London Riots


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The Exchange

Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
I mean, I've read about The Clash!

Yes but was it really about the Clash? Or just about the clash.

The Exchange

Zombieneighbours wrote:


This thread, is a response to a horrible set of events, discussing its in a largely mature and level manner. We may well disagree, we may well even get into an argument, but we aren't trying to make one another angry, we are not dragging the conversational of its topic, we are not being disruptive. We are merely discussing a subject we find of interest.

Yes it is, yet the manner of the discussion, well that is another thing entirely.


Rioting has spread to brum, and their appears to have been a shooting in Leicester.

Correction: Leeds not leicester.


Two articles I found regarding not the riots so much as the underlying tensions behind them (note that there are two articles linked there)

Quote:

...here's a sad truth, expressed by a Londoner when asked by a television reporter: Is rioting the correct way to express your discontent?

"Yes," said the young man. "You wouldn't be talking to me now if we didn't riot, would you?"

The TV reporter from Britain's ITV had no response. So the young man pressed his advantage. "Two months ago we marched to Scotland Yard, more than 2,000 of us, all blacks, and it was peaceful and calm and you know what? Not a word in the press. Last night a bit of rioting and looting and look around you."

Eavesdropping from among the onlookers, I looked around. A dozen TV crews and newspaper reporters interviewing the young men everywhere.


shifty wrote:


Ok well that logic usually starts to fall apart pretty quickly.
If black males between 14 and 30 are at an elevated risk of violent crime, who are they at risk from? And WHY are they at risk?

Statistically young people (but especially males) from all backgrounds are at an elevated risk of crime. Are all young people criminals who bring it on themselves.

I am not going to pretend that much of the violence against young black men in London, is undertaken by other young black men. The statistics are fairly clear on this.
While you rack that up to thuggery, there is more to it than that.
While over all crime experienced by londoners is relatively flat across ethnicity with only mixed race individuals experiencing a significantly higher rates of crime, fear of crime in the black communities have a disproportionately raised fear of crime flat across ethnicity with only mixed race individuals experiencing a significantly higher rates of crime, fear of crime in the black communities have a disproportionately raised fear of crime
Along side this we have a situation where the MET is struggling with institutional racism, both real and perceived. Elevated fear of crime, and an unwillingness to turn to the police is recipe for weapon carrying.
Young disenfranchised men, turn to crime, as a way to reduce the presure of stress caused by social evaluative stress. And other young disenfranchised people make easy targets.

Elevated fear of crime, and an unwillingness to turn to the police is also a recipe for gang formation, as insecure, disenfranchised and frightened young men, form coteries for protection from each other, and from the perceived and genuine hostility of the police. Not all gangs are criminal enterprises, especially not initially.

Violence carried out by petty criminals and gang members drives those not members of gangs to join of form them.

However, beef between gangs, caused by the human tribalism generates violence, which rarely stops with members, but spreads to relations and wider friendship cicles, which in turn drives more people into gangs for protection.
The violence and weapon carrying within by gang members helps to criminalise them. After all, in for a penny, in for a pound.


ProfessorCirno wrote:

Two articles I found regarding not the riots so much as the underlying tensions behind them (note that there are two articles linked there)

Quote:

...here's a sad truth, expressed by a Londoner when asked by a television reporter: Is rioting the correct way to express your discontent?

"Yes," said the young man. "You wouldn't be talking to me now if we didn't riot, would you?"

The TV reporter from Britain's ITV had no response. So the young man pressed his advantage. "Two months ago we marched to Scotland Yard, more than 2,000 of us, all blacks, and it was peaceful and calm and you know what? Not a word in the press. Last night a bit of rioting and looting and look around you."

Eavesdropping from among the onlookers, I looked around. A dozen TV crews and newspaper reporters interviewing the young men everywhere.

Thank you for those. I'd caught the '"Yes," said the young man. "You wouldn't be talking to me now if we didn't riot, would you?"' quote already via twitter, but its interesting to see the full article.


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GeraintElberion wrote:
Elevated fear of crime, and an unwillingness to turn to the police is also a recipe for gang formation, as insecure, disenfranchised and frightened young men, form coteries for protection from each other, and from the perceived and genuine hostility of the police. Not all gangs are criminal enterprises, especially not initially.

Fear of crime?

Not likely brother.

