Bad things happening in London

[robertlouis]

This headline appeared in Sunday's Observer under Nick Cohen's byline.

He'll never live it down!

No riots here. Just quiet, ever-deeper misery

[russtafa]

Australian police are so politically correct that they tuck our little scum bags into bed and i suspect that the pommie cops are the same

[robertlouis]

Australian police are so politically correct that they tuck our little scum bags into bed and i suspect that the pommie cops are the same

No they don't, Russ. True, they aim for containment first and confrontation if they have to, which is by far the pragmatically most sensible approach, but the real problem in dealing with the aftermath of this will be how the courts deal with the offenders, particularly when the prisons are already full to bursting.

[AmyDaly]

Are there still riots going on over there?

[russtafa]

the Romans would have crucified them from one end of the U.K to the other as a lesson.god bless the good old days

[Nicole Dupre]

Are there still riots going on over there?

There are recent news articles about it all. I assume so.

[robertlouis]

Are there still riots going on over there?

Yes, but fewer in London and more in other cities. Hopefully they're burning themselves out, if you'll excuse the pun, Amy.

It's all that Nikka's fault lol.

[Prospero]

The coverage of all this is vivid. But for those of us out of the combat zone the truth comes home when you travel just a mile f and find gutted shops, terrified local businessmen and women. Some corner store people have lost everything - and were living so marginally they had no insurance. It's heartbreaking. Our Government's response is to call it "criminality pure and simple" without looking at the deeper and troubling roots of this. Yes we have to stop it now - if necessary with force majeur. But think about its causes. The lower depths who have no moral compass or sense of hope anymore. And the roots of THAT are in the values that have permeated our society since Thatcher's time... "greed is good' as proclaimed in the Wall Street movie. But mob violence always takes the same form. Shakespeare knew this long ago. He wrote in Julius Caeser of how the mob killed a writer called Sina mistaking him for a politician because he had the same first name. More recently UK mobs attacked a paediatricians home because they didn't know the difference between that and a paedophile. Crowds and power... they lose all restraint when they see everyone around them acting badly. And there has also been a loss of any respect in the wider public for the police. Most are ordinary men and women doing a dangerous and thankless task. but recently we've also seen corruption at the top (in the scandal over phone hacking and payments to the police) and thuggery in the ranks - the shooting that triggered this (excuse the pun) the police killing of the brazilian Jean de mendes on a Tube train after he was mistaken for a Jihadist, the casual killing and cover up of a newspaper vendor during the student protests and many other unreported incidents of brutality by police against young black people. The list goes on and on. But our politicians thunder that this is "criminality, pure and simple" and make to wave a big stick. it is neither pure nor simple - like much of the truth about things. it is complex and troubling.

[Nicole Dupre]

Yes, but fewer in London and more in other cities.

Doesn't this stuff happen all the time at soccer games in all of those areas anyway? You guys should just have a few quick football games, and see if you can trap them all in a few stadiums.

[Prospero]

[quote=Nicole Dupre;983690]

Yes, but fewer in London and more in other cities./QUOTE]
Doesn't this stuff happen all the time at soccer games in all of those areas anyway? You guys should just have a few quick football games, and see if you can trap them all in a few stadiums.

LOL... a bit like a mousetrap with soccer as the bait?