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Technology Blamed For Helping UK Rioters
Hugh Pickens writes "The WSJ reports that following three nights of rioting and looting in London, Blackberry's messaging network and social networking sites are being blamed by police, politicians and media organizations for helping rioters in London spread word about the next hot spot . It's an 'encrypted, very secure, safe, fast, cheap, free, easy way for disaffected urban youth to spread messages for the next targets,' says Mike Butcher, editor of TechCrunch Europe and digital advisor to the Mayor of London. But Ian Maude, an analyst at Enders Analysis, said it's unfair to lay the blame on technology. 'Certainly, it's a lot easier for people to communicate with each other in real time via some of these services but that's a fact of life. They're not good or evil in themselves, its the purposes for which people use them.' The Metropolitan Police, known as Scotland Yard, say they are monitoring social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Research In Motion Ltd. (RIMM), the maker of Blackberry smartphones, says it has 'engaged with the authorities to assist in any way we can.'" An anonymous reader points out that the rioters aren't the only ones using technology. London police have begun posting pictures on Flikr of people they'd like to interview following the riots over the last few days.
And technology was equally blamed for helping UK police.
Just another example where technology changes nothing. It just enables all the good and bad impulses inherent in humanity.
Blaming technology for the rioting is bullshit. You have to have people willing to riot and loot in the first place, this just helps them group together....
But more than that, the real bullshit is that in any group that size, there's no way the communication is "secure", in fact it MUST be broadcast (by tweet or whatever) where anyone could see it. Yes that lets rioters group but it also SHOULD give police a heads-up where to be. If technology is to blame for the riots then the police are almost as much to blame for allowed the riots to occur when the targets are handed to them on a digital platter beforehand.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
A few months ago the western world wailed loudly when some arab countries terminated internet and mobile phone connections because it was thought to be assisting their local rioters. Here we have a supposedly democratic country where, at the first sign of trouble, government officials are suggesting exactly the same thing.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Guns blamed for helping gunmen shoot people.
Bombs blamed for helping suicide bomber blow up.
Planes blamed for helping people crash planes.
Fire blamed for helping people start fires.
Phones blamed for helping people coordinate bad things.
Internet blamed for child pornography proliferation.
How about this?
Sensationalist media blamed for making everything a scandal or a controversy!
People wanting to ignore and pass off responsibility just fire the blame cannon everywhere. Why are they rioting? Why is there so much civil unrest in England? Are the English that repressed that this is a cry-out for help? Or is this all being blown out of proportion, and the riots are really just a couple of small groups causing trouble. Personally, I think the PoliceState in that country has spiraled out of control, and now there is a growing underground movement with there backs to the wall, so we are seeing the rebellion swell as more and more dissenters act out the only way they personally feel they can. How about looking at the fundamental causes for societal unrest, lets analyze the sociology of the The Land of the Panopticon Complex.
'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
Give law-abiding Britains their gun rights back and let them use them in public when attacked by people who clearly intend to render substantial harm to life, limb or property.
Liberals were predicting that the "make my day" self-defense statutes Florida and Georgia have would result in a bloodbath because recipients of violence could not only stand their ground (by abolishing the "duty to retreat") but also lowered the threshold for using a weapon in self-defense.
Instead, a lot of criminals suddenly realized it would be open season on them.
Of course, you're well within your right to lecture these "redneck states" on how uncivilized their behavior is--even as your city is struggling with outright barbarism in its midst.
With all the surveillance cameras in London one would thought that is has to be the most secure city in the world.
Oh the irony.
Love many, trust a few, do harm to none.
Yes, we in the UK should definitely consider selling our principles out.
After all, a mere 10,000 people annually are killed by guns in the US, and when you compare that to the 40 or so people who have been injured in these riots the case is clear - we should have more guns in the UK.
When the unrest does hit your state, and regular citizens are shot with their own guns, which is what always happens when inexperienced gun owners try to take the law into their own hands, I hope Slashdot is up long enough for me to laugh at you.
