London [All Cities] Riot 2011

[saxitoxin]

- a quartet of chavs looting a backhoe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZaRokYhf0s&NR=1

- Symmetry caught on film rioting in Manchester

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km8FTZEuRbY&NR=1

[Fruitcake]

A letter to David Cameron's parents

Dear Mr & Mrs Cameron,

Why did you never take the time to teach your child basic morality?

As a young man, he was in a gang that regularly smashed up private property. We know that you were absent parents who left your child to be brought up by a school rather than taking responsibility for his behaviour yourselves. The fact that he became a delinquent with no sense of respect for the property of others can only reflect that fact that you are terrible, lazy human beings who failed even in teaching your children the difference between right and wrong. I can only assume that his contempt for the small business owners of Oxford is indicative of his wider values.

Even worse, your neglect led him to fall in with a bad crowd.

There’s Michael Gove, whose wet-lipped rage was palpable on Newsnight last night. This is the Michael Gove who confused one of his houses with another of his houses in order to avail himself of £7,000 of the taxpayers’ money to which he was not entitled (or £13,000, depending on which house you think was which).

Or Hazel Blears, who was interviewed in full bristling peahen mode for almost all of last night. She once forgot which house she lived in, and benefited to the tune of £18,000. At the time she said it would take her reputation years to recover. Unfortunately not.

But, of course, this is different. This is just understandable confusion over the rules of how many houses you are meant to have as an MP. This doesn’t show the naked greed of people stealing plasma tellies.

Unless you’re Gerald Kaufman, who broke parliamentary rules to get £8,000 worth of 40-inch, flat screen, Bang and Olufsen TV out of the taxpayer.

Or Ed Vaizey, who got £2,000 in antique furniture ‘delivered to the wrong address’. Which is fortunate, because had that been the address they were intended for, that would have been fraud.

Or Jeremy Hunt, who broke the rules to the tune of almost £20,000 on one property and £2,000 on another. But it’s all right, because he agreed to pay half of the money back. Not the full amount, it would be absurd to expect him to pay back the entire sum that he took and to which he was not entitled. No, we’ll settle for half. And, as in any other field, what might have been considered embezzlement of £22,000 is overlooked. We know, after all, that your David likes to give people second chances.

Fortunately, we have the Met Police to look after us. We’ll ignore the fact that two of its senior officers have had to resign in the last six weeks amid suspicions of widespread corruption within the force.

We’ll ignore Andy Hayman, who went for champagne dinners with those he was meant to be investigating, and then joined the company on leaving the Met.

Of course, Mr and Mrs Cameron, your son is right. There are parts of society that are not just broken, they are sick. Riddled with disease from top to bottom.

Just let me be clear about this (It’s a good phrase, Mr and Mrs Cameron, and one I looted from every sentence your son utters, just as he looted it from Tony Blair), I am not justifying or minimising in any way what has been done by the looters over the last few nights. What I am doing, however, is expressing shock and dismay that your son and his friends feel themselves in any way to be guardians of morality in this country.

Can they really, as 650 people who have shown themselves to be venal pygmies, moral dwarves at every opportunity over the last 20 years, bleat at others about ‘criminality’. Those who decided that when they broke the rules (the rules they themselves set) they, on the whole wouldn’t face the consequences of their actions?

Are they really surprised that this country’s culture is swamped in greed, in the acquisition of material things, in a lust for consumer goods of the most base kind? Really?

Let’s have a think back: cash-for-questions; Bernie Ecclestone; cash-for-access; Mandelson’s mortgage; the Hinduja passports; Blunkett’s alleged insider trading (and, by the way, when someone has had to resign in disgrace twice can we stop having them on television as a commentator, please?); the meetings on the yachts of oligarchs; the drafting of the Digital Economy Act with Lucian Grange; Byers’, Hewitt’s & Hoon’s desperation to prostitute themselves and their positions; the fact that Andrew Lansley (in charge of NHS reforms) has a wife who gives lobbying advice to the very companies hoping to benefit from the NHS reforms. And that list didn’t even take me very long to think of.

Our politicians are for sale and they do not care who knows it.

Oh yes, and then there’s the expenses thing. Wide scale abuse of the very systems they designed, almost all of them grasping what they could while they remained MPs, to build their nest egg for the future at the public’s expense. They even now whine on Twitter about having their expenses claims for getting back to Parliament while much of the country is on fire subject to any examination. True public servants.