You join a gang because it instantly gives you:

1: Power.
2: Celebrity status.

'Fear' hardly enters into the equasion. You don't join for all teh convenient lefty bleeding heart reasons of disenfranchisement and lack of Police presence, you join up because you instantly get a rep as being semi-dangerous and more powerful. It instantly gives you a mystique amongst peers, and strangely enough the girls look at you like you are the big man now.

Its the same sense of thrill and danger that people find intoxicating and cause people to drive fast, play with guns etc. hat rise you get in adrenaline on the edge of danger.

Quite a lot of gangs form up informally, its a bunch of guys usually from school or the like who form a bit of a core, and then collectively they get to know more people that then begin hanging around and it grows organically. Some gangs then harden up and begin formally gathering members, but most just drift along, changing fluidly over time.

Police attitudes are usually pretty poor, but whey wouldn't they be when Friday night presents the perfect time to go start trouble, and then when Police arrive you know FULL WELL you can just give them the finger or thwor something at them and there's basically nothing they can do about it, their hand are tied.... not like the old days when you'd be getting a sound thumping.

In fact it's easier starting a hassle with Police than other groups because not only WONT you get stabbed or shot, you get the added laugh of giving an up yours to authority - another exhilarating activity.

Simply put, you are now the King of the world.

Give all that up for a job at a supermarket? HARDLY!

And whats the barrier for entry into such a fun life of girls guns and thrills?

Nothing, no qualifications required and all you have to do is hang around and look tough, you don't even need to be able to fight as at least a few of your friends will be up for the real blood and guts violence and you can just hang with the numbers to add threat and cow people into not complaining.

And if you get to set fire to something and know you wont get in trouble, well how good is that eh?

Eventually, getting away with crime after crme after crime, you realise you can do more crime and get paid for it. Whats the worst thats going to happen? a short stint behind bars amongst your friends? Will only add to your already growing and weighty cred.

Any time you get nicked you can cry and say how you only did it because you are poor and disadvantaged, and then tell the youth services idiot you only carried a knife because you were scared.

One of my friends got charged for carrying a knife, he said it was because he got bashed and now had a (pair of) butterfly knives for protection. What he FAILED to tell the court was that he got bashed when he decided that he didn't like these two well dressed 'posh' guys one night and him and his friend decided to jump them and give them a beating for it. Sadly these pair of 'posh guys' creamed my friend and his accomplice, and beat them silly.

So he started tooling up so that next time he wouldn't lose.

THERE is the true mentality brother.

The first step to getting the sorry situation fixed is actually look at the REAL mentality and causes. Very little to do with teh Police and a horrible oppressive society.

If fear of violence gave one cause to join a gang then I'd just add that it is more usually fear of DOMESTIC violence, rather than an external third party.


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
I mean, I've read about The Clash!

I listen to The Clash, a lot....

Poverty is relative.... I could take a "gangsta" who lives in "The Block" in Redfern (notorious suburb in Sydney) or "The Valley" (Although that place has gentrified a lot) in Brisbane to a remote community in the Northern Territory and they would be screaming within the hour to get back to the city.

There have been "riots" in remote communities but they are far less about poverty (the level of which is shocking for a 1st world country) and more about Tribal and clan competition for power within the community exacerbated by alcohol and kava.


Crimson Jester wrote:
Zombieneighbours wrote:


To be honest I'd like a criminal justice system designed to reduce crime, rather than an expensive system of punishment that actually(according to the vast majority of the available evidence) breeds criminality and crime.
Now this I can agree with.

I do, as well.


The 8th Dwarf wrote:
Poverty is relative.... I could take a "gangsta" who lives in "The Block" in Redfern (notorious suburb in Sydney) or "The Valley" (Although that place has gentrified a lot) in Brisbane to a remote community in the Northern Territory...

(raises hand)

Or the 'Bra housing estates, Kings Cross in the heyday, or the Brewarrina reservations... (oh and I don't recommend Dubbo). Old Redfern and Waterloo (And Wooloomooloo) was pretty bad once upon a time, but that was back when.

I have had the good fortune in later life to travel to a lot of countries and see a lot of 'interesting' places, from the downtrodden areas of the UK (England/Scotland/Wales/Nth Ireland) through the Pacific and South East Asia, and through the US and South America.

