Corruption Part 2 / The Riots

Can see your logic re the chicken and the egg - though not sure scientists would agree! Me - I don’t care either way … I eat them both!!
Think the difficulty with the means test idea (or one of them) would be deciding on the dividing line!! At what level (of income/assets) do you (does one) say “Well - they are priviliged!”? Maybe it should be on Tax band or Council Tax Band (or do they call it something else now!)
Maybe if you or your family is a high rate tax payer you get treble the sentence! If you or your family are “normal” rate tax payers then you get double the sentence and if you or your family are on benefits then you just get the plain sentence!
I do think that as well as meeting (and apologising) to those that they injured or whose property they damaged they should also have to work to repair the damage.
On another note - what is the latest book you are reading (maybe we should move into Bookworms) and what have you read recently that you have really enjoyed (or hated)?? I read a lot - as the state of my house clearly shows!! Keep thinking I must tackle it, and then sit down with a book instead!!

Suspect that is a Chicken and Egg type debate!!
Wonder how many videos there are on youtube of genuine rioters treating the police disgracefully? Bet there aren’t so many as it wouldn’t serve the purpose of the rioters for those to be seen! NOT saying that the police are perfect - I think they may not all be of sufficient ccalibre, and that most (of the recent recruits at least) are not properly trained. (like nurses and many other professions too sadly!!)
I almost think that there should be a “means test” for the rioters/looters and if they are from a “priviliged” background then they should get double the punishment!! Realise that it isn’t at all practical etc etc - but a) they should know better (!) and b) they aren’t in genuine “need”. Though I still can’t don’t feel that there was much need involved in any of it!! They weren’t taking food or other genuine essentials - just “stuff” that they wanted and didn’t want to pay for!!!

Quite agree that people need to be able to respect those in positions of responsibility and power? Maybe if the police weren’t routinely under attack they wouldn’t “over-react”? I don’t think excuses should be made for ANYBODY here! Not the police - but not the rioters! However strongly I feel about the politicians and the bankers, and any other issue I still know that it doesn’t under ANY circumstances give me the right to destroy other people’s property, or just take it away because I want it!!
The worst thing that could possibly happen - IMHO - is that excuses are made for the behaviour of the rioters, the looters and in some circumstances the police too!! They should be made to make good the damage that they did.
No easy solutions to complicated problems that is for sure!

Seems obvious to me that something has to change! The big question - obviously- is what! It isn’t a problem that is going to be solved in an instant - just as it isn’t a problem that was created in an instant!
It is easy to cricicize those who were rioting and looting - and there really is NO excuse for their behaviour! However, I think it would be a lot more useful if the amount of time and effort that has gone into criticism could be put to the much better use of trying to find a solution or set of solutions for the problem!!
I am sure that some of the rioters/looters had genuine grievances (still no excuse) and some of them were just greedy or enjoyed it (also no excuse)
The important thing really is to find a way to ensure that it doesn’t happen again! YOung people (and some older ones) need some basic discipline in their life. They need a structure to their day - and I think most importantly - they need to understand that you don’t get something for nothing! I know that the benefit system was set up to ensure that nobody was left with nothing to live on - but it has become a way of life for some people (Some of whom would get a job if they could - I know that)
However - I genuinely believe that some kind of “National Servide” would be beneficial in lots of ways!! I am NOT talking about compulsory time in the military though! I mean a period of time living in a disciplined way, in a group. Each person required to look after their personal living space and their personal effects. Each person also expected to conform to a timetable. Each person required to contribute in some way to “society”. That may mean a “menial” job, or it may not - but it would involve “work experience” of some sort!
I genuinely believe that “society” would benefit from such a scheme! It would cost money to set up and to run - but would it really cost more than the ridiculous amount that is currently spent on benefits? I don’t know! But I think that the long term benefits would be immense!!
I hope that MPs - whether they are in Gorernment or in Opposition - will ALL join together, will stop scoring cheap points off each other as to who is to blame - and will work together to come up with a serious sensible workable plan to improve life in Britain so that riots like these do not become standard practise!!
Just my honest opinion!

