London Calling

[Egbert]

I dunno, I think if you have a figurehead who represents the unity of the british people, making a speech about rioting being stupid seems appropriate.

Seeing the USA has a figurehead, the President, who represents the unity of the American people, making a speech about rioting will cause all rioters to promptly stop rioting, apologise, repair all the damage and bandage the injured. Yup, just remember that next time there is a race riot in Los Angeles or Virginia or where ever.

[Hauldren Collider]

The president is nothing of the sort. And I already said I never expected it to do any good, I just kinda figured this was one of those opportunities for the queen to exercise her rarely-used power of speech.

[Barnabas]

It's a nightmare.

It all started on Saturday night at a demonstration in Tottenham about a man shot by police on Thursday. The details of the shooting are not yet know (which is what they were protesting about). Things got ugly, and a riot broke out, two police cars and a bus were burned, plus some buildings including a large carpet store with flats above. Many people were made homeless.

On Sunday night rioters gathered in nearby Enfield to trash shops and loot. Once it became clear that the police were stretched, copycat gangs all over London started looting, and the police have been unable to cope. It's snowballing, and people are even getting attacked in their homes, with shops and businesses burned and looted. The prime minister originally announced he was staying on holiday, but has finally agreed to come back and make some decisions. Meanwhile, people are living in fear and the mayhem has now kicked off in Birmingham, Liverpool and possibly Bristol.

It's all going off in Camden just over a mile away, but as the police secure an area the rioters just zoom somewhere else and attack that. They are using blackberry private messaging apparently to organise themselves. I'm worried they might end up here, if not tonight then any time soon. It's scary, and the police are struggling to keep control. In fact they've lost control in many ways, and the thugs know this, and more and more are being encouraged to join in. Only a small proportion of the police are trained in riot control, and these officers are insufficient to cope. Regulars officers are apparently 'not allowed' to engage in large scale public disturbance situations. However, the regulars are getting involved now, a bit, although they are not equipped, in various ways. In many cases they just watch the looters emptying shops and somehow hope to catch them later. The copycat stuff has nothing to do with the original incident, but all the opportunists are cashing in on it.

I never thought I'd say this but it's probably gonna take take the sodding army to help restore order.

It's scary here.

That **** is insane. It looks like thugs feel like they have the upper hand because if they all attack at the same time the police will be over stretched. You have to send in the army, or if you have some kind of in between force between the cops and the army, send that.

Usually when lootings happen, the reason is something really huge, like Katrina, in Argentina we had lootings twice, 1989 and 2001, the first time we had hyperinflation worse than the Weimar Republic, the second, a 4 years economic depression with deflation and imminent default. This one is different, reminds me a little of the French crisis of a few years ago with all the car burnings.

Do these thugs belong to some group? are they ethnic brits or immigrants? all mixed? just regular criminals?

[Egbert]

The queen gives Christmas speechs, every Christmas, to the whole Commonwealth.

[Uncle Sparky]

Well surely innocent homeowners are armed with something more than a telephone in your country. Right?

ROLF. American response. "See spichus dark folk - shoot em!! SHOOT 'EM GOOD!!!"

... and I was in Englandia a few months ago - why no riots fo me???

... and the Queen should stay out of it. Send in the Wombats and their mates, with William & Harry respendent in their ermine capes.

[Sava]

What happened is that they've had peaceful protest and nothing happened. They rioted once and improvements were made. They had more peaceful protests and were ignored again, so they rioted. Now reporters are all over the place wanting interviews. Purpose validated and served. The part of London where this is occurring is very poor.

Or it could just be crowds of hooligans completely unaffiliated with the original demonstration who are merely using it as an excuse to go out to cause mayhem, light cars on fire, and loot stores.

But I like your completely uninformed version better

[Sava]

ROLF. American response. "See spichus dark folk - shoot em!! SHOOT 'EM GOOD!!!"

