Why are majority of the riots in northern towns?

[PhoebeMcPeePee]

DH & I were watching the riots on the news this morning like most people absolutely horrified.

He's from one of the northern towns affected although we live in the south and started discussing why these riots now (and historically) tend to be more focused on northern towns but didn't really come up with any one thing. Any thoughts on this?

I think calling these events protests is to give them a legitimacy they don't deserve. Throwing bricks, attacking police officers, setting fire to libraries, citizens advice and hotels, and looting from shops isn't protest. These people are using concerns individuals have for their own criminal advantage. If they were intending to make genuine protest, they would liaise with the police and organise a time and date. Not attack and burn. Some of them, and some people not participating may have reasonable concerns but this is not the way to do it and I hope they are all rounded up and prosecuted. It does nothing for their cause if they have one, if anything it delegitimises it.
If they want Reform UK to pursue their claims in Parliament or through councils that's the way to do it, or make appointments with their new MPs

My immediate area is mainly white but our town centre is quite run down now and immigrants get the blame for that. It's absolutely ridiculous.

It's worrying because the mob out are incapable of thinking and don't think twice about destroying anyone's house or property to make whatever point they think they are making. My husband has moved his car and I've moved mine into the garage, doors are bolted and we've moved all plant pots and garden furniture into the shed

Running out of real coffee at a station would be unheard of in the south.

There must have been some sort of crisis if all 7 of the places selling real coffee at Leeds Station ran out simultaneously ?

But read the post I was replying to. There are growing numbers of these people and in many places its become no go areas for white people. That's not respect or happy coexistence. So it's disingenuous to say this is all the fault of white right wingers. It's much more complicated than that.

Try your google search again using the actual word I used in my very easy to understand, short comment. Town. I said town.

I remember the guy who was told off during Lockdown 1 for standing on his own doorstep in his own garden

Go on then?!

@SaltAndVinegar2 your argument suggests these people have no control over their actions and their circumstances makes them inevitably criminal. They have a choice. Yes, they may well feel angry but they've grown up in a country where these actions are criminal and they know it. If they choose to go drinking and looting no one forced them into it.

Largely absolute shitholes, there’ll be no riots on Richmond N Yorks or Harrogate.

You said “why should they stop them?”

Punishment to England at the costs of lives. You’re right, to the governments they are pawns. It’s sad when other people see it as a score 1 to France.

Frightening. I was in toxteth during the 2010 riots. I was about to move my car when thugs came and smashed the windscreen. I then couldn't see through the windscreen so couldn't drive it. It got burnt out later that night (along with about half the cars in the street, the other half belonged to people who had come from out of the area to destroy things in our area. Their cars were left alone).

We thought they might set our house on fire at one point as we were next door to a derelict terrace and they were going in and out of it. We moved all our valuables to the cellar just in case. It was a 3 storey terrace so we had a good view from the top floor. Very scary indeed, and upsetting to see people being so violent. 999 calls weren't answered and police did not attend the area until much later when they drove down the street in a riot van once or twice but they didn't attempt to stop the violence.

Thats a terrible thing to say.

Do you not like British culture? It is rather more than football and pubs but they are rather British traits.
Do you feel that someone who prays 5 x a day is somehow unable to participate in pubs and football?

Nope because the poor young working class white man doesn't have a community leader to advocate for them and thats part of the problem.

We have one in our town centre right opposite a Wetherspoons

Sorry, I meant why should they because they hate us. They don’t feel a need to keep us onside any more, because we made it clear that we’re not on theirs. As always, it’s the most vulnerable who pay the price.

There's also been a demonstration in Weymouth today, a primarily white seaside town. Not been any violence tho, I don't think.

Yep Tower Hamlets have some very unwelcome areas for not just white people but anyone who isn't Pakistani and Muslim. I'm born in London and mixed race, in one area of THs I had nappies thrown at me and was spat at, by Muslim women on a work visit to a construction site.

Weymouth is where the Bibby Barge is and some dilapidated guest-houses.

Objectively - and for the refugees themselves - it would be far better for them to be housed in rich areas welcoming to them“

That’s a very sensible suggestion, @Axelotylbottle . Currently live in a pleasant, pretty affluent area in the NW and would be happy to see more immigrants here. Local business in all sectors struggles to recruit.

I don't think you understand. You are looking from the viewpoint of your own experience and assuming that other people with a totally different experience will respond to a stimulus the same way you will. Every individual does have control over their own actions, but this choice is an illusion to some extent and circumstances lead them to act in certain ways. Not all disenfranchised people are rioting of course, in fact most aren't, but the fact that increasing numbers are indicates that something has changed over recent years.

It's a bit like the prison population. The majority have come from abusive or neglectful backgrounds or are care experienced. People from those backgrounds are more likely to make choices that end in criminality, compared to people who come from supportive families. Most women in jail are sexual abuse victims who have turned to drugs and crime as a way to escape their trauma. It's all very well to say "well if I was raped I wouldn't turn to drugs and crime". Maybe you wouldn't but you just don't know. That's not to say that everyone from a difficult background will become a criminal but the likelihood is increased.

Or to take a other example, obesity. Yes everyone has a choice about what they eat, but when half the adult population is obese it shows a wider problem in society. Especially when it's disproportionately poor people who are obese.

They can hate us all they like. It’s horrific that France can get away with it. Give England it’s due, they do what they can to bring boats in distress to shore. I will never agree France has a reason because of Brexit.

I won’t derail the thread. Sorry I misunderstood your point. But what I said above stands.

In theory i see your logic, but it wouldn't take long for people to complain, i imagine there would be far more complaints in an upper class area than a working class area.

It would also make life less affordable for the refugees, even just looking at basics like being near waitrose rather than tesco with no access to a car.
Also upper class areas generally need a car to access more other things whereas poorer areas generally have better public transport.

I don’t even know what the hell you’ve just written. Are you on something?

I'm getting anxious now. A few of the neighbours are also moving stuff and there definitely feels like somethings brewing

It sounds horrible what you've been through. I have an irrational fear of fire and that's what worries me as it's all quite dry round here with lots of high dry grass around people's houses etc and they've started fires in Tamworth