Any updates? Are things getting better in the UK?
Yep, everything is just about back to normal, for now.
The politicians are playing to the public gallery in respect of various kneejerk demands, which is to be expected, such as:
Baton rounds, rubber bullets, can be used by the police - they were already available to use, but rejected by the police as from the experience of their use in Northern Ireland, they tend to make matters worst.
Water cannon available for mainland police forces at 24-hour notice, we have about 6 in Northern Ireland that can be shipped over, but the police had already made it very clear that they rejected their use in the situations encountered over those 3/4 days in the various cities.
At least the Prime Minister, and indeed the police, have totally ruled out putting troops on the streets - riot control is a matter for the police, who are trained in such matters, and not the army, which are not. Although the PM said consideration would be given to using troops behind the scenes, for example in police stations managing the cells, in order to free up more police for the front-line, should anything like this happen again.
Also the politicians seem to be moving on from headline grabbing nonsense that this was all just about criminality & greed, the PM has gone back to using the buzzwords of 'Broken Britain', that he was using on the run up to last year's general election, but stopped using once he was elected. Sadly, he has not come up with any proposals to repair 'Broken Britain', yet..
I think everyone agrees it was 'criminality'! Saying that we have criminals because of criminality is a meaningless tautology. Criminality is the state of committing crimes so of course, by definition, where we have crime, we have criminality. It explains nothing, it says nothing about the underlying causes and it tells us nothing about how to fix it.
And when it come to 'greed', that certainly is right regarding the looting, which both the politicians and the 'popular press', you know the tabloids - the ones that are currently being investigated for their own criminality, like to focus on.
What they ignore is how all this kicked-off, with running battles with the police, police vehicles being smashed & set on fire together with buses, private cars, shops, offices and even people's homes - none of which financially benefited those carrying-out these actions. The looting, the opportunist 'greed' crime only came after law & order had broken down, as is usual in riots across the world, but it's so much easier to focus on the looting and just dismiss it all as 'criminality'.
The other funny thing is all the ill-informed public ranting about the unemployed 'under-class' - the list of those appearing before the courts include many employed in jobs, mostly minimum wage jobs, but including, for example, a teaching assistant, a graphic designer and several students that had possible bright futures ahead of them, until their court appearance.
THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR WHAT HAPPENED.
However, the 5-10% of the population that are not in any way enfranchised by society are revolting. As the gap between the most and the least widens, as the police, politicians & big business (from the banks to the media) are shown to be incompetent, corrupt and downright oppressive towards this group, and as they seem to slip further and further away from being able to sustain themselves.
The prices for basics are increasing at rates of up to & over 20%, whilst wages, or benefits, are largely frozen - yet they see millionaires being allowed to get richer and richer, politicians on the fiddle, backers pocketing bonuses or pay-offs running into millions, having virtually bankrupted the country - they have little reason to stick to the rules, and it appears it takes just one final spark to 'allow' them to go for it.
Frankly, as someone that is fairly well off and comfortable, I've just about had enough of the mess this country is in - caused by the politicians & super-rich - and how the rest of us are having to pay to clear the mess-up.
http://www.facebook.com/LootersVsPhotoshop
