Topic: Politics

[munchkin5]

I have so many questions about it. Is it slowing down or stopping? What will the aftermath for London be? Or even Britain as a whole? Ramifications to the rest of the world? Is it really that easy to just turn a city into complete anarchy?

It's stopped in London since they put 10,000 more police officers on the streets, but the looting has still been happening on a smaller scale in places like Manchester and Birmingham, though it'll probably stop soon. The vast majority impact of this will be local to the areas of the riots, with a lot of arrests, people losing homes, businesses closing down, and increased insurance premiums among other things, the estimated cost of the riots in money terms is around £100 million. The political impact will probably have more effect on the police than on education or the issue of poverty and it's link to crime, especially with the Tories in government.

And apparently it is that easy to turn an otherwise peaceful city into semi-anarchy, at least for a few days until the police can react and move way beyond normal operational strength to deal with the unrest.

[Plank of Wood]

Uroboros, lolwat? Jesus Christ did you actually bother reading the article I posted?

Firstly, it's hilarious that you had to spend five paragraphs explaining what everyone already knows - that the rioters have no political agenda by this point. We all know. The news has said it. The people doing it have said it. The police are saying it. The people who had a political agenda are saying it.

But you got one thing horribly wrong; If you're saying unemployment, impoverishment and poor social care have nothing to do with it then you don't understand it at all. These rioters attacked their own communities easily and without any regret because they don't feel like they're part of the community, and they don't care about their country, their leaders or the police. The police hate the youth of my country, and the media moreso. To say that chavs aren't part of normal British society is massive understatement, and we hate them because they were born into a world with no real rules, respect for authority or concept of hard work. And then when they do something like this, we're just going to hate them more. If they had decent role models, social worker funding and a school that taught them how to actually exist as a human being then this would have never happened. But they didn't, so smashing up shops and stealing 42" TVs is the only chance at have control over their lives they have, especially when those TVs probably are about five times the amount of money they get from their benefits that have just been cut.

No, they're not rioting directly to protest this. But to disregard why they want to riot, why they think it's fun and why they could so easily smash up their own home town is blatant close mindedness. To say that people pointing out why the riots happened are saying that it's "good" is even worse.

If you're telling me that thug culture is the root of this, then you should think hard about why there is a thug culture.

So how is this possibly not about education? When the arrest statistics are released, see how many of them are aged around 14-20 (almost all of them) and how many are in the "NEET" (Not in Education, Employment or Training, (basically no qualifications)) group (definitely all of them). Then tell me bad education standards has nothing to do with this.

A grand majority of them could like pop music but that wouldn't mean their musical tastes has anything to do with their active choice to destroy s**t. Consider how small a fraction of the local populace these rioters make, when compared to peaceful citizens of the same age and education/employment group you stated. You do not have to be one of the affected, to be offended nor to act. Let's say that hypothetically, all of them are white. Yes, that is an interestingly saturated stat, but no, it doesn't mean it has anything to do with the cause nor the reason they are ruining things. Unless of course you were implying more that wasters and dregs generally tend more towards random violence and criminality, then that is just plain getting off subject to the point of being a bit of a red herring.

Again, lolwat?

You've thoroughly missed the point of what I was saying.

[munchkin5]

If they had decent role models, social worker funding and a school that taught them how to actually exist as a human being then this would have never happened.

While social services are improtant It's naive to think that that's enough to solve the problem, there is already a great deal spent on social services, but it's not getting to the root of the problem, which is generational poverty. There simply aren't enough resources in the country to support all the kids born into low income single parent homes in communities where the schools are failing and underfunded. The solution as always when tackling poverty is to lower the birthrate.

Although to assume that the riots are just because of antisocial poverty stricken kids isn't quite right either, there were plenty of people involved that don't have that already flimsy excuse of living off benefits in a council house, and plenty of far from well off kids out there who want nothing to do with this. Everyone involved in the riots was a criminal regardless of their economic situation and should be treated as such.

[Gnoll]

This is incredibly confusing.

Can we just discuss something less divisive, but still political?

Like the ongoing protests in Syria.

Yes, that counts as less divisive at this point.

[munchkin5]

There wouldn't be any point in discussing politics if the subjects we were discussing weren't divisive.

[Plank of Wood]

Can we just discuss something less divisive, but still political?

Then it's not a debate. Nothing is learnt if everyone has similar opinions.


Also I'll get back to you on this later today Munchkin, I have to leave the computer right now because of herp derp family herp.

