Violence is rarely mindless. The politics of a burning building, a smashed-in shop or a young man shot by police may be obscured even to those who lit the rags or fired the gun, but the politics are there. Unquestionably there is far, far more to these riots than the death of Mark Duggan, whose shooting sparked off the unrest on Saturday, when two police cars were set alight after a five-hour vigil at Tottenham police station. A peaceful protest over the death of a man at police hands, in a community where locals have been given every reason to mistrust the forces of law and order, is one sort of political statement. Raiding shops for technology and trainers that cost ten times as much as the benefits you’re no longer entitled to is another. A co-ordinated, viral wave of civil unrest across the poorest boroughs of Britain, with young people coming from across the capital and the country to battle the police, is another.
19 thoughts on “From Penny Red in London”
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liminali: thanks for your great link: (Here is a quote from it. I encourage all PWers to check the link out:”
“There are people who are reacting to the fatal police shooting of Mark Duggan. There are people who reacting to the police “stop-and-search” tactics. There are people who are reacting to austerity measures that have pressed them to the point of breaking. There are people who are waging class warfare from the only position they’ve got. There are people who are simply tired of not being heard. There are people who are just using political conflagration as an excuse to be violent assholes for the sheer thrill of it. Etc. And every combination thereof.
To try to find a singular motivation, or a singular source of the disquiet, or even to try to attribute a singular emotion to a toxic mix of rage, fear, alienation, anger, frustration, exhilaration, dispossession, is folly.
And to be surprised is dishonesty, or privilege. ”
I also encourage all who haven’t read it to read “L’Miserables” by Victor Hugo.
Peace.
tzaddi_star, thankfully not everyone has the same attitudes as the ones you have encountered.
The blog Shakesville has a good discussion of the situation in the UK, with quotes from the Laurie Penny piece, including comments from people in London about the conditions they’re dealing with there. And a lot of grief and sadness is being expressed about peeps’ online contacts’ reactions, too. Shakesville maintains a safe blogspace. It’s one of my daily blogs and has been for years.
http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2011/08/on-uk-riots.html
I wish for a Gandhian-type (cf. this spring in Egypt) revolution. Problem is: where’s Gandhi? Last time I looked, Martin Luther King was killed, and no one is volunteering anymore..
I’m so glad you put this up on PW, well done.
Sadly, it seems that if you don’t condemn the rioters as nothing but criminal thugs you will be accused of completely condoning the riot.
Thanks, Fe. Yep, Rob 44.
(sp: gardener)
the oppressed do have a voice, and many use it as constructively and as often as possible. that some may believe violence is their only one, is exactly the kind of thinking that serves the powers that prefer they have none. and if this is all part of the process of what some think 2012 to be, has anyone seen this perspective?
http://www.vimeo.com/27240681
No, not good at all.
This is not a good development:
APNewsBreak: British far-right aims to quell riots
© 2011 The Associated Press
Aug. 9, 2011, 6:28PM
LONDON — The leader of a British far-right group says its members are taking to the streets of British cities in an attempt to quell riots that have spread across the country for four nights.
Stephen Lennon, leader of the English Defense League, told The Associated Press that up to 1,000 members planned to turn out in Luton, where the group is based, and others areas that have suffered unrest, including the northwestern city of Manchester.
Lennon said some members had were already carrying out patrols trying to deter rioters, and that hundreds more would join them Wednesday.
“We’re going to stop the riots — police obviously can’t handle it,” Lennon told the AP.
The far-right group was cited as an inspiration to Anders Behring Breivik who has confessed to the July 22 massacre in Norway.
Read more here.
Fe: Agreed. Look for this movie to be playing in a country near or around you soon. Same script, different locale. Here we go, 2012 astrology.
Violence has been and still is the only voice of the oppressed. Why?
Burning River:
Because the oppressed are not supposed to have a voice.
Rob44:
As Penny says, so it also is in America.