The skin colour and clothes change, but I can still spot 'my own kind; pretty quick, and it's always the same old same old.

Domestic Violence tends to be a significant catalyst to gang culture, as is drug and alcohol dependencies in parents. Ditto with single parent families where there is a high risk of exposure to violence etc.

Once the authority of the parents is exposed as a sham, the kids begin to buck authority in general, which is why sticking it up the Police becomes a passtime.


Shifty wrote:
sticking it up the Police becomes a passtime.

Hee!

Liberty's Edge

2 people marked this as a favorite.

Oh, and the best line came on NPR's News of the World today. Some BBC wag was reading comments posted to their Facebook page, and a dude from Africa nailed the problem with their whole commentary on these riots so succintly. I'm paraphrasing here, but what he said was basically:

"When poor people are taking to the streets and rioting in Africa and the Middle East because they want jobs and opportunities, [the BBC] cheers them on and supports their cause, but when people do it in London, then its just an embarrassment, because the West doesn't want to admit that it has the same problems."

He's got a point there.


London's burning!

But ad hominem accusations are SO last-never.

Same goes for the response. I for one don't want this thread locked.

Sovereign Court

Ram the riot act through parliament, read it, and since the met seems incapable of doing its job call in the army to arrest anyone who doesn't disperse. Looting a corner store and setting flats on fire is not a legitimate form of political protest.

Liberty's Edge

Hey peeps, we got ur trolls here.


Damn, did it just get cold in here?


Ignoring Shifty who's continuing to just shout "BUT...BOOTSTRAPS!"

The Guardian interviewed teenagers at the end of July...who called a rise in violence and potential riots in July due to government and police activities.

If you trap an animal, it will injure itself lashing against its restraints. If you trap a community, it will react the same way.


ProfessorCirno wrote:
Ignoring Shifty who's continuing to just shout "BUT...BOOTSTRAPS!"

Convenient.

Once Ad Homs fail, and your meme reply is discounted, you can just move to /ignore.

Well done that man.

Liberty's Edge

NOW would be a good time for smvnfing. It's not for me, though.

KEBGIT!


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Gark the Goblin wrote:
NOW would be a good time for smurfing.

That I can agree with. :)

P.S.

Spoiler:
SMURF!

Edit:

Spoiler:
SMURF!ed again :)


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Release the smurfs of war!


Hmmmm....

.....RIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTT!!!


Vomit Guy wrote:

Hmmmm....

.....RIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTT!!!

You didn't vomit.

I now feel cheated and socially disadvantaged; I better go and loot a Tesco.


BRAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNNNSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!


Vomit Guy wrote:

Hmmmm....

.....RIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTT!!!

Sorry, that should be ...

Sssssssmmmmmmurrrrrffffff
*cough* smurf


Zombie Guy wrote:
BRAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNNNSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!

Thats the spirit!


Shifty wrote:
Vomit Guy wrote:

Hmmmm....

.....RIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTT!!!

You didn't vomit.

I now feel cheated and socially disadvantaged; I better go and loot a Tesco.

Vomit has all kinds of different sound effects. That's what makes it so.....

....AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWesome.


Vomit Guy wrote:


Vomit has all kinds of different sound effects. That's what makes it so.....

Had Social Services purpose build me a top quality school to make up for my hard luck status I'd have known that, but thanks for now pointing it out.

Now I had better go burn down a pharmacy in protest at not being given a purpose built top school.

The Exchange

Shifty wrote:
yellowdingo wrote:
You are right. we should all have personal forcefields.

A lot harder to be a victim of knife and gun crime when there are very very few knives and guns around... which means less of a reason to have a knife or gun of your own.

Similarly, if they don't have a knife or a gun they don't walk around trying to stand over other people.

Frankly though, if one scummy person really feels like stabbing another scummy person in the head because they both thought playing 'Gangsta' was cool then thats just fine by me, however the same lairy Muppets go around darkening the day of decent people, and that's not on.

So we go back to carrying Swords and Muskets and Knives like the Gangstas of 1700's london: Stab a few doxies in an alley way and carve out theyse internal organs, rumble a tourist off the boat from the americas and make off with his purse of coin, or just flog some of that Opium out of a back street tea shop to bored idiots with more coin than brains?


We'll return to Internet Posters Say the Darndest Things right after a few words from our sponsors, including Blind Men Movers and Suntory Yamazaki Single Malt Whiskey.