[Uroboros]

Warning, incoming TL;DR. I need to learn to organise my counterpoints better.
For brevity, the first paragraph is a good summary, if you want to skip the rest.
Plank gets to read the whole thing, for the sin of disagreeing with me!
===================

No, they're not rioting directly to protest this. But to disregard why they want to riot, why they think it's fun and why they could so easily smash up their own home town is blatant close mindedness. To say that people pointing out why the riots happened are saying that it's "good" is even worse. If you're telling me that thug culture is the root of this, then you should think hard about why there is a thug culture.

I'm not disregarding at all. I'm simply suggesting that they're not just mindless byproducts of blame to be found more accurately elsewhere. My rant was largely inspired by overly romanticised mildly pro-anarchist hyperbole I stumbled upon elsewhere, whilst googling the events. It really irked me to have these riots compared to things like the Egypt riots or marches for racial equality. Even in a nigh-utopian society, there would still be a fringe criminality and thug culture. Its existence is the product of nothing but humanity itself, though its degree of spread can be a mark of how advanced a nation's management is. Do we hold them accountable as any other criminal, or allow them elbow-room in hopes of 'saving' them, at risk of only promoting it as a low-risk indulgence, in a culture where having an ASBO is almost like a trophy?

Uroboros, lolwat? Jesus Christ did you actually bother reading the article I posted?

The long narrative on the social gap? No. I didn't. Though for the sake of replying here, I had a read over it, and I just find it further states what I felt is obvious. Though my personal feelings of shifting the weight of blame from personal choice and responsibility onto others remains. Yes, there is a natural trend towards criminality in specific groups, and yes, perhaps there is more that can be done to try force them back into the fold, but ultimately, choice is the big decider. And that's what I was ranting about. Other sites have people painting the riots over-romantically. I guess I was just gassing here, instead of creating new accounts just to flail at those who actually said the things. But hilarious? Please.
My focus is on personal responsibility as a citizen, not as a social commentary on stunted maturity. Perhaps there is where our clash is. I was saying that statistical correlations do not necessarily mean there is a direct relation. A trend towards criminality within the bracket? Definitely. A justified lash-out from a downtrodden, trapped fringe group? No. Your post, mentioning "NEET" status could be interpretted as both, and after the vomit I happened across on other sites, I guess I assumed the worst. My bad. If i'm still missing your point, assume i've totally glazed over or misread something, and try spelling it out for me. Without the patronism, if you please.

But you got one thing horribly wrong; If you're saying unemployment, impoverishment and poor social care have nothing to do with it then you don't understand it at all. These rioters attacked their own communities easily and without any regret because they don't feel like they're part of the community, and they don't care about their country, their leaders or the police. The police hate the youth of my country, and the media moreso.

This isn't solely something subtly enforced upon a margin of the populace through oversight, this is often a choice they make. There are many programs to make up for people who fall through the gaps, for those willing to get back into the loop. The young and coming of age are rebellious, it is often a natural part of maturation. Whether you furrow your brow and behave prickly, or whether you go mugging people and deliberately giving police a hard time, is entirely a choice of the individual. You can blame culture all you want, individual willpower and individual responsibility will always take precident in my eyes. I understand why they do it. Why they lopsidedly think they're owed it, and why they don't care. To assume they 'want to be saved' and the riots are a cryptic cry for help from a neglected slice of the social equasion, I feel, is pretty off-mark. To say they know nothing else is, I feel, also pretty inaccurate.

To say that chavs aren't part of normal British society is massive understatement, and we hate them because they were born into a world with no real rules, respect for authority or concept of hard work. And then when they do something like this, we're just going to hate them more. If they had decent role models, social worker funding and a school that taught them how to actually exist as a human being then this would have never happened. But they didn't, so smashing up shops and stealing 42" TVs is the only chance at have control over their lives they have, especially when those TVs probably are about five times the amount of money they get from their benefits that have just been cut.

