How are our London friends?

Mark and Bev are alive and tweeting. They're in Streatham and there was some looting and such about two minutes walk from where they live but that's about it as far as I know. The main drag was being used by the cops to get to various areas in South London such as Croydon, so it was a bit of a noisy evening.
 
It's bizarre. Other cities are joining in on the fun now.

I stayed at a pub in Croydon which a mate ran, back in the 20th century.
 
We're ok. I've lived through 3 riots in this city, and I have never known anything like it. Right now all I can hear are sirens, we're very close to the main high road in Streatham, so we can hear everything. It's 5pm, yesterday it was about this time it started in various suburbs.

Sunday night I was woken at 1.30am when youths in cars and on foot gathered below our bedroom window. I could hear a lot of trouble on the street, there were a number of small gangs out there looting several shops, and these guys were working out where to go next. They were having a whale of a time.

Last night it seems every suburb we border got hit, Croydon worst of all. They've burnt down people's houses as well as businesses. It's just unbelievable. I know Croydon very well, I went to school there for 5 years, it's fucking heart breaking. The kids in Croydon seem to have been the worst so far, car jacking, shooting people, and just setting light to fucking everything they can.

There's some incredible footage on YouTube, if you search for Mark Stone. He was in Clapham Junction last night with his iPhone. He filmed EVERYTHING, got right in these kids faces. He's a journo that lives locally, but a film crew was sent to him later on and he stayed there all night. The footage of these fucking animals ransacking every shop, even hairdressers, I swear to God I've never seen anything like it.

I'm getting more and more angry at these fucking apologists making excuses about poverty. These fucking cunts are already wearing £100 trainers and they all have mobile phones and fucking Blackberrys. That's not even close to poverty. They're just sub-human cunts, every last fucking one of them. I want to see the cops out with tear gas and plastic bullets tonight. My parents had fuck all, I grew up in a council flat, and my parents got shit jobs they hated to pay their way. We didn't have the money for half the stuff these parasitic shits have. If I hear the words 'disenfranchised' and 'disaffected' again I will scream. They're animals, that's all they are.

Sorry to go all right wing on you there, but that's just how it is now. I've just watched a video from Clapham last night where the cops got a looter on the ground and people were cheering as they beat the shit out of him. It's the only thing that's really made me smile today. How fucking sad is that?
 
I was reading last night that the chief of police (I think... someone in a similar position none the less) said that they where trying to "police with consent", so they didn't make the situation worse

WTF????

That very easily translates to "we can't do anything because we'll be accused of racism"

I know if I owned a house / shop in the area that was being looted, I'd be sitting in the front door with a shotgun and daring the pricks to come near me
 
That's essentially it. Riots here have been about race and police brutality in black communities. A lot of work has gone into improving relations between the cops and minority communities in the last 25 years, but essentially that boils down to a softly softly approach. This shows that 'policing by consent' means 'you're fucked, we can't help you'. I don't blame the cops at all, they've been standing front line having shit thrown at them for three days, because they have been powerless to do anything. They mentioned plastic bullets today and suddenly it's all calmed down. Funny, that. Football fans, Sikhs, Turks, are all standing in massive groups in their communities ready to defend them tonight. People are fighting back.

Manchester has gone nuts today, though nothing like Croydon and Clapham last night. I suspect they too will be calmer from tomorrow. They've arrested kids as young as 11 today. Boggles the mind.
 
I am waiting to hear the stories of police brutality, you know it is going to happen when it all settles down, which is total and utter shit, and the coppers should of been in there IN FORCE since the first outbreak IMO.


There is no real excuse for the shit that has happened, and those caught deserve everything they get, sad that it took a social uprising of well minded people before the cops came in force to back them up. Was watching a story on the ABC news channel this arvo where a bloke was talking about how a bunch of blokes in there suburb went out deterring the looters, they are all that weak that they just needed to be challenged and they ran off.

*rant over*
 
Check this video out watching this makes me think I might go live with monks
 
Last edited by a moderator:
The cops have been AMAZING. The poor bastards have basically been sent in and not allowed to touch anyone. They've been human shields at best. It took public outrage at the government to get them unleashed. They brought in police from all over the country. I work in the West End on Oxford Street and we had Lancashire cops there, while our home suburb that night had cops from Swansea in Wales. I have to say I loved seeing riot police at the end of my street, and I would be very happy to have that kind of presence on a regular basis.

You can blame what happened in Tottenham on Saturday night on the shooting of that bloke, but that doesn't wash for the rest of the country. It was pure lawlessness. It wasn't just kids, that's for sure, the stories coming from the courts are insane. There is a real breakdown of families here, I'm not talking about single parents but all people responsible for the raising of a child. Teenagers having kids and not having the skills to know how to treat and raise that child. Then that child has a child, and on and on it goes. I'm disgusted with the way these people talk to their kids, and what they allow them to be exposed to. If a child is screamed at for everything, if you're always telling it to shut up, if you don't care where it is all day, then you end up with a feral. They hit 16 and then they start it all themselves. It's depressing, but that is the reality of most of the UK now.

It's true there aren't enough jobs, but it's also true that most of these people wouldn't want them anyway. The benefits system works for those that wish to abuse it and fails those that for who it was actually created to help. They want stuff, gadgets, clothes, cars, but have no desire to work for the money to get them. You always get a few bad apples, it's just life, but we have a nation of them now. I have to wonder if this was a good thing, if somehow people will start looking at society and try to do something real to fix it. I am really pleased it's escalated from being a racial issue, it just turns everything into a shit fest and these problems are way bigger than that.

I'll shut the fuck up about my scummy country now. :p
 
Watto said:
Check this video out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Gex_ya4-Oo watching this makes me think I might go live with monks
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's one of the worst ones. I think people have started a fund to replace all his stuff, good on 'em. Three guys were killed in Birmingham two nights ago while helping to defend their street. People were being told to strip in the street and having all their clothes stolen. Fucking beggars belief. To do these things you have to have no moral understanding whatsoever.
 
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