Enfield riots?

[Empusa]

Just seen on Twitter and in a few articles like this, that there are meant to be plans for a riot in Enfield tonight and riot police are in the town centre?

Used to live there, and got family there (luckily a fair distance from the centre), but fucking hell! What the hell is going on?

working oh please don't be so sanctimonious and patronising.
have you walked out your front door to chaos today? because i have.
i say it as i see it BECAUSE i live in the middle of one of these communities and see what happens EVERY DAY.

i have seen genuinely politically motivated action - this is NOT IT

I believe society has broken down and that there are a huge number of people who are not being served by the government (I guess it can't serve everyone). I am sure there are loads of reasons why the riots are happend - however, they are a symptom of a society that has broken down rather than a cause.

You don't think its sanctimonious and patronising to start quoting qualifications that justify your position that basically this has nothing to do with society and that all that's needed is people to take responsibility for their own actions? I am a bit surprised that with these qualifications you don't think that mass riots triggered by the shooting of a man in police custody in areas associated with race riots have a political element. There was plenty of criminality and thuggery throughout the troubles in Northern Ireland but there was an underlying political reality that fostered it.

It is very easy to attempt to justify these actions when you don't live in them. The good law abiding people in Hackney Enfield etc when interviewed by the news all seem to want the police to take radical action to remove these people. It is easy to read the guardian(me inc) and live a nice life outside of this sort of thing and then look for political reasons as to why they are rioting.There are plenty of people with the same day to day experience not rioting. We have had years of legislation to promote the freedom of the individual and I never thought I would say it has gone too far but watching these scenes I can't see any alternative in the short term at least

Workingwhile shops or business were never ever looted in n ireland.

Of course rioting is about power.

But honestly, society is pretty good in the UK. There is enough food to go around. We all have access to fresh water. We don't all have a roof over our heads, but I don't think the riots were in support of Shelter. Leaving aside access to schools, we all have access to education via libraries and digital media. (Well, there are certainly libraries in Clapham and Croydon, and it seems many rioters had access to digital media) This is more than people in this country had 100 years ago.

We wake up in the morning and nobody is bombing us. People might feel disenfranchised but they do actually have the vote. We do not have Polio or Small Pox.

I realise that the problem of poverty in the UK is that it cuts people off from society, not that they are poor in world terms. However, most socially deprived people in this country are not rioting. We don't even know that individual rioters are socially deprived.

If the riots have been caused because the Government (of any political persuasion) is so awful, what precisely is it that they were supposed to do to make the rioters feel happy and powerful enough?

working you were providing all us poor ignorant people with a definition of politics which alluded to assumptions about what we do and do now know. i was merely reassuring you that i know a little of the topic
and as you know society is at the simplest level is a collection of individuals - which is why individual responsibility is key.
and as for NI - you do know that according to political theory NI could technically have been classified as a third world country during the 70's/80's? is that england now?
now - am taking my children out to support my local community, and hope it doesn't all kick off again before i get them home.

agree with queenmaeve - politically motivated rioting is rioting, looting is looting.

albeit apparently the recent riots around the short strand were organised by a local loyalist paramilitary whose finances were being investigated by PSNI? that's commerce not politics.

Queenmaeve, there were a fair amount of kneecappings for non-political purposes though and racketeering etc.

Teejwood, I was actually trying to clarify what I meant by politics because there was post after post by people saying "but I doubt they even vote". It wasn't directed at you.

I work with people in poverty in the UK whose infant mortality rate is similar to that of the developing world, where 75% of kids live below the breadline. I work with kids who are so malnourished that they routinely end up having their entire set of teeth removed in childhood and who have diseases like rickets. Some live in seriously overcrowded housing conditions. There really is poverty in the UK, it's not all about laptops and mobiles and cars.

It's not about justifying, there is no justification. I don't justify. I don't want to hug a hoodie. I just think it's a sign that the downturn is about to become more dangerous for all of us.

Some of the original rioters, but I bet the majority who've carried on and been breaking into electrical stores etc. don't care at all about what's going on politically. They're quite simply opportunists.

Its simple really, why would someone care about society enough not to behave this way, if they feel society doesn't care about them and is treating them badly.

For those saying this is obviously because of economic and/or political reasons, do you believe that none of these halfwits have ever created criminal damage, or committed theft, before?

Because I suspect that they have, and that they are now just enjoying getting to do it as a mob, rather than individually smashing up bus stops.

I was brought up in Northern Ireland at the peak of 'the troubles' No one ever looted a shop or burnt anything for kicks that I saw. They were fighting each other and were politically motivated. These riots are just thieves on a night out. You can see they are enjoying it.

My point about political motivation is that what is going on right now is not driven by any desire to make a political point. There is no purpose or agenda to it and no-one in the mobs could tell you what it is that they hope to achieve.

That is not the same as saying there has been no political influence on this situation whatsoever. Politics are part of our society - but there are so many complicated, interelated issues that have got us to this point that it seems self-indulgent and blinkered to point the finger at the government (or the last one) and say "aha, I told you so, your policies have brought us to this". There are a million and one things that have brought us to this. Human culture grows and changes and reacts to all sorts of influences. If there was some way of tracing back all those influences from the current violence back through history you would probably find that things like the world wars, individual political figures, inventions, even things like the environment, as well as social policies, economics and more obvious influences, have all had an effect on society and have gradually got us to this particular point in time where we have a sub-culture of young people who are willing and keen to commit this kind of mindless, targetless violence.