I don't think I said chavs aren't part of our society, did I? If I have then that must have been one hell of a typo. They're not the majority, because if they were, we'd have a pretty quick social collapse. I don't figure myself as someone who had exactly a 'big budget' upbringing, but the common theme between the functional and the direly antisocial was simply personal choice. Barring abuse or mental/emotional issues, this is not solely community-social nor solely about red tape or policy. Those who are now thugs in my town, had the same teachers I did. Same culture. Same neighbourhoods. Similar friends. The same police treatment I did. The same job opportunities and programs I did. There are many who were pretty rotten, who simply grew up and settled down, who simply chose to stop being "part of the problem", regardless of their grades or employment situation. Yes, there is probably more that can be done to help, but no, you cannot force harmony. Too much emphasis on situational factors would suggest that the criminal and destructive element of society is everyone's responsibility but their own. Sometimes you simply cannot do any more for them, until they make the choice. Even with all the contributing factors to degeneracy, the worst outcome is never a given. I say this as a somewhat dysfunctional, low-bracket, barely educated, unemployed, benefit-trapped individual myself. Just observations. Though i'm scarily well on my way towards 30 now and I suppose that leaves enough generational gap for oversight. Oh god. I'm getting old. Help.

[Detoxicated]

Even though the rioters might not have a political statement, the riot itself is a political s

I'm not disregarding at all. I'm simply suggesting that they're not just mindless byproducts of blame to be found more accurately elsewhere. My rant was largely inspired by overly romanticised mildly pro-anarchist hyperbole I stumbled upon elsewhere, whilst googling the events. It really irked me to have these riots compared to things like the Egypt riots or marches for racial equality. Even in a nigh-utopian society, there would still be a fringe criminality and thug culture. Its existence is the product of nothing but humanity itself, though its degree of spread can be a mark of how advanced a nation's management is. Do we hold them accountable as any other criminal, or allow them elbow-room in hopes of 'saving' them, at risk of only promoting it as a low-risk indulgence, in a culture where having an ASBO is almost like a trophy?

I don't know, the thing is human beings are generally interested in peace and harmony with their surroundings, as in harmony they function better and can reach higher goals than in conflict. While there is a small percentage of people who are just born as criminals (rapists, compulsory thieves etc.) most people are a result of their surroundings and the society they live in plus the education received from parents and/or school. If the parents are never home as they have to work at three different jobs to get their family through, no values can be passed onto their prodigy. The children of said parents will disregard school and teachers as waste of time (as a result of already having lost their most important figures of authority) and therefore will usually not engage in further studies which brings them to a life of either extremely heavy work, or easier criminal activities. This is by no means a human problem, it is a problem created by society. While I do not glorify the destruction of private property, I must still respect the anger of the youth mob as they are simply victims of a long going vicious circle. This is not the first case of extreme riots in england. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadwater_Farm_riot Society is to blame for creating such individuals in the first place.

[Uroboros]

While there is a small percentage of people who are just born as criminals (rapists, compulsory thieves etc.)

The only people who are born criminals, are those with medical (psychological/mental) issues that are our responsibility, both to identify and to treat. Typical kleptomaniacs and rapists are not born that way at all.

most people are a result of their surroundings and the society they live in plus the education received from parents and/or school. If the parents are never home as they have to work at three different jobs to get their family through, no values can be passed onto their prodigy.

They are not a result of their surroundings and society, they are merely influenced by them. Role-models can be found in teachers, other family members, and even the family of friends. Falling upon hard times is not a guarantee of degeneracy.

I must still respect the anger of the youth mob as they are simply victims of a long going vicious circle.

If it were anger and civil disobedience alone, or hell, less destructive criminal activity, I may have been compelled to sympathise with them. However, they chose to ruin other livelihoods, to assault other people and to put lives in jeopardy. They get no respect from me, and whatever cause they felt they had, they have proven to be secondary to their ill will. They could have just as easily gathered to make organised wide-spreading graffiti hits, or even just to focus arson on governmental buildings, unemployment offices and the like, but instead they just chose to riot aimlessly. You can't claim they're angry about the lack of jobs, whilst destroying work places of the low/mid class. You can't say you're angry about having little, and then torching small family businesses. You can't say the police treat you badly and then validate their suspicions with random destruction and assault. This is less about righteous anger, as it is an organised tantrum about nothing in particular.

This is not the first case of extreme riots in england. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadwater_Farm_riot Society is to blame for creating such individuals in the first place.

That riot was racially motivated and was motivated by police prejudice. Those riots have a far stronger spark to cause them, and even a cause to be angry and to lash out so hard. These riots are nothing like those. You can barely compare the two at all.

