Monthly Archives: August 2011

Russell Brand Nails the UK Riots

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Russell Brand on the mic

Image by joeltelling via Flickr

Politicians don’t represent the interests of people who don’t vote. They barely care about the people who do vote. They look after the corporations who get them elected. Cameron only spoke out against News International when it became evident to us, US, the people, not to him (like Rose West, “He must’ve known”) that the newspapers Murdoch controlled were happy to desecrate the dead in the pursuit of another exploitative, distracting story.

Why am I surprised that these young people behave destructively, “mindlessly”, motivated only by self-interest? How should we describe the actions of the city bankers who brought our economy to its knees in 2010? Altruistic? Mindful? Kind? But then again, they do wear suits, so they deserve to be bailed out, perhaps that’s why not one of them has been imprisoned. And they got away with a lot more than a few fucking pairs of trainers.

These young people have no sense of community because they haven’t been given one. They have no stake in society because Cameron’s mentor Margaret Thatcher told us there’s no such thing.

If we don’t want our young people to tear apart our communities then don’t let people in power tear apart the values that hold our communities together.

As you have by now surely noticed, I don’t know enough about politics to ponder a solution and my hands are sticky with blood money from representing corporate interests through film, television and commercials, venerating, through my endorsements and celebrity, products and a lifestyle that contributes to the alienation of an increasingly dissatisfied underclass. But I know, as we all intuitively know, the solution is all around us and it isn’t political, it is spiritual. Gandhi said: “Be the change you want to see in the world.”

In this simple sentiment we can find hope, as we can in the efforts of those cleaning up the debris and ash in bonhomous, broom-wielding posses. If we want to live in a society where people feel included, we must include them, where they feel represented, we must represent them and where they feel love and compassion for their communities then we, the members of that community, must find love and compassion for them.

As we sweep away the mistakes made in the selfish, nocturnal darkness we must ensure that, amidst the broken glass and sadness, we don’t sweep away the youth lost amongst the shards in the shadows cast by the new dawn.

Russell Brand is donating his fee for this article to a clean-up project.

Read full article @  UK riots: Big Brother isn’t watching you | UK news | The Guardian.

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PressTV – Police ignited British unrest

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English: Metropolitan Police officers on patro...

Amid the worsening and spreading unrest throughout Britain, an analyst says the incident was sparked by police forces that were heavily armed.

The whole incident was “sparked by the police carrying fire arms” that they never used to carry in the past across Britain, said Ian Williams, of Foreign Policy in Focus, in a Wednesday interview with Press TV.

“The fact that they had the fire arms and they were prepared to use them, in very dubious circumstances, shows the reduction in the civility of British life over the last few decades,” he underlined. Continue reading →

IPCC ‘May Have’ Misled Media Over Mark Duggan

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Independent Police Complaints Commission

 Updated

The police watchdog has admitted it may have wrongly led journalists to believe that police shooting victim Mark Duggan fired at officers before he was killed.

Mr Duggan’s death in Tottenham, north London, on August 4, was the trigger for the first of four nights of riots that spread from the capital across England. Continue reading →

NON GMO The Fight Against Criminals

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So you don’t think Monsanto and GMO is no concern to you?

George Noory interviews author Jeffery Smith. If the label doesn’t say “Non GMO”, don’t buy it as it probably is. Force the food manufactures to Print NON GMO. Boycott anything else. For more info google Jeffery Smith GMO. Continue reading →

Why Police were soft on looters

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London

Image via Wikipedia

 

because they were ‘ordered to stand and observe’

  • Yard insiders: Officers were ‘told just to try and contain violence’
  • Complaints by public that looting mobs were being allowed to continue.
  • Tactics finally changed on Monday as armoured vehicles moved in.
  • Met Police took three days to issue pictures of offenders.

Police were ordered to ‘stand and observe’ rioters as they laid waste to London’s streets instead of confronting them, it was claimed today.

Scotland Yard insiders have revealed teams were frustrated at their inability to wade in and arrest troublemakers while they looted and burnt out shops.

They had apparently been told to try and contain any violence but not to haul away offenders who would instead be identified through video footage later, according to The Times.

It was only on Monday night, when the riots escalated still further, that tactics changed and armoured vehicles called Jankels were used to disperse the crowds.

On Tuesday night, some 16,000 officers also flooded London’s streets – almost triple the previous night’s deployment – and they were finally given the green light to confront the gangs.

