I'm in Newham at the moment. It's very tense and there's a massive standoff in the main road. The media are completely ignoring it.

it wouldn't be so bad if it was actually about the guy who got shot, protest isn't a bad thing, but everyone is just being opportunistic and robbing everywhere & setting random stuff on fire. They're just detroying people's lives, it's rubbish.

... i read they even tried to rob a charity shop. How low is that?!?!

Last edited by IceCream (2011 August 09, 1:08 pm)

dizmox wrote:

...are making me angry. [...] This wouldn't happen in Japan.

I read yahoo news a lot because it's fairly sensationalistic and entertaining... and there is always this really predictable cesspool of comments underneath the article where people compare fukushima with new orleans/ LA & Paris riots, saying really racist things. that stuff makes me angry.

yes its stupid to destroy your own neighborhood. yes these people probably were not parented correctly. But it's also important to know that despite 'common knowledge' there was actually significant looting of ATMs and convenience stores inside severely-hit touhoku prefectures.
(http://www.debito.org/?p=9248)

I think it's important to see these things in a greyscale otherwise we end up with very unpleasant generalizations (not that that was where you were going dizmox)

Last edited by dtcamero (2011 August 09, 2:32 pm)

When I say Japan I mean the hypothetical nation where everything is perfect and nothing bothers me except for overhead power lines and a lack of proper bread in the supermarkets.

Having been mugged before as a kid in my relatively safe town it's frustrating that a lot of these people will just be let off lightly/never get caught, then continue to live off the state they think has a grudge against them. |:

IceCream wrote:

You have to look at the situation too though. The "it's stupid to destroy your own neighbourhood" idea is ok, if your neighbourhood is alright to begin with. So many in London are just poverty stricken dumps.

The tottenham neighborhood is actually full of really nice hundred-year-old-plus buildings that are being torched... it's kind of like harlem, which is packed with decaying, yet gorgeous rehab-able brownstones. Quite a sad thing really...

I empathize with the fact that this is a community that is largely marginalized, probably willing to assimilate if given the chance... but not being offered much in the way of employment and treated with great suspicion, to understate, by police.
But, i'm sorry it will reiterate that it's stupid for them, especially them, to destroy their own neighborhood.
1) They not have much chance of it being rebuilt with anything better.
2) There are businesses in those neighborhoods that provide jobs. Those jobs are gone now as those businesses will move/close. New businesses are definitely not moving in... not a smart way to protest youth unemployment.
3) The olympics will be held very close to tottenham next year, something traditionally thought of as a prize for the city/country, leading to an economic boost. Well those shoppers are certainly going to stay away from surrounding areas now, even though they obviously need that money the most. Very little of that boost will help these people now.
Not trying to argue here but it's also hard to empathize with the rioters because of the blatant opportunism of the looting... Even Malcolm X would say that you've lost the argument when you show up in a suspiciously new set of sneaks.

dtcamero wrote:

dizmox wrote:

...are making me angry. [...] This wouldn't happen in Japan.

I read yahoo news a lot because it's fairly sensationalistic and entertaining... and there is always this really predictable cesspool of comments underneath the article where people compare fukushima with new orleans/ LA & Paris riots, saying really racist things. that stuff makes me angry.

yes its stupid to destroy your own neighborhood. yes these people probably were not parented correctly. But it's also important to know that despite 'common knowledge' there was actually significant looting of ATMs and convenience stores inside severely-hit touhoku prefectures.
(http://www.debito.org/?p=9248)

I think it's important to see these things in a greyscale otherwise we end up with very unpleasant generalizations (not that that was where you were going dizmox)

erm looting in a disaster zone where people have lost everything is different to the looting for fun in London.

... yeah, i'm not trying to say it's not dumb. But it's not so easy to think entirely rationally when you're caught up in the moment, and you've been feeling rubbish for a while either.

Like i said, i dislike the opportunism too. But what they're doing is based on feeling, i guess, not rational argument. That type of arguments can explain why people feel like that to begin with, but they can't act as justification for the event.

Y'know, i kinda feel the same atm. i wouldn't ever do that, for rational, moral reasons. But if i'm truthful, part of me wants to be there caught up in the excitement of the moment too, & let out a bit of anger. I can almost taste that feeling of freedom, it would feel so good!! So, i dunno, i think i can understand, a bit...