[Detoxicated]

Both started as with initiative violence coming from the police. While the one battled racism, it was just as crazy if not crazier than the riots we have now. It is easy to say that the riot was against racism from a nowadays point of view, while people back then just felt the way they do feel about the riots now. Who knows, maybe they will speak about the social injustice riots of 2011 in fifteen years, we don't know. I am not claiming that they are doing right, but again this nonsense has to come from somewhere, you don't decide to riot on a whim, you don't decide to pillage on a whim, or they would have done so already for a long time. Instead a pot of steam just exploded after the flame of felt oppression and injustice came over them once again in form of a brutal police murder. This is how many felt when starting the riots. There is always people of the "running with crowd" who just use the opportunity, but regardless the beginning did have a meaning.

Now don't get me wrong, burning people's houses down is just freaking retarded, but instead of simply bashing them, one must ask why such a terrible extremity could happen in the first place. Still one must respect that they do have a certain feeling of extreme anger, or else they wouldn't burn things down. One doesn't have to respect the valve they use to cope with their anger.

[munchkin5]

Both started as with initiative violence coming from the police.

This is a vast over simplification, the 1985 riots were caused by credible accusations of institutionalized racism in the police. These riots were intially sparked because the police fatally shot a gang member carrying a gun, and then a lot more rioting happened with no connection to the original motivation but simply because people realised they could.

You don't decide to pillage on a whim

Yes they do.

Still one must respect that they do have a certain feeling of extreme anger

The vast majority of these people aren't doing this out of any sort of anger

[Plank of Wood]

Plank gets to read the whole thing, for the sin of disagreeing with me!

Fffffuuuuuuuuu-

Do we hold them accountable as any other criminal, or allow them elbow-room in hopes of 'saving' them, at risk of only promoting it as a low-risk indulgence, in a culture where having an ASBO is almost like a trophy?

Not really. I'd like to see them punished just like any other criminal would. However I would also like to see the government actually trying to reduce the amount of people who enter the lifestyle, and cutting their youth clubs and social services isn't doing that. Though that is a fair point, people who commit crime due to their lifestyle shouldn't be "let off" just because their lifestyle and upbringing is overwhelmingly to blame for their anti-social behaviour.

My focus is on personal responsibility as a citizen, not as a social commentary on stunted maturity. Perhaps there is where our clash is. I was saying that statistical correlations do not necessarily mean there is a direct relation. A trend towards criminality within the bracket? Definitely. A justified lash-out from a downtrodden, trapped fringe group? No. Your post, mentioning "NEET" status could be interpretted as both, and after the vomit I happened across on other sites, I guess I assumed the worst. My bad. If i'm still missing your point, assume i've totally glazed over or misread something, and try spelling it out for me. Without the patronism, if you please.

The post about NEET was not justifying that they should riot, or saying that they were lashing out because of it. I was responding to Inkling's post about education not being the reason why these riots were happening, and I was showing that the age of the rioters and the likelihood that they are school leavers with no or little qualifications implies otherwise. I'm going out on a wild assumption here, but I'm assuming that the kids who are doing okay in school or the 18-20 year olds who held down a decent job wern't looting Tesco for Sacks of Rice last Monday.

It's cool though, I don't think I worded it well enough to get that across.

EDIT: Or maybe they all have great community related jobs. Goddamnit.

This isn't solely something subtly enforced upon a margin of the populace through oversight, this is often a choice they make. There are many programs to make up for people who fall through the gaps, for those willing to get back into the loop. The young and coming of age are rebellious, it is often a natural part of maturation. Whether you furrow your brow and behave prickly, or whether you go mugging people and deliberately giving police a hard time, is entirely a choice of the individual. You can blame culture all you want, individual willpower and individual responsibility will always take precident in my eyes. I understand why they do it. Why they lopsidedly think they're owed it, and why they don't care. To assume they 'want to be saved' and the riots are a cryptic cry for help from a neglected slice of the social equasion, I feel, is pretty off-mark. To say they know nothing else is, I feel, also pretty inaccurate.

Exactly, No they don't. They were never told to think outside of the tiny gang world they live in. Why would they want to give up their lives of doing what they want, taking lots of drugs and being thugs in general for a peaceful life where they support their community? They were never taught altruism, and so why should they care about the people who live around them? That's the problem. So I don't see the riots as a cry for help at all, I see them as an effect of a problem that needs to be solved.

Also, any sociologist or anthropologist will tell you that no-one anti-social chooses to be anti-social.