It is so far from being simple that the knee-jerk "blame the government" response is really irritating and, in my view, distracts from the real issue which is that we need some fundamental social changes which can't come about simply by a change of policy, or redistribution of funding. It will have been slow deterioration of various values and systems that got us here and it will take an equally slow re-building of the same values and systems to get us back, if that is possible. It will take this government and the next 100 years of governments. History is full of peaks and troughs and we are in a trough.

The government (using that term for everyone who has been in power over the last few decades) has its share of responsibility and has to take the lead in trying to start to make changes, but there also has to be some straight-talking and acceptance of fundamental problems that may not be politically attractive or intellectually complicated enough for people to want to talk about on the news or political programs. Just pointing the finger at the government is side-stepping the reality of what is happening to people in these communities and it makes it look like no-one has a clue or cares enough to listen to what is being said on the streets and in the heart of these communities.

This is not politically motivated. Well it might have been at first but not now. It's just a lot of youngsters and some older people jumping on the band wagon and looking for fun (well what they think of as fun).

It does seem that something much, much bigger is going on.

Last night, I watched teenagers around the Pembury Estate in Hackney smashing up their own corner shops, burning their own neighbours' cars - basically destroying their own area, the streets where they live. It was complete anarchy, people smashing things up for the sake of it, breaking shop fronts and then not even bothering to loot them. Chaos. What is going on????

Yes knee cappings for rapists and drug dealers working.

There is such bollocks being spouted on this thread. The youth of today have spent their entire lives being expected to take NO responsbility for their actions or work for anything. Swear at a teacher in school? No consequences. Hang around on a street corner drinking at the age of 11? No consequences. Want the latest mobile or computer game - dont work for it or save up, get it on credit or nick it. The sense of entitlement from young people today is breathtaking.

The vast majority of these people are not so impoverished that they have no food on the table. How do you think they even found out about where the next lot of looting will happen - blackberries, iphones, computers - all luxuries. If they were truly desperate, they would be stealing food and medicine.

Parents let their children get away with anything. Schools have to let kids get away with anything because they are either too afraid of the parents to discipline the kids properly, or they simply do not get support from the parents to do so. Kids tell teachers ' you cant touch me, you cant shout at me, I know my rights' and they are fucking right.

This is the result.

And I would agree with you kungfupanda, I don't blame this government or any particular policy etc but to pretend that it's just the actions of a few people who just fancied something to get off on on a Summer night and that it materialised out of the blue just seems to minimise the fact that this is anarchic. Anarchy is a powerful thing, and usually rooted in social realities. I do think the economy will relate to it, but in a broad sense, not the Condem decision to close libraries or what have you... the consumerist mentality in which designer labels are status and the easiest way to "have" in some of these areas is to become involved in criminality. The legitimate jobs just don't buy the lifestyle that these young people identify with, which is a lifestyle that glorifies a particular attitude to the mainstream.

When people start burning up their own communities the rage is deep, it's entrenched, it's hardcore. It's not just "for kicks" though I have no doubt that some of these people will be getting an immense high from it. I am sure there will be people who are looting because they can too, and many who have been involved in petty crimes and not-so-petty crimes alongside them. Firesetting in your own community is something different though. It is animalistic, it is the breakdown of all moral order and social conscience, and it is reflective of deep, deep rage and a sense of being disconnected from your environment and its social and political structures.

In Northern Ireland, the rage was not directed within the community so you wouldn't have seen this behaviour, would you? It doesn't mean that you didn't have sociopaths attracted to "the cause" who really didn't care about politics and were opportunistically chasing destruction. Those people will be rioting too.

It's just too easy to say "ah well, it's Summer, they just don't like work and this is fun" IMO.

Political?

What a joke.

The profile of the first group of rioters was age 14-17!

100% agree with samstown. My London school was full of little fuckers like the ones out there looting and vandalising, actually, I bet I'd probably recognise quite a few of them!

The parents don't give a fuck about what they do, they aren't punished for wrongdoing so they have no sense of what is right and what is wrong. They just do and don't give a fuck about who or what they damage, as long as 'they're alright Jack'.

I thank God that my parents brought me up properly. They weren't perfect, and I wasn't perfect, far from it as a teen but I've turned out alright, thanks to them.

'Firesetting in your own community is something different though. It is animalistic, it is the breakdown of all moral order and social conscience, and it is reflective of deep, deep rage and a sense of being disconnected from your environment and its social and political structures.'

Totally agree. This is what it looked like in Hackney last night. Hundreds of youths just going wild, smashing things up. The sense of anger and frustration coming from these kids was breathtaking. The hatred of the police was absolutely staggering. If an officer had somehow been caught up in this, he would have been mauled to death, and that is my fear...that this will turn away from destruction to property to destruction of people.

destruction of property

And this is what worries me, AmongstWomen. We all know that these divides are part of our society and our community, but it just doesn't take much to tip it over.

I live in an ex-council house in an urban area where there is quite a bit of poverty and "yoofs" in hoodies. We've never had any trouble, thankfully, but I can hear them tearing up the car park doing donuts in cars they are barely old enough to drive.

We are noticeably different in our community by virtue of having jobs to go to and also being a different nationality and it has never been an issue.. but I can't help wonder if this is the beginning of the unravelling. If it was just this issue, just about opportunistic violence on the back of a death in police custody (if that's even what it was, too hard to tell from the differing accounts) it might seem less of a threat, but there is so much worry and concern and anger in the greater community because of the broader economic downturn that I don't think that it would be totally far-fetched to worry about communities turning on eachother based on who has work or is perceived to be of one culture or class etc.