The Met has also come under fire for taking three days to issue any images of suspects – and then only releasing 12 grainy pictures. The Mail Online managed to produce another 30 with ease.
In contrast, Greather Manchester Police were issuing images online via social network sites within hours of similar violence in their area.

more @ Mail Online.

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If British shopkeepers had the right to bear arms…

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Glock 23 pistol

Image via Wikipedia

vicious thugs would think twice before looting

During vicious thugs would think twice before looting – Telegraph Blogs the Los Angeles riots in 1992, many store owners in the south central part of the city defended their property against marauding gangs with their own weapons, and succeeded in protecting their livelihoods and thousands of jobs that depended on them. And across the country, Americans admired their bravery, thankful for the Second Amendment to the US Constitution which protects their right to keep and bear arms, and thereby defend themselves, their families and their property. In contrast in London in 2011, shopkeepers were left at the mercy of feral, brutal thugs acting with impunity across whole swathes of the capital as the police were overwhelmed. If they had the right to bear arms and defend their stores with force, it would have been a very different story, and brutal looters would have met firm resistance.

Britain’s gun laws are among the most draconian in the world, yet the nation has some of the highest levels of violent crime and burglary in the West, and there is no shortage of gun crime in major cities such as London and Manchester. While criminal gangs are often able to acquire firearms on the black market, ordinary law-abiding British citizens are barred from owning guns for self-defence.

The riots in London, the West Midlands and the North West should prompt a renewed debate in Britain over the right to bear arms by private citizens. The shocking scenes of looting across the country are a reminder that the police cannot always be relied upon to protect homes and businesses during a period of widespread social disorder. The defence of life and property can never be entrusted solely to the state, not least when there is a complete breakdown in law and order. As we have seen this week in Britain, when individuals are barred from defending their own property from mobs of vicious thugs, sheer anarchy and terror reins.

via If British shopkeepers had the right to bear arms, vicious thugs would think twice before looting – Telegraph Blogs.

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Where were police? Shopkeepers left defenceless

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Police
  • Officers accused of inaction as looting mobs go wild
  • Cameron leads calls for more robust policing
  • Top Yard commander: ‘We need to do more for London’
  • All able-bodied officers and special constables called in
  • Plastic bullets would be used for first time ‘if deemed necessary’

Shopkeepers joined an increasing chorus of voices today demanding to know what the police were doing as swathes of London descended into chaos last night.

Business owners accused police of adopting a softly-softly approach which left their shops and businesses vulnerable to attack by baying mobs.

While police were criticised in some quarters for being far too slow to get to riot scenes, officers were accused by shopkeepers in Hackney of standing just yards away from looters as windows were smashed and armfuls of goods were scooped up.

Cypran Asota, who has run the Boots opticians for 25 years, told the London Evening Standard how he watched as the shop was destroyed.

Read more @ London riots 2011: Where were police? Shopkeepers mystified as they’re left defenceless | Mail Online.

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London Riots: Shop-owners defend their businesses in east London

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John Domokos stands with Turkish shop owners amid disturbances on Kingsland High Street in east London


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The Twitter Riots put the Surveillance Society on trial – When IT Meets Politics

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Image representing Twitter as depicted in Crun...

Image via CrunchBase

The time lines for the Tottenham Riots and subsequent assaults on Enfield, Walthamstow and Brixton show clearly how Twitter enabled small groups to rapidly develop tactics for distracting the police while their elders looted the local trading park. Now we will see whether the technologies used to enable the Iranian secret police to track down and incarcerate dissident Twitterers are used to do likewise to those who organise the incineration of inner city shopping centres for criminal gain. If not we will know that the great RIPA debate was, and is, dishonest: even if the technologies work, we do not have the competance and will to use them, or they are being used for the security of the state, not of its citizens.

In my previous blog entry on the riots I referred to the use of footage from the surveillance cameras and the RFID chips and serials numbers to track and trace the looters. It has been put to me that the torching of the Jewellers in Tottenham and later of Aldi and Carpetright was to destroy the evidence being logged by the surveillance cameras while the discarding of packaging was to “lose” the RFID chips. That raises the interesting question of whether surveillance cameras that do not transmit in real-time to a remote location are more of a threat than a benefit. It also indicates the need to put the RFID chips inside the product rather than the packaging.

full story @ computerweekly.com

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