It’s day four of riots and madness in the U.K., and if we want to understand what’s happening, we’d best pay attention to young journalists like Laurie Penny, who wrote Tuesday: “Angry young people with nothing to do and little to lose are turning on their own communities, and they cannot be stopped, and they know it.”
Penny Red (posted on Aug. 9) via @JPBarlow:
In the scramble to comprehend the riots, every single commentator has opened with a ritual condemnation of the violence, as if it were in any doubt that arson, muggings and lootings are ugly occurrences. That much should be obvious to anyone who is watching Croydon burn down on the BBC right now. David Lammy, MP for Tottenham, called the disorder ‘mindless, mindless’. Nick Clegg denounced it as ‘needless, opportunistic theft and violence’. Speaking from his Tuscan holiday villa, Prime Minister David Cameron – who has finally decided to return home to take charge - declared simply that the social unrest searing through the poorest boroughs in the country was “utterly unacceptable.” The violence on the streets is being dismissed as ‘pure criminality,’ as the work of a ‘violent minority’, as ‘opportunism.’ This is madly insufficient. It is no way to talk about viral civil unrest. Angry young people with nothing to do and little to lose are turning on their own communities, and they cannot be stopped, and they know it. Tonight, in one of the greatest cities in the world, society is ripping itself apart.
Violence is rarely mindless. The politics of a burning building, a smashed-in shop or a young man shot by police may be obscured even to those who lit the rags or fired the gun, but the politics are there. Unquestionably there is far, far more to these riots than the death of Mark Duggan, whose shooting sparked off the unrest on Saturday, when two police cars were set alight after a five-hour vigil at Tottenham police station. A peaceful protest over the death of a man at police hands, in a community where locals have been given every reason to mistrust the forces of law and order, is one sort of political statement. Raiding shops for technology and trainers that cost ten times as much as the benefits you’re no longer entitled to is another. A co-ordinated, viral wave of civil unrest across the poorest boroughs of Britain, with young people coming from across the capital and the country to battle the police, is another.
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By Lew Ciefer, August 10, 2011 at 1:55 pm Link to this comment
That’s one way to calm the barbarians, buy them off. Of course Rome tried that and found out that they always want more.
There is another option that worked wonders for Comrade Stalin. Put them all In Gulags and work them to death building railroads.
Report thisBy Lew Ciefer, August 10, 2011 at 1:51 pm Link to this comment
Comrade ITW please explain to all those evil capitalists out there how those on fixed incomes—like the poor and elderly—are helped by paying more for less?
Do not all those Wal-Mart shoppers shop at Wal-Mart of their own volition? That would include all those former customers of those ‘burned downed businesses’ in your little fairy tale.
Comrade ITW, are those who work at Wal-Mart ‘forced’ to work by coercive action on the part of the State or do they do so of their own volition?
Is it not true that while smaller, less profitable, businesses might fold that the flip side is that all those former customers of more expensive, less profitable establishments are better off because they have increased dollar purchasing value and can now spend those savings on other needs or wants; which create demand on other segments of the economy?
Isn’t it true that your real beef with Wal-Mart is that individuals are free to choose rather than have a pretentious, self-absorbed, Socialist oaf dictate how to live their lives thus reducing the demand for pretentious, self-absorbed, Socialist oafs?
How is it that Wal-Mart was unable to survive in South Korea and Germany and the only way it could break into the market in England was to purchase ASDA which was considered Britain’s most successful retailer? How do you explain that many of its overseas adventures are unprofitable?
Report thisBy Tobysgirl, August 10, 2011 at 1:32 pm Link to this comment
Please read Red Penny’s entire blog, and check out the rioter’s response to the NBC reporter.
These right-wing idiots seem to have forgotten that minimal social welfare programs go a long way to keeping the population passive and quiescent, and that it’s a very bad idea to live in a society with lots of people who have absolutely zilch to lose.
Report thisBy Lew Ciefer, August 10, 2011 at 12:43 pm Link to this comment
Marxist/Socialist thought: More dependence on God-The-State somehow equates to one being more independent. Up is down and down is up. Dependence = independence. DUH!
So how does that work? How does more dependence on government empower a deadbeat teat sucker? If you’re sucking on that teat aren’t you already empowered?
This is always the end result of unbridled Socialism—you eventually run out of other people’s money. Take note America…you’re next.
Most of that lumpenproletariat is comprised of welfare-dependent immigrants from other parts of the world. An immigrant can always say he/she is not going to take it anymore and return from whence they came and WORK to build a nation reflecting their ideals ... any bets that’s one thought that will never be entertained by those feral freeloading riffraff?
Report thisBy FRTothus, August 10, 2011 at 12:11 pm Link to this comment
Apparently, thieving and looting are in two different classes, just like terrorism - it depends on who is doing it. When the wealthy screw the poor, practice violence, economic or otherwise, the MSM is only too happy to go along, applaud them for their (lack of) morality while they ignore the devastation, but when the poor do it…
Capitalism is and always has been a disaster for the majority.
Report thisBy Inherit The Wind, August 10, 2011 at 12:05 pm Link to this comment
Here in the U.S., rioters who loot, rob, and burn down businesses, and destroy communities, get a government bailout.
********
You mean like, Wal-Mart? They destroy communities, effectively burn down business, and rob and loot people of their property and businesses.
Report thisBy John Sullivan, August 10, 2011 at 6:50 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
The people of Iceland and Egypt (and all the other Middle Eastern regimes) have taken a better and more sustainable approach to changing the social order. That said, I will not take sides against the UK rioters.
Report thisHere in the U.S., rioters who loot, rob, and burn down businesses, and destroy communities, get a government bailout.
By diman, August 10, 2011 at 5:39 am Link to this comment
By gerard,
All that young creative energy that could and should be freed to do good work building a better future!
This is called being in denial about the reality around you Gerard. What better future are you referring to? What creativeness are you talking about? Have you been outside lately?
Report thisBy Inherit The Wind, August 10, 2011 at 4:59 am Link to this comment
Her point is well taken: Rioting is about catharsis and the powerless taking power. One doesn’t have to endorse the violence, one can even condemn it, but one cannot dismiss the reasons for it.
I expect it here in the US before long, not because I want it, but because when the rich and powerful strangle the poor and powerless too much, they riot.
Report thisBy doublestandards/glasshouses, August 10, 2011 at 2:55 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
It ought to be a wake up call for the US. This is what happens to millions of people when they have no future. What is to be expected from millions of unemployed who have been written off by the system?
Report thisI noticed that the msm ignored economic realities as a factor in the rioting. The elites of the world are in total denial about what is happening to the working class of the world.
By Lisa, August 9, 2011 at 9:44 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
BREAKING NEWS:“Libya recognizes UK rioters as official government of the UK.”
Report thisBy gerard, August 9, 2011 at 5:21 pm Link to this comment
All that young creative energy that could and should be freed to do good work building a better future!
Report this