UK riots

[HamCrescendo]

depressing



not seen much going on round my ends (Harrow) apart from a few police vans and lots of small groups just sprawling about and rumours but to use a shitty journo buzzword, it seems tense




sony fire is fucked


depressing

[pkay]

[quote="danrev"]
sony fire is fucked
/quote]

700 working class jobs

terrible

[esfandyar]

Wish I was there to help. Fucking livid right now.

[.onelove.]

The fallout from this is going to be massive, social networking clamp downs, more power to the police and authority. Half the public already seem convinced that calling in the army to mow down the rioters is the justifiable move now, they'll be actively encouraging a draconian regime.

[the_agonist]

posted this elsewhere...what i can see is that this country's authority is fucking useless! powerless, police scared in case they make 'situations', or are made accountable for anything that may be misconstrued as brutality! police shit scared for their own jobs, dont wanna get suspended. we have shit all over our own country with our bureaucracy...And i would love to hear from somebody who would beleive otherwise. there needs to be some protection for the police in situations like this to be able to actively, forcefully, and aggressively intervene and fuck some people up, send a message to the rest of this country's kids.

[charleswpeck]

Can't believe the absolute idiocy I'm hearing on the BBC.

"Now Tommy, do you live in Enfield?"
"Yes, I do."
"And how does this make you feel?"
"Well it's awful."
"Thank you very much Tommy"

Then weather report.

Stay safe everyone. This is some Orwellian shit.

[Shum]

Looting fuelled by social exclusion

After the riots came the looting. Across London windows were smashed, and shops emptied. On Monday experts said social exclusion and the breakdown of law and order could have spurred looters to disregard social norms.

"Many of the people involved are likely to have been from low-income, high-unemployment estates, and many, if not most, do not have much of a legitimate future," said criminologist and youth culture expert Professor John Pitts.

Unlike most people, some of those looting had no stake in conformity, he said. "Those things that normally constrain people are not there. Much of this was opportunism but in the middle of it there is a social question to be asked about young people with nothing to lose."

On much of the footage of the widespread theft after the riots, looters can be seen brazenly taking the goods they want, some without taking the precaution of covering their face. In one video shot early on Sunday morning in Wood Green, people can be seen leaving H&M with a haul of goods, with others standing around JD Sports apparently waiting for their turn to take goods.

One north London resident, who wanted to be identified only as Tiel, described a conversation: "I heard two girls arguing about which store to steal from next. 'Let's go Boots?' 'No, Body Shop.' 'Hit Body Shop after it's dead [meaning empty].'" The girl came out of Boots "nonchalantly, as if she'd done her weekly shop at 4:30am", he added. He described others, holding up clothes to themselves in the broken windows of H&M. "They were just so blasé about what they were doing."

In Wood Green about 100 youths targeted shops, including electrical stores and clothes chains such as H&M. "I've got loads of G-Star," said one teenager, emerging from a clothes shop. Other teenagers were seen with suitcases filled with stolen goods, and in the early hours of Sunday residential front gardens were used to sort and swap them.

Evidence has also been emerging that looters are attempting to sell their stolen goods. In Tottenham, just off the high street, one 20-year-old, who refused to give his name, said he had heard looters trying to get the booty off their hands as soon as possible.

"I know some were on corners trying to sell laptops from Currys for 20 quid. What you going to do with it?" he said.

Looters found ways to justify their actions, Pitts added. "They feel they can rationalise it by targeting big corporations. There is a sense that the companies have lots of money, while they have very little." Combined with a lack of intervention from police and increasing lawlessness, the combination was explosive: " [Looters] quickly see that police cannot control the situation, which leads to a sort of adrenalin-fuelled euphoria – suddenly you are in control and there is nothing anyone can do."

A generation bred on a diet of excessive consumerism and bombarded by advertising had been unleashed, he added. "Where we used to be defined by what we did, now we are defined by what we buy. These big stores are in the business of tempting [the consumer] and then suddenly these people find they can just walk into the shop and have it all."

One eyewitness, who asked not to be named, said a police officer patrolling Brixton Road on Monday morning told him he thought 12-year-olds were looting.

Dr Paul Bagguley, a sociologist at the University of Leeds, said looting was a common feature of most riots but a mixture of practical reasons could have increased its extent. Rising unemployment was important not only as a catalyst of unrest, but because it meant more people were unoccupied on the streets leading to "biographical availability". "It's a straightforward argument, but powerful. Without jobs people are more likely to be hanging around the streets. Also there are simply more desirable, portable consumer goods to steal than ever before."

Looting was seen as a less risky activity than rioting: "Looting tends to involve a wider range of people – children, women, older people – because it does not involve physical violence. Riots enable people to lose their inhibitions, give them liberty to do things they wouldn't normally do."

Areeb Ullah, a Tottenham resident, said looters had disregarded the needs of the area and local people. And while large stores were targeted, some smaller shops had not escaped the looting. "The businesses around here were barely getting by anyway. A flower shop was set alight. What has that florist ever done? I saw a man in his shop just crying. This is only going to make Tottenham worse."

[pkay]

bristol

[bassrael]

london eye
http://yfrog.com/kiu4tvtj


fake?

[ascent]

pic been circulating twitter for a while.. not reported on news and no other pictures taken so yes fake

[Phigure]

london eye
http://yfrog.com/kiu4tvtj


fake?

totally shopped, look at the reflection.

[pkay]

[Mysius]

bristol

copycat cnuts. Lets hope nothing gets burnt down.

[zerbaman]

its brosteps fault

Was that intended to be shit?


The army stepping in will just make it worse imo. The "Gangs" that are said to be uniting to fight the system, are more than likely to have their own weapons to shoot back...

These pricks are behaving like animals though

[pkay]

Sloane Square

http://yfrog.com/h413umcj

actually remember going by this area during my last visit. Apparently they have decent windows? That or people really didn't want to try that hard fore hugo boss

[iamfisher]

i live in peckham but am currently away from london and have had to sit and watch as my street has gone up in flames, its almost worse being away from the place coz not knowing what is going on is driving me insane, managed to get hold of my flatmate after a couple of hours of panic and apparently my flat was within a couple of minutes of going up in flames, the tesco store that connects to my flat was looted and was about to be torched but luckily the riot police got there just in time to stop it, if that place had gone up then my flat would have gone with it along with a lot of music and a couple of hard drives worth of projects and other bits of music, luckily my vinyl is currently sat right beside me, if that was there then i'd have been straight on a train to try and save it haha, in all seriousness though, i hope everyone is keeping safe and that nobody is in any serious danger, the shock of watching this unfold is truly incredible

[pkay]

this pic kinda struck me... cops and the medic look about same age as the rioter

http://images.brisbanetimes.com.au/file ... ndon10.jpg


too big to link

[charleswpeck]

i live in peckham but am currently away from london and have had to sit and watch as my street has gone up in flames, its almost worse being away from the place coz not knowing what is going on is driving me insane, managed to get hold of my flatmate after a couple of hours of panic and apparently my flat was within a couple of minutes of going up in flames, the tesco store that connects to my flat was looted and was about to be torched but luckily the riot police got there just in time to stop it, if that place had gone up then my flat would have gone with it along with a lot of music and a couple of hard drives worth of projects and other bits of music, luckily my vinyl is currently sat right beside me, if that was there then i'd have been straight on a train to try and save it haha, in all seriousness though, i hope everyone is keeping safe and that nobody is in any serious danger, the shock of watching this unfold is truly incredible

jah bless mate

[pkay]

[MikeE]

I totally picked the wrong weekend to fly to london and stay in clapham it seems...