In the Uk it seems to me that we bent over backwards not to offend the religious sensib ilities of Muslims and Hindus. For example, there was the ridiculous direction by the Red Cross that their charity shops could not put nativity scenes in their windows at Christmas so as not to offend non-Christians. It has been this type of muddled thinking that has offended the “native” population. They see immigrants as being treated wiuth more sensitivity than they themselves receive. Also not enough effort was made to ensure that English was learnt.
In France you know that you are living in France and you have to become accustomed to the French way of life.

Very true, Jane, & Trevor Macdonald is a model citizen, too. I don’t think I made any reference to ethnicity, just people with different views. We are indeed living in a foriegn country & welcomed whole heartedly - different story if you are Tunisian, though.

Mark, the man most admired after he lost his son and their friends was not of "English"ethnicity.
He behaved with dignity and was concerned to stop the violence caused by young thugs.
An example to us all!

I’m afraid to say that multiculturism does not & has never worked except in a police state. Throughout history since man became “civilized” & was allowed to have a view, he has been hostile to those with different views to greater or lesser extent. This can lead to fights in pubs right up to World wars! In Britain we have had ethnic wars for centuries, some have LASTED a century!
Still not a popular view but perhaps Enoch Powell had a point?

Britain has always been a nation of mixed origin. Angles, Saxons Jutes, Huguenots, etc.
We went to to foreign countries and turned them in to an empire and gave them our nationality.
We are also living in a “foreign” country, la belle France and we have been welcomed whole-heartedly.
You may not have noticed, but the world has been “shrinking” for some time now and people move around much more than they used to. This is a fact of life that you will have to accept.

Personnally I view the riots from a totally different aspect to mosty other sf members.
I believe that this is just the tip of the iceberg. Britain is doing something to itself now that we fought against in the great wars and that is invasion. Britain is being invaded. At the last census it was proven that 40% of the population is now of foreign ethnestisity. A great deal of these "invaders do not work and are simply a burden on the country. This will continue till there are very few true British people left. The Goverment and all its rich friends will then find that there is not enough money coming in from taxes so they will try and up these taxes for their own good - not that of the country.Consequently, as we can see now, the gap between the haves and the havenots becoming far far greater. War will occour, and the riots are just a taste,and this will not be a civil war because it will be between the government, the armed forces, and the invaders who will outnumber the British probably 10 fold. Britain is a pimple on the world just waiting to explode!

Good points Richard, add Neils ‘bring back discipline’ and we’d be halfway there!

It should not be a political issue but that is what many people are trying to make it. Who has the most influence/blame - school or family?

Good job there isn’t any real news to report. A very small number of people took part and it affected a tiny, tiny area of the UK and as usual the BBC and other media went overboard. Everyone is trying to turn this into a political debate signifying a deep social malaise when it’s a result of bringing up children without discipline at home and school. Given the age of the rioters quite a lot of them would have been brought up under the watch of a certain Mr Blair and Mr Brown.

Its interesting the strength of feeling we all have for these riots. I don’t recall any thing like the level of interest when something similar occurred here in France a few years ago (remember all the burnt cars in the cities?) & I wonder why - after all, I don’t live there. I also don’t feel compelled to vote in a country that I no longer live in but I do watch the English news! Maybe its because as an Englishman abroard I feel that this behaviour reflects badly on the reputation the English have here?

whilst we can look for reasons why this happened and some can sympathise with the rioters (not I), can we also remember that some innocent people were actually murdered during the rioting and others injured. We cannot possibly condone this sort of behaviour no matter what the apparent justifications are…

Joking aside, there is NO excuse for anti social behavior on this scale. There have been poor for hundreds of years, long before state education, benefits & assisted housing. The only thing these rioters are deprived of is character, & that comes from inside. In countries with no state benefit system being poor means no food, no housing, no money, but somehow they survive, carve an existence & even prosper, all done without ruining what their neighbours have achieved.
Perhaps the UK police, who are always damned if they do, damned if they don’t, should have a version of the French CRS.
And Niel? Yes, they are! Punishment never made me an angel, but it made me realise that for every bad thing I did there was a consequence.