Normally, I am all for more restrictive gun control measures. But I gotta say, the thought of crowds lighting cars on fire outside my house makes me wish I had an assault rifle of some sort at the ready... and maybe a few M249 SAW's. Those are so light, my sister could handle one. She has the strength of ten Canadians, which isn't saying much, I know... but that's pretty good for a girl.

[Aeson]

The queen gives Christmas speechs, every Christmas, to the whole Commonwealth.

Are there Christmas riots?

[Thoth]

No "Anarchy in the UK"? I'm slightly disappointed.

Fine.

You asked for it.

[MikeH]

I dunno, I think if you have a figurehead who represents the unity of the british people, making a speech about rioting being stupid seems appropriate.

Bless.

[MikeH]

What happened is that they've had peaceful protest and nothing happened. They rioted once and improvements were made. They had more peaceful protests and were ignored again, so they rioted. Now reporters are all over the place wanting interviews. Purpose validated and served. The part of London where this is occurring is very poor.

This is quite a good article.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/08/tottenham-riots-not-unexpected

[MikeH]

Also, the government response to all this has been stunningly bad. It is an unprecedented situation, the worst rioting we've ever had in the city but still we've had 3 days of no government presence or leadership, it's ridiculous.

PM initially said he wouldn't come back from holiday, although now he has. For the worst rioting in British history, he wasn't going to come home? He really is a piece of ****. The Gov't couldn't find ANYONE to go on Newsnight last night to talk about the issues. Theresa May the Home Secretary was on TV this morning mumbling inanities.

[MikeH]

Also, the government response to all this has been stunningly bad. It is an unprecedented situation, the worst rioting we've ever had in the city but still we've had 3 days of no government presence or leadership, it's ridiculous.

PM initially said he wouldn't come back from holiday, although now he has. For the worst rioting in British history, he wasn't going to come home? He really is a piece of ****. The Gov't couldn't find ANYONE to go on Newsnight last night to talk about the issues. Theresa May the Home Secretary was on TV this morning mumbling inanities.

[Dinner]

Also, the government response to all this has been stunningly bad. It is an unprecedented situation, the worst rioting we've ever had in the city but still we've had 3 days of no government presence or leadership, it's ridiculous.

I've been sitting over hear thinking WTF is going on? I mean it looks kind of like the LA Riots in the 90's where there was a sort of justifiable excuse but then hoards of people just used it as an excuse to loot and burn stuff down to destroy the evidence of their looting. Yet even that was over in a day with tons of police on the streets and the governor bringing in the national guard to restore order. Put a curfew in effect and authorize authorities to shoot looters on sight and the thieves will crawl back under which ever rock they came out from under.

[lightblue]

I've been sitting over hear thinking WTF is going on? I mean it looks kind of like the LA Riots in the 90's where there was a sort of justifiable excuse but then hoards of people just used it as an excuse to loot and burn stuff down to destroy the evidence of their looting. Yet even that was over in a day with tons of police on the streets and the governor bringing in the national guard to restore order. Put a curfew in effect and authorize authorities to shoot looters on sight and the thieves will crawl back under which ever rock they came out from under.

There's no way that the UK government would ever allow looters to be shot, at the moment they are not even allowing water cannon, batton rounds or tear gas to be used, which is odd as it gets deployed quite regularly in Northern Ireland. The Tories' reputation for being the "law and order" party is coming under severe scrutiny.

I used to teach in an inner city school (in Peterborough rather than London, so not quite as extreme), and I know the kind of kids involved. We would have kids whose sole ambition in life was playing football (most don't succeed), winning the X factor or popping out a few kids and get a council house and live on benefits. Education is their last priority. They want the trappings of the celebrity lifestyle, and if they can't afford it they will now take it.

The only way to deal with it is a curfew for under 18s across London, and maybe for all after a certain time. Start using some force to reestablish control and dissuade most of the hangers on to slink away. These kids won't hang around if the armoured trucks actually drive into them, the tear gas wafts across the street and rubber bullets are flying into the crowd.