If they're using Blackberries and Twitter to organise there has to be a level of functional literacy. And many of those arrested and charged seem to be well-educated and middle-class, including one estate agent (which is begging for jokes -- who would have imagined a thieving estate agent?)
Well, the police commented that they were using intelligence to determine where to deploy resources, and that "there's a lot of intelligence out there in the public domain", which I think is what you're referring to. One of the problems seems to have been that a lot of the rioters have been organising using Blackberries, which the police haven't (yet) had access to.
I don't know if it is the same in the UK but here it seems the PC media is doing their damnedest to cover up the fact it appears to be almost exclusively a black on white hate crime.
Here in the UK it is almost exclusively not a black on white hate crime (although there are some minority elements of that, and there have been white supremacist groups trying to turn it into that in order to inflame things). In predominantly black areas it's predominantly black people rioting, in predominantly white areas it's predominantly white people rioting, in mixed areas it has been a mix. It's mainly a Lord of the Flies type kids-left-to-their-own-devices-go-feral type crime, with a lot of added "W00t! Free stuff! Shiny!"
In case you have not noticed the UK did NOT use water cannons or plastic bullets in the riots. The UK police take a soft approach, which is why when the shit hits the fan (like in this case) people get so upset.
In case you haven't noticed, the police have said that they didn't use water cannons or plastic bullets because they wouldn't have worked. They're only effective (according to the police -- I don't know any better) against dense, stationary crowds, not dispersed, moving crowds which are what they faced.
"Have you noticed that a lot of the recent immigrants went back smartish"
No I haven't noticed. I still hear plenty of foreign languages on the tube.
I said "a lot", not "all". And we do get tourists in London, too.
How about getting a job on a building site
They all need at least City & Guilds certificates (because of safety); he's tried to get one, but failed the course because he couldn't do the written elements.
or cleaning or 101 other low skilled jobs.
That's what he's trying for. None around, at least not for anybody with learning difficulties.
If he's that badly dyslexic then thats going to be his lot for life. Unfair but thats just the way it is.
We know.
Either way , given that blind people can manage to get jobs citing dyslexia as an excuse for being unemployed is frankly pathetic.
Blind people count towards disability quotas. Dyslexics don't. And even so, the unemployment rate for blind people is over 70%.
Have you noticed that a lot of the recent immigrants went back smartish when they discovered that the opportunities here were not as good as they expected? If there are so many opportunities, care to suggest what my son should be doing other than spending every day scouring the newspapers and the net, knocking on the doors of local businesses with his CV and filling in job applications? Don't say "set up his own business"; he wouldn't be capable of running one because of his learning difficulties. Don't say "Go to college", he's been and failed, and is struggling to pay off the debt he incurred. It's no good citing Branson. Times have changed since he made his fortune, every dyslexic has a different spectrum of abilities and difficulties, and he needed his stroke of luck of editing a student magazine at just the time the government removed the retail price regulations on music media (and the mainstream outlets missing their chance to capitalise on that). Just because one made it doesn't mean that the path is available to everyone.
So you have a hammer, and everything is a nail? Laissez-faire is wrong whatever the facts show? Western or not, laissez-faire or not, high incarceration rates seem to correspond (roughly) to high crime rates, so it's hard to argue that incarceration brings crime down. It's easier to argue that bringing crime down reduces incarceration. The incarceration rates are here, and I'd feel safer in some of the countries at the bottom than some of the countries at the top..
I live here so I'm ok with it, but it is a strong accent, isn't it?
One interview I saw last night was with a Scouser (native of Liverpool) and (I think) an Indian and a Pole. The Indian and Pole were much easier to understand than the Scouser -- and I am originally from Liverpool.
Well, I think they're right to be more selective about who they send to prison, because it's an expensive solution that acts as a very efficient training ground for criminals. Yes, our incarceration rate of 150 per 100,000 is tiny compared to the USA's 743, but it's higher than Canada (117), Denmark and Norway (each 71). I don't think I'd hold up the USA as an example of how to achieve a low-crime society.
Yup , 500,000 polish came over here and most of them got jobs that the chavs are too lazy to take.
Most of my work is elsewhere in the EU. What goes around comes around.
Sorry, there are plenty of opportunities but its far easier for some members of society to sit on welfare and whinge. And when they bored whining because everyone got fed up with listening, they cause trouble.