The last few days have revealed some truths, and some heartening truths. The fact that the riot cleanup crews had organised themselves before your David even made time for a public statement is heartening. The fact that local communities came together to keep their neighbourhoods safe when the police failed is heartening. The fact that there were peace vigils being organised (even as the police tried to dissuade people) is heartening.

There is hope for this country. But we must stop looking upwards for it. The politicians are the ones leading the charge into the gutter.

Your son David was entirely right when he said: “It is a complete lack of responsibility in parts of our society, people allowed to think that the world owes them something, that their rights outweigh their responsibilities, and that their actions do not have consequences.”

He was more right than he knew.

And I blame the parents.

(Courtesy of Nathaniel Tapley)

[thegreekdog]

Dear Nathaniel Tapley,

Your letter is taken under advisement. The gouvernment is full of liars, cheats and croouks. We're all hypoucrits.

Houwever, I have a question for you - Do you think any of the riouters knouw any of the things you wroute in your letter?

I loouk fourward to your respounse.

Best Regards,

Mr. Cameroun

[Pedronicus]

Umbrella attack on Police

[Lord and Master]

A letter to David Cameron's parents

(Courtesy of Nathaniel Tapley)

Hear, hear!

[Pedronicus]

How riots start - Exemplar case:

interesting

[Phatscotty]

I think one machine gun could probably convince the looters to just go home.

Better make it two. Just to be sure.

Just so you know, this kind of attitude by other governments recently in other parts of the world ended with NATO launching air strikes on them -

If the English government were to carry out your suggestion, it would be mighty hypocritical of them

oh noz, hypocrite government?

How about peace on the streets and no more destroying communities and fucking up everyone elses jobs and lives?

[saxitoxin]

Windsor regime borrows page from Hosni Mubarak, investigating way to shut-down internet during periods when regime is questioned.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/social.med ... ?hpt=hp_c2

"Good Use of Twitter" = Organizing Riots Against Governments the Ruling Regime Dislikes
"Bad Use of Twitter" = Organizing Riots Against the Ruling Regime Itself

[Fruitcake]

Windsor regime borrows page from Hosni Mubarak, investigating way to shut-down internet during periods when regime is questioned.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/social.med ... ?hpt=hp_c2

"Good Use of Twitter" = Organizing Riots Against Governments the Ruling Regime Dislikes
"Bad Use of Twitter" = Organizing Riots Against the Ruling Regime Itself

Typical knee jerk reaction from a bunch of second rate twats. They still don't get it do they. As soon as they block one channel another 5 will spring up in their place.

I wonder when it will occur to them that the chickens have well and truly come home terrifyingly to roost. The violent anarchy that took hold of British cities is the all-too-predictable outcome of a three-decade liberal experiment which tore up virtually every basic social value.

[jbrettlip]

Too bad it isn't like the good old days: Australia would be getting a bunch of new residents.

[PLAYER57832]

Too bad it isn't like the good old days: Australia would be getting a bunch of new residents.

So you consider pushing your problems onto other, innocent and even unsuspecting people to be "justice?"

Seems to me that is exactly the mentality that lead to this mess.

[jbrettlip]

Too bad it isn't like the good old days: Australia would be getting a bunch of new residents.

So you consider pushing your problems onto other, innocent and even unsuspecting people to be "justice?"

Seems to me that is exactly the mentality that lead to this mess.

You do know basic history of Australia, right???

[PLAYER57832]

Too bad it isn't like the good old days: Australia would be getting a bunch of new residents.

So you consider pushing your problems onto other, innocent and even unsuspecting people to be "justice?"

Seems to me that is exactly the mentality that lead to this mess.

You do know basic history of Australia, right???

I believe my response shows that I do.

[Woodruff]

The looting is seriously out of control in London:

[saxitoxin]

Cameron to Turn-Over UK Law Enforcement to United States

Washington is sending an Overseer to London to restructure the UK police service into a force better capable of protecting US interests and prevent McDonalds, KFC, Pizza Hut, Adidas, Starbucks, Apple and Nike stores from being looted in the future.

Mr Cameron has reportedly "asked" former New York police commissioner Bill Bratton to act as a "consultant" to British police on how to curb street violence.

Mr Bratton told NBC and ABC News America he had received a call from Mr Cameron asking him to consider ...

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-08-13/l ... tion=world

The new American Viceroy has indicated he will radically alter the UK police. He say the days of the the bumbling Bobby wandering about in scuffed tennis shoes and a mindless grin on his face are gone. Into New Britain will march a crack, jackbooted paramilitary force that will have Englishmen trembling in fear.