Living in London, and seeing the chaos first hand, I find the millions of ignorant teenage American basement dwellers posting here, with their stupid, teenage libertarian logic highly offensive. Britain is a different country, with different traditions, and different laws to the US.
IF these gangs of hoodlums were all packing .45s, then hundreds of innocent people would likely be dead.
There is NO government conspiracy to start riots as a pretext to limit our civil liberties
CCTV does work -- ask all the homie-g gangbangers being busted right now, where the evidence that put them behind bars came from
Grow up, and kindly refrain from commenting on things you obviously know nothing about. Ignoramuses.
I don't live in the UK, so I obviously don't have my finger on the pulse of London. I'm sure SOME of the people are upset over actions of the police and real or perceived inequalities and the police shooting of a young man in a poorer neighbourhood. But there is undoubtedly a number of people for whom this is just an opportunity to behave badly.
As someone who has observed pointless, causeless, riots, or attempts to get riots started at so many large public gatherings and events over the last decade, from the Seattle WTO meetings, the Toronto G8 summit, the Genoa G8 Summit, the Vancouver Stanley Cup finals, a failed attempt at the Vancouver Olympics, football hooliganism across Europe, etc. in most of these cases, there was really no social cause, just an opportunity to behave badly and anonymously in a crowd. Most of the participants, were simply partying violently and could not even articulate what social injustice they were upset about.
No one loves their government, there is always unrest, and always the "disaffected" and "disenfranchised". Sometimes there is a cause, but it has to be recognized that every large public gathering provides an opportunity for the darker side of human "crowd mentality" to come out.
If you aren't part of the solution, then there is good money to be made prolonging the problem
And THAT is exactly the point. That is the key to the rioting and looting this time around. I've posted this in two place now, but here's goes again: The London riots cannot be divorced from the recent political and financial scandals in the UK and beyond.
In the last few years, the general public has been made privy to the monumental failure of ethics and responsibility in institutions both public and private. Bankers and financiers have been seen publicly seen to profit enormously from feckless and irresponsible behaviour. Politicians and civil servants have been shown to be inept at best, and in collusion at worst. And--in particular in the UK--the media and police force have been found to be involved in the most scandalous, unscrupulous and unethical behaviour of recent times.
We are living in an age of irresponsibility.
It's interesting to see that many of the rioters are expressing no political, social, or ideological motivations. They are either engaged in arson or larceny. It is simple opportunism. But this behaviour not a random incident; it is an inevitable consequence of our times. I would hold that these rioters across the UK, discontented from the effects of austerity and unemployment, and cynicised by the endless stream of unresolved scandals, have simply decided to have their own slice of the rotten pie.
If bankers can loot the nation without consequence, if the media can destroy lives with impunity, and politicians lie without consequence, then why should a young unemployed man with few prospects turn up what may be his only opportunity to own a big flatscreen TV, or some designer clothes, or to vent his rage at the state? Because it would be "wrong"? Because it is "immoral", "unethical"? But for his entire life this young man has been shown by example that crime pays, that ruthlessness and wrongdoing pays, that rage and emotion pay.
I don't wish to sound like a religious reactionary, bemoaning the loss of public morality. But what kind of ethics have these young men learned from their leaders and public and private institutions? In the UK and beyond. Where are the ethical pillars of our society who lead by example? In politics? In the church? In the media? In private industry? I see none such. And moreover, I see those in such influential positions profiting from their poor examples.
Remember to these young people, the state over the last 10 years is all they have ever known. A state that has lied and warred. A media that has colluded and harassed. Public institutions who have lost all sense of civic duty. Industries that have profited from the most wanton recklessness and greed. And everywhere, none have been held to account.
There are other underlying causes such as deprivation, unemployment, and hooliganism. But such things have always existed in the UK and elsewhere, but I see this spontaneous outbreak of criminal opportunism first and foremost as a sign of our times. These opportunist rioters have been lead by example by our corrupted ruling classes. As the saying goes, "As above, so below".
May the Maths Be with you!