I know some people who prefer to sit on welfare and whinge, so I'm not disputing that they exist. But believe me, if you think there are plenty of opportunities then you have no clue what's happening on the ground. Did I mention that my son is severely dyslexic, so to all intents and purposes he can't read or write? That doesn't stop him doing physical work, except when the employers demand a degree to hand out towels. It's wrong to assume that because the articulate and well educated can usually find something that everybody can, and it's wrong to assume that everybody is able to respond to education.
I see this same justification for arson and looting again and again and again and you know what - it's bullshit.
There are always opportunities for anyone who wants to work / learn - but these people can't be bothered to start at the bottom and work there way up - they want it all now.
If only. There are not always opportunities. One old friend of mine has been unemployed for decades. He does a lot of voluntary work, so he's not afraid to work, there's just no paying work out there. And my son can't even get voluntary work because even that is fiercely competitive around here (it looks good on a CV).
it's still a good deal, assuming you study something worthwhile, rather than art history or media studies.
It's still a good deal whatever you study, considering that you need a degree to hand out the towels on the reception desk at the gym I used to belong to.
In fairness, most of those deaths are not suspicious. You'd expect some deaths in police custody just from random natural causes, and when you factor in the fact that people in police custody are more likely than the population at large to be long-term drug or alcohol abusers (and so are likely to have increased mortality) the numbers are not particularly surprising. Yes, some of the deaths are suspicious but only a very small proportion of them. If you read the Guardian article you'll see that only 13 officers have been recommended for prosecution; since they usually work in pairs or teams that means something like 6 cases, not 333. Even if you take in the cases that were suspicious but the CPS couldn't get enough evidence you are still way below the 333 cited.
He said he might be shouted at or grounded when he returned home but he would "live with that".
If that's the interview I think it is, he actually said that because it would be a first offence he would only get an ASBO but could live with that. He might be in for a surprise, because the magistrates courts that have heard the cases so far have referred many of them up to the crown court, even in the case of guilty pleas, because the crown court can hand out much longer custodial sentences than the magistrates court can.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not sure if they actually did deploy the army
No -- in part it seems because the army doesn't have the resources available, being already rather overstretched (including the reservists) overseas.
If they're using Blackberries and Twitter to organise there has to be a level of functional literacy. And many of those arrested and charged seem to be well-educated and middle-class, including one estate agent (which is begging for jokes -- who would have imagined a thieving estate agent?)
Well, just like the Renaissance, they were heading steadily north but then they saw the weather in Scotland and gave up.
Well, the police commented that they were using intelligence to determine where to deploy resources, and that "there's a lot of intelligence out there in the public domain", which I think is what you're referring to. One of the problems seems to have been that a lot of the rioters have been organising using Blackberries, which the police haven't (yet) had access to.
I don't know if it is the same in the UK but here it seems the PC media is doing their damnedest to cover up the fact it appears to be almost exclusively a black on white hate crime.
Here in the UK it is almost exclusively not a black on white hate crime (although there are some minority elements of that, and there have been white supremacist groups trying to turn it into that in order to inflame things). In predominantly black areas it's predominantly black people rioting, in predominantly white areas it's predominantly white people rioting, in mixed areas it has been a mix. It's mainly a Lord of the Flies type kids-left-to-their-own-devices-go-feral type crime, with a lot of added "W00t! Free stuff! Shiny!"
In case you have not noticed the UK did NOT use water cannons or plastic bullets in the riots. The UK police take a soft approach, which is why when the shit hits the fan (like in this case) people get so upset.
In case you haven't noticed, the police have said that they didn't use water cannons or plastic bullets because they wouldn't have worked. They're only effective (according to the police -- I don't know any better) against dense, stationary crowds, not dispersed, moving crowds which are what they faced.
26 is barely out of nappies.
Ah, you've seen those pictures too, have you?
Come on, you know that Correlation does not imply causation! ;-)
But it certainly looks as if places that have low crime don't have low crime because they lock up more people.
"Have you noticed that a lot of the recent immigrants went back smartish"
No I haven't noticed. I still hear plenty of foreign languages on the tube.
I said "a lot", not "all". And we do get tourists in London, too.
How about getting a job on a building site
They all need at least City & Guilds certificates (because of safety); he's tried to get one, but failed the course because he couldn't do the written elements.
or cleaning or 101 other low skilled jobs.
That's what he's trying for. None around, at least not for anybody with learning difficulties.
If he's that badly dyslexic then thats going to be his lot for life. Unfair but thats just the way it is.
We know.
Either way , given that blind people can manage to get jobs citing dyslexia as an excuse for being unemployed is frankly pathetic.
Blind people count towards disability quotas. Dyslexics don't. And even so, the unemployment rate for blind people is over 70%.