Very good points Nicole. Even though I was brought up on a council estate during the 50’s and 60’s (Dagenham in Essex, the largest socila housing project in the world)I can remember it as a time of hope and opportunity. Fantastic outpouring of creativity in the arts and of course pop music. One reason was that there were more jobs than people available hence the influx of people from what remainded of the British Empire especially the Wet Indies.

On BBC4 Broadcasting House was broadcast an item about punishment in schools 20 years ago and a young lady who was an organiser of the campaign to stop all forms of punishment such as the ruler on the hand, the slipper, the cane, detention, etc. There was such a response that it was stopped. Are today’s children more badly behaved than we were then?

…and some form of direction…maybe some role models with values they can respect?

At 17 years old, I found myself living within the middle of the Brixton riots which was a scary yet thought provocating experience, which may well of contributed to my work in the UK at the time as a Youth Worker and later on a counsellor. Due to lifes twists and turns, 4 years ago my husband and myself found ourselves rehoused on a council estate in South East London. I learnt much through this experience. The majority of people were hard working although a small proportion had lost hope of ever being employed or finding a way out of awful housing conditions (and they were pretty grim). Police sirens were heard maybe 20 times a day - if not more. To add to that several familes felt isolated and unable to fit in with society. Many of the new refugess in the area were starting to come from war torn areas whereby they had seen families destroyed by war and corruption. They could not trust anybody as all forms of trust had been taken away. They had come to Europe for a better life (and whom can blame them) but in many areas it is hard to say how much better their life was - only they can answer that as they were often housed in the poorest of conditions and labelled as being priorities over UK citizens. After the terrorising ordeals some had experienced, I cannot imagine how this made them feel. Yes then you have the people in the UK who feel they should have priority socail housing as they live there and I can fully empathise with this too. However my mother was a refugee from the Germany, arriving just after the war and my husband whom is French nationality was born in France avoiding dreadful civil war that had bestowed his parent’s birthland in Africa. I certianly do not condone people who leave their countries of origin to seek a better life! Day after day on our council estate I saw children as young as 5 on the streets with no parents in sight. Sometimes they were from one parent families but there were all kinds of social reasons as to why they were left alone. Some parents were alcoholics, some were drug addicts and some were hard wworking people struggling to find childcare costs, unable to really know where to get help! Flats were tiny where we lived and often 5-8 people to 2 tiny bedrooms was not uncommon due to housing shortages. People constantly under each others’ feet, councils that run out of money for repairs so that living conditions such as leaks, mould, broken rooves etc become the norm. Kids formed into terrifying gangs as these are often the only peer groups they feel they have and the only people they felt able to relate to. Imagine this for us residents! They knew they could commit crimes and would be out of prison within maybe a few weeks and laughed at the police officers who arrested them. They felt above the law and in many ways there were and still are which is quite appalling. They cannot see hope or direction! I do not condone anything that has taken place, yet when you live in such areas you see many of reasons towards the underlying causes! Very often I lived in fear! My husband and myself both worked 60 hours a week each to get out of such conditions, making sure one of us was usually around for our 2 young children. Eventually we had enough money to move to France and have chosen a small village just outside of Montpellier to live. I have been here for 2 months and already have fallen in love with this country, it’s people and it’s own set of eccentricites! I could have moved to other parts of the UK for a better life but have chosen here as it feels right! Apart from beaurocracy driving my a little crazy, I know I have made the right choice. I guess what I am trying to say is that most people strive for a better life but not all achieve it due to numerous reasons! There are many reasons for social unrest and I certainly do not have the answers but I feel I have a little little insight into some parts of society that I feel needs help and guidance - be it tougher laws