riots

my posts are usually dull consisting of gym, work, home, gym, football, work, blah blah blah.

this post is going to be different. on this occasion i am going to write about the riots going on and peoples reaction to them. skip it if you are not interested in my 2p worth.

about 4 days ago, a black guy got shot whilst being arrested by police and after that there was a protest by the family and local community wanting answers to the circumstances in which he got killed. the police didnt say anything and as the crowds dispersed a large group of youths started rioting and smashing things up, and its since spread across others areas of london and its gotten ever more serious. so serious in fact that the prime minister had to leave his £1000 a night holiday villa in italy to deal with it.

anyways, people have been writing on facebook (as usual), about how these kids should be punished and how they had no discipline and be made to join the army??. i merely pointed out that instead of dealing with the symptoms, people should maybe look at the causes of the trouble, namely welfare cuts, poor social housing, poor education, chaotic home lives, high youth unemployment and other similar issues which contribute to young people not feeling they have any prospects or hope and so they dont care about a society that doesn't have anything to do with them and so dont feel bad about smashing things up and fighting symbols of authority (police).

that statement was met with a torrent of criticism universally from everyone, which surprised me. i rather naively thought that there might be one person who might look at the issue as something more than the criminal vandalism it is and ask why are they indulging in criminal vandalism on such a scale, but not a single person did.

i just thought it was a sorry state of affairs and i think peoples reaction to the riots are a reflection of why the rioting takes place in the first place. people looking for simple, direct, easy explanations that dont involve them. there is a lot of talk about how the rioters are ferrel kids and not taking responsibilty but not a word on the responsibilities of government or society.

the government has over the last year announced cuts in welfare to single mothers, who lose benefits when their children reach school age, so as to make them work, as if raising a child is not considered work. its not paid work on minimum wage at a supermarket but it does have benefits for the individual and society but the government dont acknowledge that. they have also announced cuts to housing and education and policing.

i have been reading a lot of books recently about grave crimes commited in argentina and chile in the 1970s in the dirty wars, and the genocide in rwanda in 94 and i am currently reading about the mass murder in indonesia in the late 1960s. in each case its people targeting another set of people with in their own country and seperating themselves from them and targeting them and exterminating them, be it communists, marxists, tutsi's or whoever. one of the comments by a friend of mine who is a reasonable and nice person on facebook said, it was time to 'clear this country out and start again'. thats the type of rhetoric used in rwanda, indonesia or cambodia.

i am not saying there is an imminent genocide, but i just thought it was interesting that you read about views like this expressed in central africa or asia or latin america and a few shop windows get smashed and a few cars get burnt out and normally reasonable people start saying shit like that here in london in 2011. i also thought it was interesting that people got so upset about it whilst at the same time our government is bombing the capital city of libya.

i read that there had been 6000 bombing raids over Libya by NATO in the last 4 months and our government has spent £250m on it so far. politicians say its for the benefit of libyans to depose a despot and its bombing with a noble cause. its not reported but i imagine the damage done by 6000 bombs must be extensive and the loss of life must be massive. no one says anything about that on facebook, but footlocker gets looted and everyone shits themselves and they start coming out with extremist rhetoric. the looters and rioters are ignorant because they have no education, dont know better and many come from broken homes. they have an excuse, but we shouldn't.

today i have mostly been listening to rage against the machine - bulls on parade.

.....on tv this evening they said that the guy who got shot by the police at the beginning of all this. didnt fire at the officers and that the story about a police officer being shot during the arrest was a fabrication made up by the police.