepared to excuse any individual infected with these memes any responsibility for the fact that they are infected.

If you are a religious bigot I don’t forgive you your attitudes just because you were raised in an environment of religious bigotry. Similarly if you are one of the no-nothing, care-nothing, shit-eating vermin we’ve seen on our streets, I don’t forgive you your attitudes just because you were raised in an environment of no-nothing, care-nothing, shit-eating vermitude.

Only catching up on all of this today so a little out of the loop.. But why not bring the army in? The kind of people (*dips brush in tar*) looting and setting fire to anything and everything are generally the kind who have no respect for 'fuckin' pigs' spoiling their fun but do respect 'our boys' fighting for our country.

I’m not sure this is true actually.
There is a large section of (both employed, and unemployed) poor in this country – mostly Sun readers - who are religiously, unswervingly uncritical of the armed forces. But I think most of those on the streets are several degrees further down on the social scale, and don’t respect anyone who isn’t one of there own (and probably not most of those who are).

It makes me laugh when they are described as organised though. An organised mob would burn the police stations first

Organised does not mean intelligent.

According to one commenter on the BBC website, it's all down to a "Failed education system where reading parables & singing hymns was long since banned by atheists & trade unions"...

"…Signed a Mister P. Hitchens…"

...Using the army doesn't necessitate use of guns. They can act as additional riot police.

And would probably do a better job than the gormless plod, even if they went in unarmed and without riot gear. It would be amusing to see how quickly these tough “gangsta’s” go running crying home to mummy if they were faced with people who’ve faced the Taliban.

At worst, the damage of these riots will cost something along the lines of millions of pounds...

The worst damage isn’t the financial damage.

...White-collar financial crime such as fraud, embezzlement and tax evasion is theft and looting of resources which costs the economy tens of billions of pounds each and every year...

I agree. It is not however, in the immediate short-term here and now, the thing that’s most threatening peoples lives and communities.

...If we're willing to do something as drastic as sending in the military to deal with rioting which is costing the economy millions, why aren't we making the same effort to tackle white-collar financial crime (which primarily occurs within the City of London) which is costing the economy billions annually? It was more a way of highlighting the inherent bias that's involved in tackling crime. Just looters wear suits and work within legitimate businesses, doesn't mean they shouldn't be brought to justice with the full force of the law...

The people aren’t calling for troops to be sent in because of how much this is costing us. They are asking for it because they want their towns, and life, back.

Don’t think that anyone who condemns the rioters isn’t necessarily apoplectically angry with the goings-on of the political elite and super-rich. Both these this are important issues – one is just a great-fucking deal more urgent (urgency and importance are lest-we-forget, separate concepts, even if they do have a tendency to overlap.

...Believe me...

Rather not.

...Everyone is welcome to read all my posts...

Doesn’t mean they’ll thank you for it.

Sorry Ronja - I thought you were just being inane for the sake of it...

No that’s just you.

Democracy Now Have a good video including an interview with journalist Darcus Howe...

Which is it - a good video, or one including an interview with professional-outraged-black-man Darcus Howe? It can’t be both

If that ludicrous man really wants to do something useful, he can donate that chip on his shoulder to the Horn of Africa. It should keep the population fed for at least a decade.

...i preferred this one

I wonder if any Grauniad journalists could even locate any of the places the rioting has been happening without the aid of google maps?

...Who else here is close to the riots?

The closest any looting got to me was in Orpington (well St Mary Cray to be exact). There were apparently morons spreading false rumours on the internet on Tuesday night (“OMG, they’ve burned down Primark in Bromley” “OMG, it’s all kicking off in Dartford” “OMG, they’ve closed and boarded-up ASDA in Swanley” e.t.c) but it was all complete bollocks.

...Stafford Scott, a community leader, has also reported that the gun said to have been found at the scene "was found in a sock meaning it wasn't prepared for action"...

How would Stafford Scott know this? What is his source?

Considering the state of the economy someone burning down your shop and claiming insurance is probably about the best that could happen to many people

Grow-up.

...suspected armed gang-member...

Not suspected. He was armed.




Right, I think that takes me up to page 20 - the rest can wait for now.

[Bella Fortuna]

Hmm.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... 8.facebook

UK riots: grammar school girl is accused of theft

Laura Johnson appears as far removed as is possible from the lawless "underclass" said to have been blighting Britain's streets.

[Ironclad]

Thinking Aloud wrote: According to one commenter on the BBC website, it's all down to a "Failed education system where reading parables & singing hymns was long since banned by atheists & trade unions"...

Goblin wrote: "…Signed a Mister P. Hitchens…"

ps Horwood/goblin the BB was stolen, don't you think. hehehe

[Atheist-Lite]

Now it's started it won't stop. The initial victory will brave them up. Even if the police use water canon or the army are brought in they've tasted victory and that'll brave 'em up so the nightmare will go on and never end. Not until a chav sits on the throne. And we'll all know about that. Consider this the opening round in a multi-round fight, and the 'outsiders' have scored big time.