RIOTS THREAD MERGED

[Ash4781]

Well some High Streets in the UK just consist of a single grotty supermarket, some pound shops and a few Charity shops.

What are they going to be running of with next ?

Maybe the must have item is some old mans pants, some surgical stockings and a few moth eaten cardigans from Help The Aged.

Reminds me of that Fast show character.

[South Lorne]

My Dad has always been utterly opposed to police holding guns, he said 35 years ago that this is where it gets you.

His view was no guns for police, but anyone shooting at one gets everything the law has to offer (min full life term, maybe the chop), that way he reckons you'd create minimum incentive to shoot a copper (because you know he's not packing) and maximum disincentive, plus the coppers don't go, as you put it, all Robocop.

Sounds right enough I think.

..should be a death sentence or nothing shooting a civilian or an unarmed policeman....for arsonists who cause death ...death sentence also....

[The Eagle]

Are these people counter-revolutionary revisionists, or just stooges for tptb? Or are there just loads of normal people who don't make noise like the knobheads?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-14456857

I wonder if people start asking themselves what they pay council tax for if they have to do everything themselves anyway...

[Traktion]

Unless they change their passwords often, human lazyiness will make it easy to get the password.

You don't need to change often. You just need to use something long and varied.

http://www.lockdown.co.uk/?pg=combi

[copydude]

22,135 children, aged between 10-13 years were jailed in 2010.

There has been a nine-fold increase of imprisonment of those aged 10-15 years, in nine years. [92-2001] That has continued to increase.But the number of children cautioned, reprimanded, warned or convicted has declined by more than a fifth.

Most juvenile crime continues to be non-violent property offences such as theft.

In 1993, John Major, the then prime minister, urged society "to condemn a little more and understand a little less."

In 1997, the Labour government condemned the "excuse culture" that allowed young criminals not to take responsibility for their actions.

The only plausible explanation for what has happened is the determination of successive governments employing intense authoritarian efforts to maintain cohesion, leading to an ever greater strain on the population.

[As Tainter points out in his collapse of Complex Civilisations], whatever the apparent cause of societal collapse may appear to be, the ultimate cause is an economic one.

And whilst it is often assumed that the collapse of society is a catastrophe for that society, it was probably a very rational preference of ordinary individuals, many of whom were actually better off, as they did not have to continue to pay for the burdensome complexity of empire.

Which sounds about right to me.

Thanks for that. Just the headline, 22,135 children, aged between 10-13 years were jailed in 2010, suggests there is a problem someone doesn't want to see.

[Supertop]

HAS THE WORD "BLACK" BEEN BANNED?

[bogbrush]

I wonder if people start asking themselves what they pay council tax for if they have to do everything themselves anyway...

My sense is that people would consider this something beyond standard council duties and pitch in. Also a way for normals to show their position, since they're not going to chuck stones back at them.

[erat_forte]

I note the BBC is referring to "UK riots".

Not much rioting in the Scottish half of the Union.

I suppose "English riots" doesn't look good on Aunty B though.

[Supertop]

I made this point also, about 1000 posts ago.

'Groups of youths' do you mean 'groups of black youths'?

Because that's virtually exclusively what it is.

The opening line of the Jeremy Vine show today was "Why are our youth rioting?"

[interestrateripoff]

Looks like it's kicking off again in different parts of the country.

[the shaping machine]

The opening line of the Jeremy Vine show today was "Why are our youth rioting?"

It's like the old joke about Pravda: "You just have to know how to read between the lines".

[The Eagle]

My sense is that people would consider this something beyond standard council duties and pitch in. Also a way for normals to show their position, since they're not going to chuck stones back at them.

That would make sense if the councils where normally efficient and useful. But given all the news articles in the last few years about ridiculous salaries for management level council employees and the cutting of useful services I would not be surprised if people started thinking that they might be able to keep their community tidy and safe far better then the council does.

The state is really showing here how useless it is, demanding high taxes and providing little in return.

---

Edited August 9, 2011 by awake_eagle

[dances with sheeple]

I made this point also, about 1000 posts ago.

'Groups of youths' do you mean 'groups of black youths'?

Because that's virtually exclusively what it is.