Have you noticed that a lot of the recent immigrants went back smartish when they discovered that the opportunities here were not as good as they expected? If there are so many opportunities, care to suggest what my son should be doing other than spending every day scouring the newspapers and the net, knocking on the doors of local businesses with his CV and filling in job applications? Don't say "set up his own business"; he wouldn't be capable of running one because of his learning difficulties. Don't say "Go to college", he's been and failed, and is struggling to pay off the debt he incurred. It's no good citing Branson. Times have changed since he made his fortune, every dyslexic has a different spectrum of abilities and difficulties, and he needed his stroke of luck of editing a student magazine at just the time the government removed the retail price regulations on music media (and the mainstream outlets missing their chance to capitalise on that). Just because one made it doesn't mean that the path is available to everyone.
So you have a hammer, and everything is a nail? Laissez-faire is wrong whatever the facts show? Western or not, laissez-faire or not, high incarceration rates seem to correspond (roughly) to high crime rates, so it's hard to argue that incarceration brings crime down. It's easier to argue that bringing crime down reduces incarceration. The incarceration rates are here, and I'd feel safer in some of the countries at the bottom than some of the countries at the top..
I live here so I'm ok with it, but it is a strong accent, isn't it?
One interview I saw last night was with a Scouser (native of Liverpool) and (I think) an Indian and a Pole. The Indian and Pole were much easier to understand than the Scouser -- and I am originally from Liverpool.
Well, I think they're right to be more selective about who they send to prison, because it's an expensive solution that acts as a very efficient training ground for criminals. Yes, our incarceration rate of 150 per 100,000 is tiny compared to the USA's 743, but it's higher than Canada (117), Denmark and Norway (each 71). I don't think I'd hold up the USA as an example of how to achieve a low-crime society.
Yup , 500,000 polish came over here and most of them got jobs that the chavs are too lazy to take.
Most of my work is elsewhere in the EU. What goes around comes around.
Sorry, there are plenty of opportunities but its far easier for some members of society to sit on welfare and whinge. And when they bored whining because everyone got fed up with listening, they cause trouble.
I know some people who prefer to sit on welfare and whinge, so I'm not disputing that they exist. But believe me, if you think there are plenty of opportunities then you have no clue what's happening on the ground. Did I mention that my son is severely dyslexic, so to all intents and purposes he can't read or write? That doesn't stop him doing physical work, except when the employers demand a degree to hand out towels. It's wrong to assume that because the articulate and well educated can usually find something that everybody can, and it's wrong to assume that everybody is able to respond to education.
It's not far off the last one for the areas where the riots are happening. It all depends what population you take.
> fiercely competitive around here Move?
I do have a job, thanks. And he wouldn't be able to afford anywhere to live where employment situation is better.
Nope; cheapest in the area.
I rather think that they are perfectly employable but employers don't employ them because of irrelevant requirements for qualifications.
Mean age you are probably right.
Cox and Box them.
I see this same justification for arson and looting again and again and again and you know what - it's bullshit.
There are always opportunities for anyone who wants to work / learn - but these people can't be bothered to start at the bottom and work there way up - they want it all now.
If only. There are not always opportunities. One old friend of mine has been unemployed for decades. He does a lot of voluntary work, so he's not afraid to work, there's just no paying work out there. And my son can't even get voluntary work because even that is fiercely competitive around here (it looks good on a CV).
it's still a good deal, assuming you study something worthwhile, rather than art history or media studies.
It's still a good deal whatever you study, considering that you need a degree to hand out the towels on the reception desk at the gym I used to belong to.
In fairness, most of those deaths are not suspicious. You'd expect some deaths in police custody just from random natural causes, and when you factor in the fact that people in police custody are more likely than the population at large to be long-term drug or alcohol abusers (and so are likely to have increased mortality) the numbers are not particularly surprising. Yes, some of the deaths are suspicious but only a very small proportion of them. If you read the Guardian article you'll see that only 13 officers have been recommended for prosecution; since they usually work in pairs or teams that means something like 6 cases, not 333. Even if you take in the cases that were suspicious but the CPS couldn't get enough evidence you are still way below the 333 cited.
"Youth" apparently being as old as 46 -- last thing I heard that was the age of the oldest rioter arrested.
He said he might be shouted at or grounded when he returned home but he would "live with that".
If that's the interview I think it is, he actually said that because it would be a first offence he would only get an ASBO but could live with that. He might be in for a surprise, because the magistrates courts that have heard the cases so far have referred many of them up to the crown court, even in the case of guilty pleas, because the crown court can hand out much longer custodial sentences than the magistrates court can.