Last night, in an intervention likely to anger senior officers further, Bill Bratton, the former New York police chief who Mr Cameron said would advise the Government on how to deal with the aftermath of the riots, said young people had been "emboldened" by over-cautious police tactics and lenient sentencing policies.

Mr Bratton said a police force should have "a lot of arrows in the quiver", advocating a doctrine of "escalating force" available to commanders. "You want the criminal element to fear them," Mr Bratton said.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/cr ... 36852.html

OLD UK POLICE




NEW UK POLICE

[Qwert]

they look like robots

[Phatscotty]

Ministers plan removal of rioters’ benefits

Ministers are drawing up controversial plans to remove benefits from those convicted of taking part in the riots that engulfed England last week, in a move Liberal Democrats and independent experts have condemned as counter-productive and overly expensive.

Officials in Number 10 and the department for work and pensions are putting together plans for the harsh punishment of those found guilty of even the most minor infringements during the riots after a public petition calling for such a move gathered nearly 200,000 signatures.

David Cameron will lay the ground for such a move on Monday.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c8970a8c-c688 ... z1V3ZuHpNZ

[Woodruff]

Ministers plan removal of rioters’ benefits

Ministers are drawing up controversial plans to remove benefits from those convicted of taking part in the riots that engulfed England last week, in a move Liberal Democrats and independent experts have condemned as counter-productive and overly expensive.

Officials in Number 10 and the department for work and pensions are putting together plans for the harsh punishment of those found guilty of even the most minor infringements during the riots after a public petition calling for such a move gathered nearly 200,000 signatures.

David Cameron will lay the ground for such a move on Monday.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c8970a8c-c688 ... z1V3ZuHpNZ

I don't really understand this move, and here's why...if they can prove that an individual was one of the looters (which I would hope they would have to do in order to remove their benefits), then why not just prosecute them under the law? I don't understand the need for this. Or do they not actually have that level of proof and just want to make a general sweep?

[Phatscotty]

I wonder if they even have the money on hand to pay the benefits? Now they are going to need even more money to repair the damage to the cities and injuries to people. They might be just looking for excuses to cut. The looter class rioting is a pretty good reason.

[Iliad]

I wonder if they even have the money on hand to pay the benefits? Now they are going to need even more money to repair the damage to the cities and injuries to people. They might be just looking for excuses to cut. The looter class rioting is a pretty good reason.

And here Woodruff, we see why this is being done.
Two main reasons
1) Illusion of action. The government can't just sit by and do absolutely nothing, by doing this it's striking chords within people like Scotty, who have all the excuses they need to hate the poor. Besides playing to their fears, this makes it look like the government has fixed the problem, where it's only creating more poverty, creating greater economic disparity and only exacerbating the problem

2) Excuse for a spending cut. Austerity measures are unpopular, but opportunities like this, when people are responding very emotionally is a prime time to cut benefits without anyone realising. Considering the Prime Minister also wanted the power to ban social media in times of unrest, it's clear there is more than a bit of politics going on here.

In any case, the plan is completely doomed. It does not address the issues at all, only creating more poverty and more incentive for crime. Likewise it's needlessly punitive, as the judicial system should take care of appropriating necessary punishment. I didn't exactly see countries racing to cut tax cuts for the wealthy after the bankers tanked the economy.

In any case, politics as usual, Cameron will try and go the Thatcher route and crack down. All the key issues will be there, the people will remain disenfranchised, unable to find jobs and another act of police brutality will ignite the powder keg once again.

But I'm sure it's a lot of fun to simply call other people the looter class, feel better about yourself, despite your crippling mediocrity, employ some "obvious" crackdown and think the problem is gone. I'll wonder who took that stance.

[Phatscotty]

I wonder if they even have the money on hand to pay the benefits? Now they are going to need even more money to repair the damage to the cities and injuries to people. They might be just looking for excuses to cut. The looter class rioting is a pretty good reason.

And here Woodruff, we see why this is being done.
Two main reasons
1) Illusion of action. The government can't just sit by and do absolutely nothing, by doing this it's striking chords within people like Scotty, who have all the excuses they need to hate the poor. Besides playing to their fears, this makes it look like the government has fixed the problem, where it's only creating more poverty, creating greater economic disparity and only exacerbating the problem

2) Excuse for a spending cut. Austerity measures are unpopular, but opportunities like this, when people are responding very emotionally is a prime time to cut benefits without anyone realising. Considering the Prime Minister also wanted the power to ban social media in times of unrest, it's clear there is more than a bit of politics going on here.