Last edited by IceCream (2011 August 09, 5:30 pm)

Sorry for the rant but my sister's place has been done.  I am raging! She even knows some of them. No poverty there, I can tell you.  Some of the people arrested to tonight: a graphic designer, teacher, someone about to join the army, a recent graduate..... They are scum.  This is just a laugh for them.  Bet 95% of them have no idea of what happened in Tottenham.  Wankers.

""Politicians and other officials keep condemning this behaviour as unacceptable, but how can impotently allowing this to continue be considered acceptable? I don't know what the solution is, but simply standing there in riot gear with occasional charging clearly isn't it. They should have realised this and acted upon it after an hour on Saturday night, yet here we are on Tuesday already with an estimated £100 million of damage and an innumerable human cost watching new scenes unfold on TV."

They do nothing because they are afraid of being accused of police brutality.  Indeed one policeman went to far in the G20 riots and a man died.  There are a few nasty police but most are not.  They are dammed if they step in and dammed if they don't.  They are not allowed to do their job. In the end, this is the result. It has been coming for a while. Britain has become very selfish and very second rate. There is littel respect for others. Especially from the rioters.  They do not care about anyone or any cause.

Icecream, being an ex communist,  I can understand what you are saying, but I grew up in Hackney when there was far more poverty then than there is now.  There was no 'fun' stuff. We played football in the street or on the Marshes or in Victoria Park. That was it. There was crime, but nothing like this.  It is nothing to do with the Tories or cuts.  It is to do with crap parents, crap education,  no role models and no fear of the law. All made worse by the drug culture and disparate communities.  We have a permanent underclass now. How come the Jews did not riot when then came, or the Indians or the Chinese.  Sorry it is a certain section of the black community and and large section of scumbag whites. These are the same scum that try to sell drugs to my kids, get pissed and are agressive, tend to have pitbull dogs (they never have poodles!), they are the same people that terrorize our street every weekend (the police catch them but the CPS do not prosecute - no wonder the scum act with with impunity.

Robbing a Charity is awful but not worse than robbing a chain store.  The Charity provides very little work for local people. The chain store does.  Both are awful and will hurt the community.  Re Charity cuts. My brother (lives around the corner from my sister in South London)  lost his leg a few years ago. He is always looking for work. Half his street is on benefits and never try. Some were on the sick but manage to do little black market jobs. No back pain there.   His next door neighbour just says "Why should I work?  I would need to earn £42K to cover my benefits".  My brother can't really pay his bills but next door has 3 cars.  There are people suffering and some estates are awful but not as many as you think.  There were job vacancies. Brits did not want them. So the Poles took them. Good luck to them. Can't we send our scum back to Warsaw?

Sadly, the cuts will get worse.  We have an enormous debt that has to be paid. This is just the start.

Britain is selfish. High earners don't pay enough tax, the rest of us are on the make because everyone else is on the make  without giving anything back.  We are a take, take society.  Sure that is not true for most of us, but the minority is a massive, pernicious cancer.

I am sad for Britain that the truth is now out.  Oh shit!  and next year we have the Olympics

Just a point about Japan. It is true they would not do this now, but there were some fruity old riots in the 40s 50s and 60s.  But there was real poverty then - I mean not enough food, not todays  British definition ie  can't afford an IPod or trainers.

As my sister says, if they are caught (bloody unlikely) what will the scum get? Nothing.

Last edited by midnightsun (2011 August 09, 7:22 pm)

The system doesn't work but there are some giant echonomical powers who try to protect it no matter the cost, these people are the result of the actions taken by those echonomical powers who, through the system, marginalize these people.
It's clear it's not their fault but the fault of those corporations.
The actions taken by the so-called "rioters" may not be THAT right (those cases of looting seem kind of exaggerated by the media, I still think they're not the rule but the exception) but their voices would not reach the politics otherwise.
Though if someone could teach me which are the specific reasons for these riots, it'd be easier to analyze.

Helen White and Robert Knight had to flee their burning flat above a supermarket near Ealing Green after it was set alight by petrol bombs.

Miss White, 31, said: "It was absolutely terrifying but we thought we would be safe in our flat. Then we saw them smashing up windows in the supermarket and they threw petrol bombs in. It was just a matter of time before the flames reached us. We panicked and ran for our lives. We knocked on our neighbours' doors to tell them to get out.

"We grabbed what we could from the flat and just fled. We could smell the burning. It was utterly terrifying."

Miss White, a musician, and Mr Knight, 27, a television production engineer, estimate they have lost £30,000 of equipment in the fire which ripped through three storeys and tore apart the roof.

------


Stay classy UK.

You can add any Japanese university in the 1960s to the list of riots too.