The discussion here, and on Penny’s blog and article pages, of the greater context of the motivations behind these riots, is worthwhile, and valid. But I think in the macro view, her indictment of structural and systemic abuses of power and wealth as primary instigators of such chaos stands.
2,000 protestors to Scotland Yard last month were not GIVEN ATTENTION. Now 4-500 looters are being PAID ATTENTION. Thank you, brilliant Len. Any gardenter knows that you do not ignore your garden and have it weed free.
Peace.
Amanda….I also was questioning along the lines you mention…in the comments section, a rather lengthy one by SJS, closing lines are:
“There’s NO justification for their actions, no excuse. They made their bed, and I for one would be sincerely happy to see copper-jacketed projectiles put them to rest in it.”
Still mulling…..
Violence has been and still is the only voice of the oppressed. Why?
also one thing i find interesting are some of the comments at her blog, esp if you scroll down a little. there are some who don’t appreciate “romanticizing” the rioting as “the cry of the oppressed,” noting that there is greed and ignorance at play. i think, given the discussions of astrology here, it’s more like repressed anger, sexual energy, stuffed guilt, disconnect, and so on. but i wonder: can we dismiss entirely the roles of greed, ignorance, etc? or are those ideas a red herring that distract us from the fundamental issues?
sometimes, i can’t quite tell. here is one such comment from Penny’s blog:
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fingertrouble said…
“Cry of the oppressed also means attacking gay men in the gay village in Birmingham apparently. It means mugging kids who have been knocked over. It means torching people’s homes.
“Please don’t romanticise this; I can see the oppressed aspect, but a lot of nasty ‘phobic and evil mob mentality and criminality. I don’t cry for a wrecked bank, but seeing people jump for their lives in Croydon brings me up sharp. This is no revolution.
“This is no poll tax riot or even the student protests I supported, it’s drawn on those for ideas I think but far darker and far more yes – mindless. Fighting back has become fighting for mine in Thatcher’s Grandchildren. For to quote the Boomtown Rats ‘you see there are no reasons’…I think Tottenham might’ve had a point. The others far less…I eagerly await people’s analysis how looting and torching a Sony factory is somehow a cry of failed yoot and a strike for freedom from oppression…but I think the kids would laugh at your rhetoric, they just want a free Wii.”
hmmm. “thatcher’s grandchildren” — has a certain ring to it.
Fe — did you and eric see Rob44’s link & quote about this that he posted? i think it’s under Len’s last post. i’ll add it here in a sec.
ok — looking at the author’s name, this may be the same person? ah well — i have more work to do. 🙂
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VIA robb44:
RE: paying attention in the context of the London + riots, this first-person analysis by Laurie Penny via Common Dreams.org…
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/08/09-0
“Months of conjecture will follow these riots. Already, the internet is teeming with racist vitriol and wild speculation. The truth is that very few people know why this is happening. They don’t know, because they were not watching these communities. Nobody has been watching Tottenham since the television cameras drifted away after the Broadwater Farm riots of 1985. Most of the people who will be writing, speaking and pontificating about the disorder this weekend have absolutely no idea what it is like to grow up in a community where there are no jobs, no space to live or move, and the police are on the streets stopping-and-searching you as you come home from school. The people who do will be waking up this week in the sure and certain knowledge that after decades of being ignored and marginalised and harassed by the police, after months of seeing any conceivable hope of a better future confiscated, they are finally on the news. In one NBC report, a young man in Tottenham was asked if rioting really achieved anything:
“Yes,” said the young man. “You wouldn’t be talking to me now if we didn’t riot, would you?”
“Two months ago we marched to Scotland Yard, more than 2,000 of us, all blacks, and it was peaceful and calm and you know what? Not a word in the press. Last night a bit of rioting and looting and look around you.”
Yeah it’s amazing. Penny Red indeed.
The full article and comments at Penny Red’s blog is worth a read. Please take a look.