Also, Smurf!


.....


Frank the Mime wrote:
.....

Smurfing flagged!


Ambrosia Slaad wrote:
Frank the Mime wrote:
.....
Smurfing flagged!

.......!!!!

Liberty's Edge

Old England is Dying

The Exchange

ahh i see the blue hell has been unleashed.

[/smurf]


[zombie]People are not getting the point.[/zombie]

BRAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!


Zombie Guy wrote:

[zombie]People are not getting the point.[/zombie]

BRAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!

Hi, I'm Sally Smothers. As you can see, poor zombies are starving in this thread. Nothing to eat anywhere in sight. Won't you help? Please, donate a brain today.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Shifty wrote:
ProfessorCirno wrote:
Ignoring Shifty who's continuing to just shout "BUT...BOOTSTRAPS!"

Convenient.

Once Ad Homs fail, and your meme reply is discounted, you can just move to /ignore.

Well done that man.

Ok. I'll respond.

Because you are entirely avoident, not commenting on any links or information about the riots themselves but rather leaning back in your armchair to comment on those awful thugs.

Because you're privileged, not understanding what disenfranchised means. You seem to think there's jobs just out there for the taking that anyone can scoop up with their fingers. YOu don't get what kind of roadblocks having bad health, having no income, having one parent, having no education, can put up.

Because you are disenfranchising them too with your desire for a great cuilling - for f!$%'s sake listen to yourself! You're all but asking every poor minority be rounded up and shot because they'll turn into gangsters! You don't understand that the criminal justice system is not there to rehabilitate criminals or reduce their numbers but to grow, or worse, you do realize this and support it anyways.

Because you don't comprehend what it's like to have a police force that does not see you as a citizen. You don't get why someone would carry a gun rather then go to a police officer because you don't get that the police aren't there to protect everyone, that some citizens are seen as crims by default and must prove their "citizenship" by being pulled over, by being searched, by being sent to court for even the slightest infractions, by being cast by what they wear - because it's cheap and that's all they can afford - or by their skin color.

Because you don't understand that gangs are about protection because there is no other protection. You don't understand that the guy who carried the gun did so because his brother was stabbed by someone who likely was malnourished and had no education, because their school is a pile of trash. You don't understand that gangs are all that's left when you tear down every youth center in the "poor neighborhood" because they cost just too darn much money.

Because you don't grasp where "bein' a gangster" comes from, and why they act like tough guys. Let me help you - it's because the rest of society declared that the poor minorites aren't fit to be anything else. They act tough because otherwise they're treated like garbage, and it's the only way they can get respect, and hell, the police are going to pull them over and search them anyways, looking for any little excuse to throw them behind bars, so why not?

Because you don't seem to get that having at least one family member in prison destroys that family. AT LEAST one, probably far more! And how that limits your money, your education, your health, your everything.

Because you don't understand what it means to not have a voice. To march two thousand strong and be ignored. To have your brother killed in cold blood and not be cared about. To have all of society view you as a nebulous "other" that doesn't count.

THAT. That is why I have troubles believing you had the little orphan Annie hard knock life you claim to have had, and you aren't anything but another middle class white collar Tory who throws around words like "multiculturalism" elsewhere.

And even if I'm wrong, that doesn't change the fact that you are factually wrong in just about everything you have said. You are wrong when you claim that "only criminals own guns." You are wrong when you claim that they can just "get a job," because that's real easy even without the awful economy when you're a poor black kid with no education, and I bet it's even easier now. You're wrong when you say it's alllll just the fault of dem poors. You're wrong when you say it's just about personal responsibility and nothing else.

And you're the wrongest person in the entire f$+!ing planet when you think all it takes is for dem poors to just pull themselves up by the bootstraps, as if all of society wasn't doing everything it could to push them down as far as they can go.


This blog puts it very well


2 people marked this as a favorite.

I thought the UK had socialized medicine? What is up with "bad health"?


ProfessorCirno wrote:
Because you are entirely avoident

Yep.

Liberty's Edge

3 people marked this as a favorite.

For f@~!’s sake people, grow up.

This should be a discussion about a very real, very current and very tragic series of events that have no one simple answer or cause and room for opposing but reasoned views.

It is not the time or place for Internet Oneupmanship 101.

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