Depraved or deprived: What lies behind these riots, and why aren't they happening in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland?

[Solopower]

I've been reading the threads on the riots and I wondered if we needed one on the causes.

People's ideas seem to range from thinking the rioters are just opportunistic criminals to socially and culturally disadvantaged youngsters.

But why isn't there any rioting in Scotland, for example, where there are pockets of extreme social deprivation?

Zoe Williams' article on the psychology of looting is worth reading, imo:
www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/09/uk-riots-psychology-of-looting?CMP=twt_gu

Super to read a contribution like that from cogitoergosometimes! I have yet to fathom this modern urge to oversimplify in an increasingly complicated age - my theory is that the media and authorities patronise us but there we are. Such a lot of good sense in these comments. As a teacher my expereince is that certainly our 'finest' will be involved, but then there are also the genetic bad 'uns - often with parents one can only feel for - and the weak willed who are easily led of course. The generations of uneducable children born to children are likely to overwhelm us in the next few decades. Worryingly their lack of imagination is a huge hindrance to the effectiveness of deterrents too. cf those caught on surveillance cameras who fondly believed that because the police were not there they would not be caught! Society will have to come up with a plan and sooner rather than later...or our adored ones will feature more often amongst their victims.

There was an interesting article in The Times describing how, three years ago, Strathclyde police really sorted out their gangs: of which there were many, proportionately more than anywhere else in the UK, and very vicious, too. The police just got into their faces and would not let them alone until it became too difficult for the gangs to operate. This was backed up by very severe treatment of them/their families by the housing departments. The Glasgow police started to be feared again. I am afraid I can't link as I read it in the print version and it will be behind the pay wall. It was very interesting. Somewhat dispels the view of Scottish society being 'milder' than English, but there's obviously a big policing lesson for us in England.

There's also this article on Glasgow gangs on the BBC website today. A different approach altogether but seems to be having an effect. Perhaps a combination of the two?

Good cop, bad cop, as it were.

Also this article in today's (Glasgow) Herald "Scottish gang scheme cuts offending in half" and this one on the same page of the Herald "Shocking offenders into far different lifestyle"

Using both the carrot and the stick.

I think we need Rebus on the case.

Abra1d, Steve House, who leads the Strathclyde force, might apply for the job as Chief of the Met in London.

This is a good article about the causes: www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/12/uk-riots-analysis

It's described as being intially a sort of mob mentality that takes over an individual's sense of responsibility - de-individuation. This bit rings true to me:

"We are talking about young people who want desperately to be accepted by their friends and when they get together in a collective atmosphere they may participate in a riot simply not to let their friends down.

"The last thing they want is to be rejected. It's like getting the death penalty for a teenager. Buddies, pals, friends mean everything to them."

In effect, it seems to be a sort of substitute for a sense of community.

This is about a teenager who predicted the riots and who says it could happen again:
www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/12/riot-predict-trouble-not-over

It's so depressing.

I read about Steve House, Solopower. That is interesting indeed.

I do think it's hard to compare London and Glasgow. London has 16m population and Glasgow has about 2m (I got this from Wiki so not sure).

Populations are different - in London it is transient with a specific set of longstanding cultural and political problems. I think the lack of community was certainly one recurrent theme coming out of the Question Time programme for young people (which was really interesting.)

Cutting youth workers, EMA etc may not be the reason for the riots but it sure didn't help.

'Cutting youth workers, EMA etc may not be the reason for the riots but it sure didn't help.'

The cuts have not yet come into effect. They were announced months ago. If that was a cause, why didn't the yoof and the 9 and 11 year olds riot then?

These riots have played into the hand of the cuts agenda. Maybe that's why they happened now and not when all the protesters were marching against cuts.

Wow if the cuts have not yet come into effect, God help us. A friend works beside a new but empty Sure Start centre in Peckham.

What's 'the cuts agenda?'

The 'cuts agenda' is the message that cuts need to be made to social security etc. Part of the agenda now seems to be evictions as well as just cuts. The agenda is to show the public feral yoof, yobs, looters, rioters and scroungers and what they do, so that the public will bay for benefits cuts.

They say it's broken Britain and Britain is broke, someone has to pay. It will be the benefit culture.

The poor and the squeezed middle will pay, the bankers will make hay.

As my dad put it to his drinking buddies last week:

"£billions of damage that the country has to pay out for and not a single person in jail........

..... I was talking about the bankers, who did you think i was talking about?!"

Yes, that's right. But a banker wears a suit, mighty smart and presentable. They couldn't do no wrong. It's the scumbag hoodies on benefits, they're the ones to blame.

I don't think any bankers are in jail, but there's a young person who stole a £3.50 bottle of water doing 6 months in jail.

Why on earth should the public pay for a mother and her 8 year old daughter to remain in subsidised accommodation when her son has committed a crime, when the public needs that money to pay the tax that pays a banker's bonus?

NormanTebbit re transient populations/lack of community, do you think the communities involved in the riots are transient? My impression is rather that they aren't. That they're stuck on the estates that they've grown up on. I don't know if that's true or not, just my impression.

Obviously, as a whole London is far more of a population in flux than somewhere like Glasgow though.

And wrt to the evictions, the Observer put it well today (may have been quoting someone, can't remember) - evicting a family is like making them pay twice for the crime - they go through the justice system and get made homeless - and that would only happen to someone in social housing.

Also heard someone on the radio today pointing out that when we talk about 'subsidised housing', while it may not be rent at market prices, social housing rents also contribute a significant amount of cash to council coffers. It's not as if anyone's giving it to them for nothing.

prettybird, I like your Dad's style.

Claig - cuts have started to come into effect, esp. EMA. But I also heard something interesting on the Radio 4 programme More or Less. They asked a few economists about the connection, if any, between riots and cuts in public spending. An economist who had looked at this across Europe over the decades since WW2 said there is indeed a correlation but the riots tend to happen before the cuts really bite. He also said, IIRC, that the connection was particularly strong in this country. (You can catch it on the podcast from the R4 site.)

Yes, I think people feel they are living under a cloud of impending doom.

Listening to the radio, reading the paper today, different aspects keep coming to the fore. In some areas there really does appear to be a lot of anger against the police. In others it's a more generalised 'I hate the adults who have made things so horrible for me in this world and I might as well grab what I can get. I'm on my own. No-one helps me, so I'll help myself. And no-one can do anything to me.'