Kay Burley? from Sky made a song and dance when the guy she was interviewing said a large group of BLACK guys attacked his shop, she almost made him retract the statement, by saying there MUST have been whites among them, to which he replied, well there was a white guy....me Her little piece with 'ja ja' was funny when the bloke just came up and started shouting that Buckingham palace and parliament would burn next ..I f*ucking wish . She seemed hot and bothered about what was going on, saying her son wouldn`t sit down for week if she knew he had looted shops etc. Made her all the more do-able I thought

Edited August 9, 2011 by dances with sheeple

[Mrs Bear]

That would make sense if the councils where normally efficient and useful. But given all the news articles in the last few years about ridiculous salaries for management level council employees and the cutting of useful services I would not be surprised if people started thinking that they might be able to keep their community tidy and safe far better then the council does.

The state is really showing here how useless it is, demanding high taxes and providing little in return.

---

On top of which they pay consultants millions of £ to tell them how to manage.

How did council management manage before consultants were invented?

[KingBingo]

Kay Burley? from Sky made a song and dance when the guy she was interviewing said a large group of BLACK guys attacked his shop, she almost made him retract the statement.

From 3:45 minutes in.

The liberal elite simply do not want to hear it. The man saw what he saw he was there, she was not.

[The Eagle]

Good analysis of some issues behind this:

Nothing 'mindless' about rioters

Daniel Hind Last Modified: 09 Aug 2011 18:04

Although riots are complex social phenomenona, the recent unrest in England has inescapably political roots.

Civil disturbances never have a single, simple meaning. When the Bastille was being stormed the thieves of Paris doubtless took advantage of the mayhem to rob houses and waylay unlucky revolutionaries. Sometimes the thieves were revolutionaries. Sometimes the revolutionaries were thieves. And it is reckless to start making confident claims about events that are spread across the country and that have many different elements. In Britain over the past few days there have been clashes between the police and young people. Crowds have set buildings, cars and buses on fire. Shops have been looted and passersby have been attacked. Only a fool would announce what it all means.

We can dispense with some mistakes, though. It is wrong to say that the riots are apolitical. The trouble began on Saturday night when protesters gathered at Tottenham police station to demand that the police explain the circumstances in which a local man, Mark Duggan, had been shot dead by the police. The death of a Londoner, another black Londoner, at the hands of the police has a gruesome significance. The police are employed to keep the peace and the police shot someone dead. This is a deeply political matter. Besides, it is conventional to say how much policing in London has changed since the Brixton riots of the early eighties - but not many people mouthing the conventional wisdom have much firsthand experience of being young and poor in Britain's inner cities.

More broadly, any breakdown of civil order is inescapably political. Quite large numbers of mostly young people have decided that, on balance, they want to take to the streets and attack the forces of law and order, damage property or steal goods. Their motives may differ - they are bound to differ. But their actions can only be understood adequately in political terms. While the recklessness of adrenaline has something to do with what is happening, the willingness to act is something to be explained. We should perhaps ask them what they were thinking before reaching for phrases like "mindless violence". We might actually learn something.

The fierce conflict remains ahead

The profusion of images that modern technology generates makes it even more difficult to impose a single meaning on a complex event. Those who live in terror of a feral underclass and those who are worried about the impact of fiscal austerity on vulnerable communities can find material online that confirms their world-view. There will be a fierce conflict in the weeks ahead as politicians, commentators and others seek to frame the events of the last few days in ways that serve their wider agenda. The police, for example, will call for increased budgets to deal with the increased risks of civil disorder. In this sense, too, riots are inescapably political events.

There are signs too that technology is allowing individuals to intervene in the process by which meaning is assigned to social events. When disorder broke out in France in 2005 in somewhat similar circumstances the political right was the major beneficiary. Sarkozy's rise from interior minister to president owed a great deal to his role in expressing the anxious aggression of a mass constituency that often lived far away from the burning cars and public buildings.

In London today people were on the streets tidying up the damage. The hashtag #riotcleanup on Twitter is being used by councils and residents to coordinate the work. The decision to act in this way, to make the streets a little more safe, to reclaim them for peaceful sociability, steps away from the temptation to condemn the violence or explain it in terms that inevitably simplify or distort it. Those who come together like this will be less likely to conclude that the country is on the verge of chaos, less likely to call for harsh measures and the further erosion of liberty in the name of security. It is the one shrewd thing one can do in present circumstances and it is to be celebrated.