I don't think I said chavs aren't part of our society, did I? If I have then that must have been one hell of a typo. They're not the majority, because if they were, we'd have a pretty quick social collapse. I don't figure myself as someone who had exactly a 'big budget' upbringing, but the common theme between the functional and the direly antisocial was simply personal choice. Barring abuse or mental/emotional issues, this is not solely community-social nor solely about red tape or policy. Those who are now thugs in my town, had the same teachers I did. Same culture. Same neighbourhoods. Similar friends. The same police treatment I did. The same job opportunities and programs I did. There are many who were pretty rotten, who simply grew up and settled down, who simply chose to stop being "part of the problem", regardless of their grades or employment situation. Yes, there is probably more that can be done to help, but no, you cannot force harmony. Too much emphasis on situational factors would suggest that the criminal and destructive element of society is everyone's responsibility but their own. Sometimes you simply cannot do any more for them, until they make the choice. Even with all the contributing factors to degeneracy, the worst outcome is never a given.

Whoops, that another bit of bad wording on my part. I wasn't accusing you of anything, I was just making the point that they're not part of mainstream society or their communities.

Once again, I still maintain that no-one chooses to be anti-social. I went to a comprehensive school with kids like that too, who will probably grow up to be thugs. And you know what? They didn't, because we had a decent school head who knew how to do his job, and our teachers knew how to respond to troublemakers; and all the people who you'd think would grow up to be scroungers or criminals are now in apprenticeships or jobs. Another comprehensive in the same town in the same area isn't run as well as ours, and the kids from there have a horrible reputation, and the amount of fights that happen there show it. Same kinds of kids, but just better schools make better adults. Or maybe it's just luck, I don't know.




tl;dr version: People are only dicks if you give them the opportunity to think being a dick is right.

EDIT: lol wtf detox

[Uroboros]

I understand why they do it. Why they lopsidedly think they're owed it, and why they don't care. To assume they 'want to be saved' and the riots are a cryptic cry for help from a neglected slice of the social equasion, I feel, is pretty off-mark. To say they know nothing else is, I feel, also pretty inaccurate.

Exactly, No they don't. They were never told to think outside of the tiny gang world they live in. Why would they want to give up their lives of doing what they want, taking lots of drugs and being thugs in general for a peaceful life where they support their community? They were never taught altruism, and so why should they care about the people who live around them? That's the problem. So I don't see the riots as a cry for help at all, I see them as an effect of a problem that needs to be solved.

Also, any sociologist or anthropologist will tell you that no-one anti-social chooses to be anti-social.

Yes, though when it comes down to it, nobody chooses their personality either, but one can make a conscious choice towards self-improvement or at the very least, adjustment, or growth in a preferred direction. It doesn't take schools or parents to teach you about it, for it to still be an option. Quite often, parents and teachers despair about the lengths they go to instil a community spirit or a sense of goodness in their charges, only to find them being reckless brats anyway. Once you move from being a child to a teenager or young adult, you no longer have the excuse of being a slave to your situation. They may not be deeply world-wise or of strong willpower, but even in the absence of good values, rioting and arson is still a long shot from devilry, petty theft or mugging.

You can lecture people on what is deemed acceptable, and offer them food for thought about empathy and equality, and the hardships of others, but you can never tell someone how to think, or what values to have, or actually get them to feel empathy. I'm just not convinced this is a reliable sign of an underlying problem beyond mob mentality taking advantage of social networking, but then again I can't picture entire districts or neighbourhoods made of nothing but pure stereotypical chavs. It's possible, but I think it would require a pretty sealed microcosm of such a street-corner culture to allow things to get to this point. Though generally speaking, chavs are more a minor element in most communities and locations. For now, it just looks like a higher extreme of happy-slapping, because I can't really believe they have reached a point of 'critical mass', for lack of a better term. Obviously there will be some cases where the system outright failed some kids, but for the majority, I feel trying to teach them against these things, is a lot like leading a horse to water AND trying to get it to drink. What more can be done?

I mean, besides not cutting back on the damn youth facilities, damnit.
*fist-shakes*

[Detoxicated]

And you get your info were munchkin?

You claim that the guy was a gang member but there isn't even proof, and still if he didn't pull the gun there is no reason to shoot him.
So you might just wake up tommorrow to think to yourself: "Hey I'm going to pillage the city!" ?

So there is no emotion attached to the destruction of property? Where do you get your info? Are you a mass psychologist from a distance?

[Plank of Wood]

Well Detox, you're making some mighty bold claims about the riots and why people are rioting. Are you English? Are you in England right now?

Because from what I'm seeing you have no idea what is actually going on here.

chavs... critical mass

"We can't take any more chavs! She's breaking up Capt'n!"
"It's come to this... Number Two, Target the JD Sports stores and prepare to fire."