In any case, the plan is completely doomed. It does not address the issues at all, only creating more poverty and more incentive for crime. Likewise it's needlessly punitive, as the judicial system should take care of appropriating necessary punishment. I didn't exactly see countries racing to cut tax cuts for the wealthy after the bankers tanked the economy.

In any case, politics as usual, Cameron will try and go the Thatcher route and crack down. All the key issues will be there, the people will remain disenfranchised, unable to find jobs and another act of police brutality will ignite the powder keg once again.

But I'm sure it's a lot of fun to simply call other people the looter class, feel better about yourself, despite your crippling mediocrity, employ some "obvious" crackdown and think the problem is gone. I'll wonder who took that stance.

So much for my wondering turning into second party overseas perceived certainties!
The real reason for the riots.

[Woodruff]

I wonder if they even have the money on hand to pay the benefits? Now they are going to need even more money to repair the damage to the cities and injuries to people. They might be just looking for excuses to cut. The looter class rioting is a pretty good reason.

I think you're probably right, to be honest. That plus the need to appear to be "doing something about it" when they really can't do so from a criminal court perspective without the hard proof.

However, the one disagreement I would have is your use of the term "looter class"...what does that even mean? Who IS the "looter class" in your view, Phatscotty?

[radiojake]

I've been thinking about this a little - The main difference I can see from these recent riots compared to other riots in history (from what I've been able to gather, obviously I wasn't present at any) is the distinct lack of reasoning behind the riots, short of acquiring and looting consumer goods. We've had race riots with particular communities fighting for more access to economic oppurtunity, but this riot didn't seem to have any of that - Infact, it's almost as if our consumer culture has something to do with it. We are bombarded with messages through advertising that tell us success if measure through consumer goods - Plasma TVs, Laptops, igadgets, designer clothing, etc, etc (all useless shit) - If there wasn't such emphasis on this consumer lifestyle, would people have looted the things that they are otherwise unable to attain?

All I know is if I happened to be involved in these riots, I would not have been stealing any Plasmas, but I sure as hell would have been smashing them to pieces - Over-consumption is the death-knell for our culture.

Just something I've been thinking about -

[Symmetry]

I've been thinking about this a little - The main difference I can see from these recent riots compared to other riots in history (from what I've been able to gather, obviously I wasn't present at any) is the distinct lack of reasoning behind the riots, short of acquiring and looting consumer goods. We've had race riots with particular communities fighting for more access to economic oppurtunity, but this riot didn't seem to have any of that - Infact, it's almost as if our consumer culture has something to do with it. We are bombarded with messages through advertising that tell us success if measure through consumer goods - Plasma TVs, Laptops, igadgets, designer clothing, etc, etc (all useless shit) - If there wasn't such emphasis on this consumer lifestyle, would people have looted the things that they are otherwise unable to attain?

All I know is if I happened to be involved in these riots, I would not have been stealing any Plasmas, but I sure as hell would have been smashing them to pieces - Over-consumption is the death-knell for our culture.

Just something I've been thinking about -

I think that's pretty fair. Looking to riots between the underclass and police, with middleclass shopkeepers in the middle, I think a lot of people are looking at the LA riots and saying thank f*ck that gun ownership wasn't legalised. The damage was pretty bad, but I think we can count ourselves lucky that people weren't shooting each other on the kind of scale that similar riots in the US produced.

[Woodruff]

I've been thinking about this a little - The main difference I can see from these recent riots compared to other riots in history (from what I've been able to gather, obviously I wasn't present at any) is the distinct lack of reasoning behind the riots, short of acquiring and looting consumer goods. We've had race riots with particular communities fighting for more access to economic oppurtunity, but this riot didn't seem to have any of that - Infact, it's almost as if our consumer culture has something to do with it. We are bombarded with messages through advertising that tell us success if measure through consumer goods - Plasma TVs, Laptops, igadgets, designer clothing, etc, etc (all useless shit) - If there wasn't such emphasis on this consumer lifestyle, would people have looted the things that they are otherwise unable to attain?

All I know is if I happened to be involved in these riots, I would not have been stealing any Plasmas, but I sure as hell would have been smashing them to pieces - Over-consumption is the death-knell for our culture.

Just something I've been thinking about -

I think that's pretty fair. Looking to riots between the underclass and police, with middleclass shopkeepers in the middle, I think a lot of people are looking at the LA riots and saying thank f*ck that gun ownership wasn't legalised. The damage was pretty bad, but I think we can count ourselves lucky that people weren't shooting each other on the kind of scale that similar riots in the US produced.

You mean the availability of guns didn't stop gun shootings during the LA riots?