So there is no single meaning in what is happening in London and elsewhere. But there are connections that we can make, and that we should make. We have a major problem with youth unemployment. There have already been cuts in services for young people. State education in poor areas is sometimes shockingly bad. Young people cannot afford adequate private housing and there is a shortage of council-built stock. Economic inequality has reached quite startling levels. All this is the consequence of decisions made by governments and there is little hope of rapid improvement. The same politicians now denouncing the mindless violence of the mob all supported a system of political economy that was as unstable as it was pernicious. They should have known that their policies would lead to disaster. They didn't know. Who then is more mindless?

The global economic crisis is at least as political as the riots we've seen in the last few days. It has lasted far longer and done far more damage. We need not draw a straight line from the decision to bail out the banks to what's going on now in London. But we must not lose sight of what both events tell us about our current condition. Those who want to see law and order restored must turn their attention to a menace that no amount of riot police will disperse; a social and political order that rewards vandalism and the looting of public property, so long as the perpetrators are sufficiently rich and powerful.

http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/08/201189165143946889.html

[The Masked Tulip]

WOW: Sales Of Aluminum Bats On Amazon.uk Are Up Over 5000% As Riots Continue

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/sales-of-aluminum-bats-on-amazonuk-up-over-5000-as-riots-continue-2011-8#ixzz1UYmVbyby

[Executive Sadman]

Ive seen a few of what i think are white girls rioting. Though its hard to tell given the gallon or so of fake tan splattered across their faces.

[Mrs Bear]

The 'Bling' culture and consumerism are inextricably linked.

for 30 years this has been escalating and since 2008 the gap between rich and the relatively poor has grown.

Consumerism has sown its ugly roots. If you keep telling people they are worthless without the latest phone, iPad, trainers, 4x4 and dare I say houses, then they have a choice: be worthless or take it.

We should be telling these kids that education is everything..... but now even that is unaffordable.

An education to 18 comes free.

I bet a lot of rioters haven't even got a GCSE to their name, because they couldn't be arsed to work at school, because they knew they could live on benefits and nobody was ever going to make them train for anything or get a job - and stick to it.

And don't anybody tell me there aren't any jobs - this problem existed when there were plenty of jobs for anyone who really wanted one and was reasonably employable, i.e. basic numeracy/literacy skills and some sort of work ethic.

Our supine Soft Society has a lot to answer for.

[dances with sheeple]

From 3:45 minutes in.

The liberal elite simply do not want to hear it. The man saw what he saw he was there, she was not.

Yes, it was a pathetic 1984/ Farenheit 451 moment. She should just have let it pass, he was not advocating anything beyond just stating what he saw. If this stuff keeps going off though, there are going to be sections of the business community/general public fighting back.

Edited August 9, 2011 by dances with sheeple

[Executive Sadman]

From 3:45 minutes in.

The liberal elite simply do not want to hear it. The man saw what he saw he was there, she was not.

Unbelievable.

[Pole]

We should be telling these kids that education is everything..... but now even that is unaffordable.

really???

As far as I know education is free in the UK. Moreover, council libraries are free with free internet and health care is free.

Compared to the 80% of the world - that's a great start.

However, what's the point of studying and working in a country such as the UK with no real policing and law enforcement?

I watch TV now and I see groups of scared policemen who are running away from children... Simply unbelievable - the world is watching and laughing... :blink

[200p]

WOW: Sales Of Aluminum Bats On Amazon.uk Are Up Over 5000% As Riots Continue

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/sales-of-aluminum-bats-on-amazonuk-up-over-5000-as-riots-continue-2011-8#ixzz1UYmVbyby

When Obama was elected, sales of guns went through the roof. They are onto a good thing. We await widespread U.S civil unrest.

[The Ayatollah Buggeri]

And don't anybody tell me there aren't any jobs - this problem existed when there were plenty of jobs for anyone who really wanted one and was reasonably employable, i.e. basic numeracy/literacy skills and some sort of work ethic.

One thing that occurs to me in relation to the reports of Blackberry Messenger being used to organise looting attacks: in order to be able to use BB Messenger, you have to be able to read and write. If the reports are true, the schools on sink estates have been doing a better job than I'd given them credit for!

[Goat]

On top of which they pay consultants millions of £ to tell them how to manage.

Not quite; they pay consultants to support the decision they've already made.

Then when it all goes wrong they say: "we followed the consultants recommendations"

How did council management manage before consultants were invented?

The same as they do now: badly.

But pre-internet and mass media it was much easier to cover up.